''Under His Very Windows: The Vatican and the Holocaust in Italy'' (2000,
Yale University Press
Yale University Press is the university press of Yale University. It was founded in 1908 by George Parmly Day and Clarence Day, grandsons of Benjamin Day, and became a department of Yale University in 1961, but it remains financially and ope ...
) is a book by
Susan Zuccotti
Susan Sessions Zuccotti (born November 14, 1940) is an American historian, specializing in studies of the Holocaust. She holds a PhD in Modern European History from Columbia University. She has won a National Jewish Book Award for Holocaust Studie ...
which examines the role of the
Catholic Church
The Catholic Church (), also known as the Roman Catholic Church, is the List of Christian denominations by number of members, largest Christian church, with 1.27 to 1.41 billion baptized Catholics Catholic Church by country, worldwid ...
Holocaust
The Holocaust (), known in Hebrew language, Hebrew as the (), was the genocide of History of the Jews in Europe, European Jews during World War II. From 1941 to 1945, Nazi Germany and Collaboration with Nazi Germany and Fascist Italy ...
Vatican
Vatican may refer to:
Geography
* Vatican City, an independent city-state surrounded by Rome, Italy
* Vatican Hill, in Rome, namesake of Vatican City
* Ager Vaticanus, an alluvial plain in Rome
* Vatican, an unincorporated community in the ...
and Popes
Pius XI
Pope Pius XI (; born Ambrogio Damiano Achille Ratti, ; 31 May 1857 – 10 February 1939) was head of the Catholic Church from 6 February 1922 until his death in February 1939. He was also the first sovereign of the Vatican City State u ...
and
Pius XII
Pope Pius XII (; born Eugenio Maria Giuseppe Giovanni Pacelli; 2 March 18769 October 1958) was the head of the Catholic Church and sovereign of the Vatican City State from 2 March 1939 until his death on 9 October 1958. He is the most recent p ...
in Italy from 1938 and on to the Second World War, accusing the Popes of silence and characterising the actions the Vatican took to assist Jews as having been reprehensible. Zuccotti dismisses claims that Pope Pius was personally responsible for saving hundreds of thousands of Jews and argues that whatever help was given by the Church resulted from the personal courage of individual priests, monks and nuns, and prelates, rather than on direction from the Vatican.
The book contains a number of chapters dealing with aid provided by Catholics to Italy's Jews, but concludes that these acts were performed spontaneously. Zuccotti writes that Catholics who aided Jews, "invariably believed that they were acting according to the Pope’s will" but that there is no written evidence confirming that this was the case.
Critical reception
According to a ''
New York Times
''The New York Times'' (''NYT'') is an American daily newspaper based in New York City. ''The New York Times'' covers domestic, national, and international news, and publishes opinion pieces, investigative reports, and reviews. As one of ...
'' book review by Christopher Duggan of
Reading University
The University of Reading is a public research university in Reading, Berkshire, England. It was founded in 1892 as the University Extension College, Reading, an extension college of Christchurch College, Oxford, and became University College, ...
, the book is well researched, though Zuccotti follows the anti-
Pius XII
Pope Pius XII (; born Eugenio Maria Giuseppe Giovanni Pacelli; 2 March 18769 October 1958) was the head of the Catholic Church and sovereign of the Vatican City State from 2 March 1939 until his death on 9 October 1958. He is the most recent p ...
tone of '' Hitler's Pope'' by John Cornwell, and builds a case for the Pope having been anti-Semitic at heart – a view which, according to Duggan, available evidence "does not warrant".
Ronald J. Rychlak, author of '' Hitler, the War, and the Pope'' (Genesis) describes the book as controversial for conceding that the church provided aid to Jews and other refugees in Italy, but giving no credit to Pius XII for this, on the basis that she could find no written evidence to confirm his involvement.
In his review in ''
The Tablet
''The Tablet'' is a Catholic Church, Catholic international weekly review published in London. Brendan Walsh, previously literary editor and then acting editor, was appointed editor in July 2017.
History
''The Tablet'' was launched in 1840 by ...
'', historian
Owen Chadwick
William Owen Chadwick (20 May 1916 – 17 July 2015) was a British Anglican priest, academic, rugby international,ucottithinks that the Pope could have informed church leaders that he would look favourably on help to the Jewish fugitives, and could have warned the Germans that he would protest forcibly and publicly at any deportations of Jews from Rome. All this is not history but guesswork, and one or two guesses have a more than minuscule improbability. "Faced with the certainty of papal condemnation, the Germans might possibly have postponed anti-Jewish actions in Italy", she suggests. Imagination boggles at what would have been said when such a message from the Pope was read at Hitler's headquarters, if it ever reached that height and if anyone round the table bothered to do more than laugh. Anyone who thinks otherwise should read the devastatingly uncompromising speech which Himmler made to SS leaders at Posen on a vital date for Italy, the beginning of October 1943."
Awards
In 2000, the book won the
National Jewish Book Award
The Jewish Book Council (Hebrew: ), founded in 1943, is an American organization encouraging and contributing to Jewish literature. The goal of the council, as stated on its website, is "to promote the reading, writing and publishing of qual ...
, in the category of Jewish–Christian Relations, and in 2002, the Sybil Halpern Milton Prize presented by the
German Studies Association
The German Studies Association (GSA) is an international organization of scholars in history, literature, economics, cultural studies, and political science who study Germany, Austria, and Switzerland. The organization began in 1976 as the Wester ...
.
See also
*
Pope Pius XII and the Holocaust
The pope is the bishop of Rome and the visible head of the worldwide Catholic Church. He is also known as the supreme pontiff, Roman pontiff, or sovereign pontiff. From the 8th century until 1870, the pope was the sovereign or head of st ...