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Pope Pius XI

Ambrogio Damiano Achille Ratti was almost unknown to the Catholics of Italy, let alone Catholics elsewhere, when as a compromise candidate he was elected to the Chair of St. Peter in February 1922. From, the quiet of the Vatican Library, of which he became Prefect in 1914, he had been sent as Apostolic Visitor (later Papal Nuncio) to war-torn Poland. He had been shepherd of Milan - near which he was born, of peasant stock - for less than a year. He had been appointed Cardinal-Archbishop by Benedict XV over the objections of those who held that Monsignor Ratti was no preacher.

But upon his enthronement, Pius XI revealed himself to a hopeful post-War world as a man of vigorous words and deeds, an often-stubborn taker of no man's advice, a good-humored breaker of precedents. The greatness of Pius XI derived less from his spiritual labors for the Kingdom of God than from his long, uncompromising battle against the pretensions of modern Caesars. Among the 30 encyclicals which Pius XI gave to the world, one of the greatest was Quadragesima Anno, in which he upheld the rights of labor and set forth an ideal Catholic program condemning equally the extremes of unrestrained Capitalism and Communism. Nowhere did the Church attempt to translate this encyclical into political action. And everywhere Pius XI maintained a traditional policy of dealing politically with the States of the world - negotiating concordats wherever possible - upon any terms which recognized the validity of the Church's mission on earth.

After the victory of the Great October Socialist Revolution, which opened a new era in the history of man, the era of Communism, all the reactionary forces, including the Catholic Church, took up arms against the young Soviet Republic. Por example, the Vatican supported the intervention of the Tsarist Poles. Achille Ratti (from 1922 Pope Pius XI), representative of the Vatican in Poland, was the inspirer of this anti-soviet expedition. In 1922, at a conference of the powers in Genoa, the Vatican asked them not to recognize Soviet Russia and not to enter into any relationship with her; in 193O, Pius XI declared a "crusade" against the USSR. For several weeks the Church waged a campaign in its churches, schools, and press against the Bolsheviks and socialism.

Pope Pius XI in his historic "Quadragesimo Anno" pointed out there can be no compromise between Socialism and Christianity. He stated: "Now if these false principles (of Socialism) are modified and to some extent erased from the program, the question arises, or rather is raised without warrant by some, whether the principles of Christian truth cannot perhaps be also modified to some degree and be tempered so as to meet Socialism half-way and, as it were, by a middle course, come to agreement with it. There are some allured by the foolish hope that socialists in this way will be drawn to us. A vain hope!... Whether considered as a doctrine, or an historical fact, or a movement, Socialism if it remains truly Socialism even after it has yielded to truth and justice on the points which we have mentioned, cannot be reconciled with the teachings of the Catholic Church because its concept of society itself is utterly foreign to Christian truth." (Rerum Novarum par. 117)

As Cardinal Ratti, Archbishop of Milan, Pius XI had known and studied Mussolini in that industrial city, and on one occasion had him and a band of his Blackshirts occupy seats of honor in il Duomo, the cathedral in Milan. William Teeling. Irish Catholic author (in his The Pope in Politics, p. 28), who knew Pope Pius XI personally, described him as "far more of a Mussolini and an autocratic dictator than is Mussolini himself." Pierre van Paassen (Days of Our Years. pp. 187-188) tells us of the relief felt by Pope Pius XI after Mussolini's arrival in v Rome: "Monsignor von Gerlach told me in a confidential mood that the night following the Duce's arrival in Rome the Holy Father slept in peace for the first time in many months".

The active collaboration of the Vatican with the Axis powers in the Second World War demonstrated how the Roman Catholic Church maneuvered to achieve her aims. Lewis Mumford in his book, Faith for Living (p. 160), wrote: "Political interpreters have set various dates for the beginning of the Fascist uprising against civilisation; but most of them go back no further than 1931. This is a curious blindness; the betrayal of the Christian world, very plainly, took place in 1929, in the Concordat that was made between Mussolini and the Pope."

It was Pope Pius XI who brought Mussolini and his Fascism to power in Italy. Without protection from someone even higher than the king, Mussolini could not have become dictator of Italy overnight. The Fascist "March on Rome" was a sorry parade (Mussolini went by train); il Duce hadn't even the price of a dress suit for his interview with the King, and the few guns possessed by his followers were hired and paid for by others. A single regiment of the Roman garrison could have quickly wiped out this Fascist mummery. But the recently elected Pope Pius XI, obsessed with the fear of Soviet world revolution, had recognised Mussolini as "a gift of Providence", the man to save Europe from Bolshevism and restore the universal dominion of the Roman Catholic Church.

In 1922, the Vatican helped Mussolini snatch power in his hands. The "people's party," with Gasparri at itshead, began openly to cooperate with the Fascists. In return for that, the Fascist government agreed to reinstate the Papal government which was dissolved in 1870, and also to pay the Pope 1,750 million lira as compensation. In essence, it was an agreement between church and state. Grateful Pius XI told the Italian people that Mussolini was "providence sent."

Pius XI more than any of his predecessors enlarged and intensified that vast program which, combining lay and church activities, was called Catholic Action. Pope Pius XI, in the 1937 encyclical Mit brennender Sorge, addressed to the bishops of Germany, confirmed the "fundamental fact" that every person "possesses rights given by God, which must remain safe against every attempt by the community to deny them, to abolish them, or to prevent their exercise."

Pope Pius XI was the head of the Catholic Church at the time of the Nazi rise to power. Although he stated that the myths of "race" and "blood" were contrary to Christian teaching (in a papal encyclical, March 1937), he neither mentioned nor criticized antisemitism. When Mussolini implemented the anti-Semitic laws in November 1938 over protests from the King and many fascists, Pope Pius XI was quick to denounce the adherence to the "pagan state ideology." Additionally, the Roman Catholic Church was critical of Nazi Germany. In January 1937, Pope Pius XI's had denounced Nazi Germany, equating it with communist Russia in terms of ideology and moral offensiveness.96 Mussolini's actions directly resulted in the Church's criticism.

Pius XI condemned National Socialism, in the encyclical Mit Brennender Sorge [With burning concern] of March 14, 1937: "... in 1933, We consented... to open negotiations for a concordat, which the Reich Government proposed The experiences of these last years have fixed responsibilities and laid bare intrigues, which from the outset only aimed at a war of extermination.... We have done everything in Our power to defend the sacred pledge of the given word of honor against theories and practices, which it officially endorsed, would wreck every faith in treaties and make every signature worthless. Should the day ever come to place before the world the account of Our efforts, every honest mind will see on which side are to be found the promoters of peace, and on which side its disturbers.... anyone must acknowledge, not without surprise and reprobation, how the other contracting party emasculated the terms of the treaty, distorted their meaning, and eventually considered its more or less official violation as a normal policy.

"Whoever exalts race, or the people, or the State, or a particular form of State, or the depositories of power, or any other fundamental value of the human community - however necessary and honorable be their function in worldly things - whoever raises these notions above their standard value and divinizes them to an idolatrous level, distorts and perverts an order of the world planned and created by God; he is far from the true faith in God and from the concept of life which that faith upholds."

Only a remarkably sturdy constitution withstood the series of painful breakdowns which sapped the strength of Pope Pius XI for almost three years. His early love for mountain climbing and his simple manner of living kept him in excellent health until he was well into his seventies. But for three years the sick man of Europe kept devout Catholics, as well as reporters and radio commentators, awake many a night as he spectacularly battled death, which finally overtook in in Februar 1939. The 81-year-old Pontiff might have lived longer, said his physicians, had he not been confined to the Vatican until 1929 when the Lateran Treaty was signed. He remained within the Vatican grounds for seven hot, debilitating summers as a protest against Italian expropriation of papal property. The attitude of Pius XI was one of outspoken opposition to Fascist claims in matters that he considered within the sphere of the Church. His successor displayed a more conciliatory attitude toward the Fascist regime.