Post Bellum

Pope “Saint” Pius X

The posts that are transcribed below (with a few corrections in spellings, etc.) were originally submitted on the Mail on Sunday's journalist Peter Hitchens's blog and formed a brief correspondence between myself and another contributor on that site.

The title of the Peter Hitchens's thread on which these post appeared under was 'Wednesday Night's Debate' (posted at 1:58 PM on [Thursday] 04 November 2010); the title was in reference to the 'Intelligence Squared' Debate that took place in London the previous evening at which Mr Hitchens (along with Lord Carey, the former Archbishop of Canterbury) debated for the proposition that 'Britain is becoming an anti-Christian country'.

In the course of the speech which he gave (and later transcribed to his blog) Mr Hitchens remarks that the prime cause in the decline of the Christian faith in Western Europe, was in his opinion, mainly caused by all the horrors of 'the First World War, [which was] foolishly and wrongly supported by the churches of Europe.'

To which statement the poster below replied (by first quoting Mr Hitchens) with the following:

"This was caused mainly, in my view, by the First World War, foolishly and wrongly supported by the churches of Europe."

Mr Hitchens, I'm not sure which "churches of Europe" you have in mind, but I wonder if this remark is entirely fair.

Nobody did more to try to prevent the Great War from happening than Pope St. Pius X, who died in 1914 - many believe that the effort (combined with the sadness for what he saw unfolding, almost inevitably, before him) brought about his early death.

Pope Benedict XV tried twice to be the intermediary for peace and bring about a speedy end to the war, in 1916 and again in 1917.

The Catholic Church was told by all sides to be quiet and keep out of it, especially in 1917 by 'establishment' (Lloyd George, Clemenceau, Woodrow Wilson...) to mind its own business, stick to 'spiritual stuff', and not be concerned with politics - an idea that is particularly interesting when one considers the same type of people later complaining loudly and unreasonably that Pope Pius XII did not do enough in the Second World War to fight the Nazis...

Posted by: G. Sarto 04 November 2010 at 10:56 PM

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To which I began with the following reply:

G. Sarto 04 November 2010 at 10:56 PM, writes:

“Nobody did more to try to prevent the Great War from happening than Pope St. Pius X, who died in 1914 - many believe that the effort (combined with the sadness for what he saw unfolding, almost inevitably, before him) brought about his early death.”

Concerning the claim that Pius X died of 'a broken heart' soon after the outbreak of war:

That this is the official 'version' can be adduced from the following, which is written in the Concise Holy History used in parochial catechisms:

“Pius X did all he could to prevent the war of 1914 and died of grief when he foresaw the evils it was about to unleash.”

The Italian diplomat and anti-Fascist politician Count Carlo Sforza (1872-1952), the former Minister of Foreign Affairs of the Kingdom of Italy, in a chapter on “The Origins of the [First World] War”, in his Contemporary Italy: Its Intellectual and Moral Origins (published USA 1944/GB 1946) calls the rumour of Pius X succumbing to grief at his “impotence to advert the disaster” of the war, as: “A legend more tenacious than history”. And then to, “establish the truth as to that legend”, he quotes extensively from one of the many official letters deposited in the diplomatic correspondence of the Austro-Hungarian Embassy – correspondence that he himself had seen.

As he writes concerning these correspondences: “They reveal that the Vatican saw with satisfaction, at least at the outset, an undertaking in which the crushing of Serbia would entail a diminution of the influence of Russia. . . . In these conversations the Secretary of State [Cardinal Merry del Val] spoke expressly in the name of the Pope . . .”

The relevant portion of Count Sforza's chapter – which quotes at length from a dipatch of July 29 1914 from Count Palffy, the Austrian Chargé d' Affaires at the Vatican to Count Berchtold – can be found by clicking on my name below [which linked to my previous posting on the World War Armageddon blog entitled, 'Count Sforza, Pius X and 1914'].

The quote below is from another diplomatic dispatch – this one being that from Baron von Ritter, the Chargé d' Affaires of Bavaria at the Holy See – and was written to his Government on 26 July 1914:

“The Pope [Pius X] approves of Austria's harsh treatment of Serbia. He has no great opinion of the armies of Russia and France in the event of a war against Germany. The Cardinal Secretary of State does not see when Austria could make war if she does not decide to do so now.”

(Source: Bayerische Dokumente zum Kriegsausbruch [Bavarian Documents on the Outbreak of War] III, p. 206; as cited in The Vatican Against Europe, by Edmond Paris; The Wickliffe Press [Protestant Truth Society] edition, 1993; p. 47).

Posted by: B Hughes 06 November 2010 at 03:45 AM

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Mr Hughes,

You can quote "anti-fascist" authors all you wish. The fact remains that Pope St. Pius X did everything he could to avert war in the run-up to 1914.

Similarly the fact remains that Benedict XV twice offered to be an intermediary for peace, and was turned down by the allies.

That is a matter of historical record.

Nor was Pope St. Pius X partisan, and quoting a Bavarian Count, cited in a 'Protestant Truth Society' pamphlet, proves nothing.

The normal thing would have been for the Pope to give his blessing to the Austrian armies going off to war - they were,after all, the Holy Roman Empire, so to speak. The fact that the Pope refused to do so (and was very forceful in telling them why!) ought to speak for itself.

Posted by: G. Sarto 06 November 2010 at 05:20 PM

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From G. Sarto's post of 06 November 2010 at 05:20 PM:

'Mr Hughes, You can quote “anti-fascist” authors all you wish.'

The “anti-fascist” author in question was Count Carlo Sforza; to quote him further from the same work – he writes:

'While all diplomatic Europe kept on repeating, “This Lenin cannot last”, the Pope asked me through [Baron] Monti – but under the seal of secrecy – would I if necessary, be able to facilitate the trip of some Catholic priests to Russia. Seeing my surprise, Monti explained (and it was evident that he was repeating the very words of the Pope) : “His Holiness thinks that even these crimes and this blood will one day be of service if it is going to be possible, when the wave of irreligion has passed, to attempt a Catholic evangelization in Russia. Orthodoxy no longer has any deep-rooted life; its end as the official religion offers possibilities which would never have existed so long as a Tsar, 'Protector of the Church', continued to reign.” It was simple and it was true; but courage was required to express it at the Vatican in 1920. I promised my support in whatever form it might be able to take ...' (p. 169).

And Count Sforza writes that while he had been High Commissioner in Turkey (before his return to Rome – after accepting the post of Under-Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs) that he had had:

'[C]onversations ... at Constantinople with Cardinal Bourne, Archbishop of Westminster, [on the “Roman question”, which] had prepared me to suppose that the problem was almost on the point of being considered. Having arrived at Constantinople on his way from Jerusalem, the Cardinal had been kind enough to visit me at the Italian Embassy and to thank me for the courtesy with which the Italian Government agents had facilitated his sojourn in the Holy Land. Speaking of his pleasure at observing the excellent relations existing everywhere between Italian agents and the Franciscan missions, he told me that he saw in them the proof that the time was ripe for a conciliation [between the Vatican and the Italian Government]. [And in this matter] I could not but agree with him ...' (pp. 276-277).

It is obvious from the above that though Count Sforza was an “anti-Fascist”; he was not necessarily “anti-Catholic”. By all means, if you wish, discount Baron von Ritter's dispatch from the Bayerische Dokumente zum Kriegsausbruch (as cited in the work later published by the Protestant Truth Society). But can you discount Count Sforza's testimony – in which he cites from official documents held within the diplomatic correspondence of the Austro-Hungarian Embassy – correspondence that he himself had seen?

If you have not already done so, I suggest that you read Count Sforza's testimony as to the true opinion of Pope “Saint” Pius X – by clicking on my name below. If you do not wish to reappraise what you've undoubtedly been taught – then that is up to you ...

Posted by: B Hughes 07 November 2010 at 06:10 PM

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Envoi

Pope Pius X was undoubtedly a 'pretended' friend of peace. . . But was he also a pretended friend of Christ . . . ? Or much more besides . . . ? In the words of the Rev. Alexander Robertson, D.D.; words he wrote five years before the outbreak of the War:

'[O]ne feels that it is impiety or culpable ignorance to talk, as so many do, of the Pope being the Vicar of the Prince of Peace, and of the Roman Catholic Church as having a mission of peace and of goodwill to mankind. He [the Pope] is, on the contrary, the Vicar of Christ's Adversary [Satan], [who is] “The Prince of this World”; [John xii. 31, xiv. 30.] he [the Pope] is the “Beast” of the Revelation, to whom the “Dragon” [Satan] gave “his power, and his seat, and great authority . . . to make war with the saints.” [Rev. xiii. 2, 7.]'

The Papal Conquest (1909), p. 316.