I don’t believe it is possible to fully understand how the church softened the rule of monarchy and the atrocities of the Nazis. It seems too easy to throw rocks at her. That’s just human nature.My intent was not to dump on the Catholic church as being the only persecutor of Jews in Europe. In fact, Martin Luther split from the Catholic Church and was rabidly anti-Semitic.Wow it seems to be a given that I should just accept the conclusion that the Catholic Church is responsible for antisemitism and the Holocaust without any supporting facts.
Catholic Church and Judaism - Wikipedia
But to ignore the role that the Catholic Church played in anti-Semitism is disingenuous, even though you bring up instances where those in the Catholic church have tried to curb anti-Semitism. For example:
1. In 325 AD the Council of Nicea decided to separate the celebration of Easter from the Jewish Passover saying, "For it is unbecoming beyond measure that on this holiest of festivals we should follow the customs of the Jews. Henceforth, let us have nothing in common with this odious people."
2. In 327 Christian Emperor Constantius created a law which made the marriage of a Jewish man to a Christian punishable by death.
3. In 367 St. Hilary of Poiteiers referred to Jews as a perverse people who God has cursed forever. Saint Ephroem referred to synagogues as brothels.
4. In 380 the Bishop of Milan was responsible for the burning of a synagogue, he referred to it as an act of pleasing God.
5. In 415 the Bishop of Alexandria, Saint Cyril, expelled the Jews form an entire city.
6. In 561 the Bishop of Uzes expelled the Jews from his diocese in France.
7. In 613 Jews were given the choice of converting to Christianity or being expelled entirely from Spain. Jewish children over 6 years of age were taken from their parents and raised as Christians.
8. In 855 Jews were exiled from Italy.
9. In 1096 Crusaders passed through Europe to the Holy Land and along the way challenged Jews yelling, "Christ killers, embrace the cross or die!". About 12,000 Jews were murdered. Then when they got to the Holy Land in 1099 they forced all the Jews they could find into a central synagogue and lit it on fire.
10. In 1121 Jews were expelled from Flanders, what is now Belgium.
11. In 1146 the Second Crusade begun as the French monk Rudolf called for the destruction of the Jews.
12. In 1180 French King Phillip Augustus expelled Jews from France, but not before seizing all their wealth and keeping it for himself.
13. In 1205 Pope Innocent 111 srote to the archbishops of Sens and Paris that "the Jews, by their own guilt, are consigned to perpetual servitude because they crucified the Lord."
14. In 1227 the Synod of Narbonne required Jews to wear an oval badge. This requirement was later reinstated by Hitler.
15. In 1229 the Spanish Inquisition starts to flush out Jews as Pope Innocent lV later authorizes the use of torture by Inquisitors.
16. In 1267 the Synod of Vienna ordered Jews to wear horned hats.
17. In 1290 Jews were expelled from England.
18. In 1298 Jews were persecuted in Austria, Bavaria, and France as about 100,000 Jews were murdered in a 6 month period.
19 .In 1394 Jews were exiled a second time from France.
20. In 1497 Jews were banished from Portugal.
21. In 1516 the Governor of Venice decided that Jews would be permitted to live in a ghetto area known as the "Ghetto Novo". This was the first Jewish ghetto in Europe.
22. In 1555 the Roman Catholic Papal bull, "Cum nimis absurdum", required Jews to wear badges, and live in ghettos. They were also not allowed to own property. Woman had to wear a yellow scarf, men had to wear a piece of yellow cloth on their hat to help identify them.
But as I read past the life of Martin Luther, a time when the Guttenberg press had given the average person the written word of God to read for themselves, these Catholic atrocities waned considerably. The state then moved in as the Catholic church waned in political power in Europe.
1. In 1648 Chmielnicki Bogdan led an uprising against the Polish rule in the Ukraine. The second goal was to kill Jews as about 100,000 Jews were slaughtered.
2. In 1905 the Okhrana, the Russian secret police, created a document called the "Protocols of the Learned Elders of Zion", which is used to persecute Jews to this very day. This later incited violence against Jews in 1915 and 1917 in the region that cost about 300,000 Jewish lives.
Then Hitler finished if all off with the anti-Semitic climax of European oppression of the Jew.
Naturally, there is far more here than I listed and by no means a comprehensive list.
My whole interpretation of these facts is that the state is to blame, and since the Catholic church for a time took on the role of the state, they engaged in such behavior. Once the Catholic church became more of a religious institution in the 1940's than a political one, they secretly opposed the Holocaust. Notice though that I said secretly, because had they come out publicly against the Holocaust, they all would have wound up like Bonhoeffer with their precious treasures in the Vatican to be looted. They were not willing to give up their lives to make such a righteous stand nor willing to give up their treasures like the prophets and apostles and early church had willingly done before them.
And this sort of thing still goes on today in the Catholic church. They still have their little world city that engages in politics, albeit not to the same extent as it once did, thank God. The same reason that the Catholic church was afraid to speak out publicly against the Holocaust is the same reason a Left wing Pope get up their today to preach about the evils of building walls (Orange man bad don't ya know just like Hitler) instead of addressing the church identified Holocaust of abortion today. Much to their shame. They are more tuned into pleasing the Left wing world powers that seem to rule the world to help increase their own worldly influence in it than focusing on brining the kingdom of God to the world.
But am I condemning all Catholics? No, but to ignore these facts, such as the Pope ignoring the pedophile problem in the church and continuing to play politics, is why the church continues to wane in importance and influence spiritually in the world today.
IF God was willing to burn his temple in Jerusalem because of apostasy he certainly will have no qualms about doing the same to the Vatican.