Holocaust Scholars Write to the Vatican (review)

142 SHOFAR Fall 2000 Vol. 19, No.1 Holocaust Scholars Write to the Vatican, edited by Harry James Cargas. Contributions to the Study ofReligion, #58: Christianity and the Holocaust-Core Issues, edited by John K. Roth and Carol Rittner. Westport, CT: Greenwood, 1998. 156 pp. $49.95. Throughout his life the late Harry James Cargas, whose interests ranged from sports to .literature to the Holocaust, continually raised provocative questions about the Catholic Church's record during the Nazi era. This most recent and last book, brought to completion by friends and family after his untimely death in August 1998, is an attempt to have leading Christians and Jewish Holocaust scholars address the Vatican in the form ofletters. Included in the collection are contributions by the likes ofNechama Tec, Richard Libowitz, Zev Garber, SusanNowak, Franklin Littell, Abraham Peck, Emanuel Taney, Marilyn Nefsky, Pierre Sauvage, Leon Weliczker Wells, Hubert G. Locke, Judith H. Banki, and John Roth. Eugene Fisher and Cargas himself provide introductions . Several ofthe contributions (e.g., Banki, Nefsky, and Sauvage) are actually in letter form. Others are far more in the form ofstandard essays. Some are more judgmental in tone (e.g., Nefsky, Garber, and Nowak). Others attempt to strike a more balanced tone (e.g., Roth, Banki, and Locke). Overall the book provides no new scholarly assessment ofthe Vatican's role during the Nazi era. In spots the analysis is rather simplistic, in part because of the brevity of the essays. In one case (Weliczker Wells) the chapter consists ofa mere five pages. This is much more ofa "What's on my mind and in my heart" book than a scholarly study. A number of contributors include personal Holocaust-era experiences. In that regard several of the essays succeed quite well. I would particularly single out the essays of Sauvage, Banki, and Roth. Roth in particular provides a moving meditation on the music ofthe papal concert in remembrance of the victims of the Holocaust held at the Vatican on April 7, 1994, in the presence of more than 7,000 people. The overarching theme of the book is the call for candid acknowledgment by the Vatican of the failures of Catholics in the face of the Nazi onslaught coupled with a serious commitment to repentance. I would have little disagreement in general with such a call. All churches must own up to their failures during the period ifthey hope to retain their moral integrity. But such recognition offailure ought to be based on sound and comprehensive analysis. Mea culpas not rooted in sound scholarship do us little good. Confessions of guilt by Christians in response to broadsided indictments fail to help us understand what actually went wrong in the responses ofthe churches and most importantly why. There are glimmers ofsuch insight in this volume, but the reader will have to go to far more comprehensive studies by scholars such as Michael Marrus and John Morley to obtain the fuller picture required for authentic repentance. The volume also raises the issue ofopening up the Vatican archives from the Nazi period. Not a new request to be sure, but one that continues to be very important. Most significantperhaps is Eugene Fisher's embrace ofthis call as the U.S. Catholic Bishops' pointperson for Catholic-Jewish relations. Fisher's support of this request in his intro- Book Reviews 143 duction to the volume is rooted in an earlier call along these lines by the late Cardinal Joseph Bernardin ofChicago at an International Vatican-Jewish meeting in Baltimore. Comments are in order with respect to the essays by Nechama Tec and Susan Nowak. I have greatly admired Tec's scholarly contributions to the study of rescuers, especially Polish rescuers, during the Holocaust. But her contribution to this volume is disappointing, even disturbing, in parts. She paints an extensive portrait of Polish antisemitism that simply lacks the necessary nuancing and does not reflect the in-depth studies of the question which have appeared in the many volumes of the annual Polin in particular. Without question there was antisemitism in Poland and it was especially virulent in religio-nationalistic circles in the immediate pre-war period. But that is hardly the whole story of...