Pope Pius XII

Who was Pope Pius XII?

Pope Pius XII, born Eugenio Maria Giuseppe Giovanni Pacelli, was the head of the Roman Catholic Church from 2 March 1939 to his death in 1958. He is the most recent pope to take the pontifical name of "Pius" upon his election. His pontificate coincided with the Second World War and the commencement of the Cold War.

Before his election to the papacy, Pacelli served as secretary of the Department of Extraordinary Ecclesiastical Affairs, papal nuncio to Germany, and Cardinal Secretary of State, in which capacity he worked to conclude treaties with European and Latin American nations, most notably the Reichskonkordat with Nazi Germany, with which the Vatican sought to protect the Church in Germany and Adolf Hitler sought the destruction of 'political Catholicism'. A pre-war critic of Nazism, Pius XII lobbied world leaders to avoid war and, as Pope at the outbreak of war, issued Summi Pontificatus, expressing dismay at the invasion of Poland, reiterating church teaching against racism and calling for love, compassion and charity to prevail over war.

While the Vatican was officially neutral during the war, Pius XII maintained links to the German Resistance, used diplomacy to aid the victims of the war and lobby for peace and spoke out against race based murders and other atrocities. The concordat of 1933, and Pius' leadership of the Catholic Church during World War II—including allegations of silence in public about the fate of the Jews—remain the subject of controversy.