Italian MP: Church did not help Jews in Fascist era
Gianfranco Fini, Italian lawmaker and former Fascist, says Italian nation and Catholic Church embraced anti-Jewish legislation during Mussolini's rule
One of Italy's most prominent conservative leaders said on Tuesday the Roman Catholic Church did not do enough to oppose Fascist-era race laws under dictator Benito Mussolini.
"We must ask ourselves why Italian society wholly embraced the anti-Jewish legislation and why, beyond laudable exceptions, there were not demonstrations of real resistance. Not even, it hurts me to say, by the Catholic Church," said Gianfranco Fini.
Fini, himself a former Fascist, was speaking at an event marking the 70th anniversary of Mussolini's race laws.
Introduced in 1938, the laws expelled Jews from public schools and offices and eventually led to the deportation of thousands to Nazi concentration camps.
Vatican Radio quickly responded with accounts by Catholic historians denying Fini's accusations, which reignited debate in Italy about the Church's wartime record.
"It is not true that the Italian Church did not oppose the race laws of 1938," Vatican Radio wrote on its website.
Church scholars say Pope Pius XI opposed the race laws at the time and they also defend his successor, Pius XII, from accusations he turned a blind eye to the Holocaust.
"I can't see any reason to accuse the Church, which instead openly and firmly condemned the anti-Jewish legislation," said professor Agostino Giovagnoli at Catholic University.
He added that Pius XI, who died in 1939, gave public speeches against the race laws that "led in July 1938 to an open conflict with Mussolini".
Jewish groups are lobbying the Vatican to freeze the sainthood process for Pius XII, but Vatican officials say he worked silently behind the scenes and helped save many Jews.
Fini convinced his own party in the mid-1990s to dump neo-fascism and enter the mainstream of Italian politics. He has also visited Israel and the death camp at Auschwitz.
