Vatican Secret Diplomacy
Subtitle: Joseph P. Hurley and Pope Pius XII
Publisher: Yale University Press
Published: June 28, 2008
Language: eng
Format: Hardcover
Number of pages: 304
ISBN-13: 9780300121346
Subjects: Biography: general; Diplomacy; European history: Second World War; History - General History; History: World; Europe; History; Modern - 20th Century; Religious; Religion / History; General; 1876-1958; Catholic Church; Hurley, Joseph P; Pius; Pope,; Religious aspects; World War, 1939-1945; XII,
Description: "In the corridors of the Vatican on the eve of World War II, American Catholic priest Joseph Patrick Hurley found himself in the midst of secret diplomatic dealings and intense debate. Hurley's deeply felt American patriotism and fixed ideas about confronting Nazism directly led to a mighty clash with Pope Pius XII. It was 1939,the earliest days of Pius's papacy, and controversy within the Vatican over policy toward Nazi Germany was already heated. This groundbreaking book is both a biography of Joseph Hurley, the first American to achieve the rank of nuncio, or Vatican ambassador, and an insider's view of the alleged silence of the pope on the Holocaust and Nazism. Drawing on Hurley's unpublished archives, the book documents critical debates in Pope Pius's Vatican, secret U.S. Vatican dealings, the influence of Detroit's flamboyant antisemitic priest Charles E. Coughlin, and the controversial case of Croatia's Cardinal Stepinac. The book also sheds light on the powerful connections between religion and politics in the twentieth century."--BOOK JACKET.