Th e Concordat of 1933 enabled the church to justify helping converted Jews, since it specifi cally states that
Jews who converted will be considered Christians. For this reason, the Vatican protected its neutrality and
intentionally used these phrases in case their documents fell into Nazi hands.
Th roughout this book, in many instances, you will read the phrase “non-Aryans,” “Converted Catholics,”
“Converted Jews,” “Converted Italians,” and so on. On the face of this, one might conclude the Holy See’s
eff orts were only to save baptized Jews. Th is argument has been used for decades by the critics of Pope Pius
XII. Th e reality of war and that of the political and legal status of the Vatican suggests otherwise.
Th e Vatican: German concordat signed in 1933 contained a clause dealing with intermarriage, which enabled
the church to recognize Jews who had converted to be considered Christians. To the church, anyone who is
baptized a Catholic is a Catholic. Using the concordat, the church could legally protect these “Jews” while
protecting the church from risking its neutrality if these documents fell into enemy hands. Th e Holy See was
well aware that many of those who worked in the Vatican were spies. Obviously, all documents that might
be deemed “helping the enemy” had to be encrypted and destroyed in order to protect the church. A loss of
neutrality would result in massive direct attacks against church facilities, including those that protected Jews
throughout Europe.
In a true Catholic conversion, the convert is required by canon law to be of a minimum age of awareness.
Second, they must undergo several months of religious training. Once completed, the next step is that of
baptism, and the new Catholic chooses a new name and usually has a godparent. A certifi cate of baptism is
then issued. In spite of these strict regulations and laws, the Vatican issued thousands of false baptismal to
simply save as many innocent lives as possible.
In the history of the Catholic Church, no one has ever been referred to as a “Jewish Catholic” or a “Non-
Aryan Catholic” or a “converted Jew.” Once baptized, they are simply Catholics. Another interesting note is
that by decree, Pius XII ordered that any Jewish children protected by Catholics could not be baptized while
they were under the protection of someone other than their parents. Th ere were in fact many instances where
these children were taught Hebrew and Jewish traditions by their Catholic caretakers.
When inquiries were made to various countries through the Vatican diplomatic service, the question “How
many Jews can your country take?” was always asked. Most of the countries worldwide said none. Th e prime
minister of Canada even said, “None are too many.”
Mindful of this, the only way Pope Pius XII could save what he called “this vibrant community” was to
mislead the host countries. He handed out tens of thousands of false baptismal papers. He referred to the
people as “Non-Aryan Catholic Jews.” Morally he would not lie, but by doing this, he would accomplish his
objective. Had these refugees actually been converted and baptized, they would simply have been Catholics,
and the Pope would not have used these unusual phases to describe them. Th is descriptive phrase has never
been used in Vatican correspondence or language before or since.
We discovered 2,335 pages of wartime documents in Campagna, Italy. From that collection, below is an
example of letters from Signore Steiner and Dr. Silberstein who were referred to as “non-Aryans” when they
requested Vatican intercession to obtain visas to travel to South America.
Source: Pope Pius XII and World War II: The Documented Truth