In the latest issue of the New Yorker, Timothy Ryback examines the little known story of Joseph Ratzinger’s visit to La Cambe, to commemorate the sixtieth anniversary of the D-Day invasion in 2004. La Cambe is a German cemetery in France where more than 20,000 soldiers are buried, including many members of an SS panzer division. Ryback notes that the visit is reminiscent of President Ronald Reagan’s visit in 1985 to a German cemetery near Bitburg, which was denounced by Elie Wiesel and others. The visit of the pope (as he will be referred to in this article) and the effort of German Catholics to deal with Germany’s past, are explored by Ryback.

The pope’s membership in the Hitler Youth when he was a young man became an issue upon his elevation to the papacy. Ryback observes, however, that the pope was enrolled in the group, which may mean that his membership was involuntary. But Ryback argues that the pope was reluctant to reflect critically on his own past (unlike many post-war Germans). This received little media attention, he notes.

Before he became pope, Benedict served in many capacities. Ryback takes particular interest in his service as archbishop of Munich. Ryback mentions that the Dachau concentration camp was located near Munich and that some people criticized the pope for not visiting the site often while archbishop. However supporters note that the pope was only archbishop for five years, during which there were no notable anniversaries or events that might have warranted a major visit.

The pope's journey to La Cambe has received virtually no press. A search of Google and other sources turned up no transcripts of his remarks (in English, at least). Ryback's account is the only one we could find--and it's not posted on the Internet.

It is not just the pope's visit to the cemetery that is noteworthy. So are his remarks. Uncontroversially he observed that “As Germans, we cannot help but be painfully moved to realize that their idealism and their obedience to the state were misused by an unjust government.” But taking note of the concept known as Pflicht, a blind and unquestioning obedience to duty, he indicated that this German trait was exploited for evil purposes by the Nazis.

But the pope made no mention of the SS during his visit. And he charged that France and the Allies were in part to blame for World War II because they had imposed a harsh peace on Germany in World War I. The pope leveled the charge that the Treaty of Versailles humiliated Germany and burdened the country with such high debts that many people became vulnerable to radical messages. The pope also argued that the Germans were doubly victimized, first by the humiliation at the hands of the French, and then by the Nazis. The pope praised the efforts of the Americans in rebuilding Germany and credited them with creating a new environment in which a healthy Germany could develop, preventing a repeat of the mistakes of World War I.

Ryback's main focus is not the pope but the relationship between the Vatican and the Nazi state. Ryback mentions the Reichskonkordat signed by Hitler and the Vatican, which called for Roman Catholic archbishops to swear allegiance to the state. In fact, the pope took the same oath when he assumed the archbishopric of Munich in 1977. Ryback notes that Catholic priests, like Archbishop of Munich Michael von Faulhaber suffered under the Nazis when they tried to resist. Many were sent to Dachau. For instance, when Faulhaber met with Hitler to discuss his opposition to Nazi values, Hitler raised his voice, alluding to the “Church’s war” against the Nazis (for which the archbishop would find himself in Dachau along with other clergy). In fact, the pope, in a statement issued on the fortieth anniversary of Kristallnacht in 1978, noted the suffering of the Jews, but also alluded to the Nazis’ war on the Catholic Church. He remembered that Cardinal Faulhaber had faced mobs who cried “Send him to Dachau!” and “Arrest the traitor!” The pope in later years described the Holocaust as a “preliminary step” to the eradication of Christianity. In addition, the pope drew attention to the plight of the Sudeten Germans, those Germans who lived in the Sudetenland of Czechoslovakia prior to the Third Reich, and who were expelled during the post-war period to Bavaria and other places.

Martin Marty, a Lutheran pastor and teacher at the University of Chicago, argues that the visit to the German cemetery was “a pretext to honor German soldiers, especially members of the Waffen S.S., by saying that they were 'simply following orders,' and leaving it to God to do the rest.” Marty, quoted by Ryback, says he accepts the view that German women, children, and even a then sixteen-year-old Ratzinger were victims, but not those who “voluntarily, even 'gleefully' participated in the crimes of the Nazis.” But a consensus on the subject has not been achieved. Cardinal Avery Dulles argues that those who acted wrongly still need to be prayed for, “especially if they are in a mixed cemetery that is not reserved for S.S. soldiers.” Dulles also insists that one can still pray that those who committed wrong acts could subsequently find repentance and forgiveness, and that “The Gospel says you love everybody and hate nobody. You pray for your enemies and those who persecute you. Jesus said that if your enemy sins against you seven times and asks for pardon, you give him pardon.”

Siegfried Wiedenhofer, one of the pope's former students, while noting that the pope’s comments at La Cambe “left something to be desired,” cautioned against misrepresenting his intentions. The pope “wouldn’t deny that the German people have had a particular responsibility for what Hitler did, and that all Germans have a particular responsibility to learn from their history,” Wiedenhofer observed. And the pope was not attempting to absolve the SS men of their sins. Rather, he wanted to “show understanding to those simple soldiers.” When questioned about how the pope would answer the question of whether or not an SS man can be forgiven, Wiedenhofer replied, “I think he would say, ‘You cannot exclude salvation. You cannot exclude it, because you are not in the position of God. In the Catholic Church, all you can say, regarding their salvation or their damnation, is that you cannot do that which belongs only to the authority of God himself.’” But he conceded that to avoid misunderstandings the pope should have mentioned that the soldiers had different levels of responsibility for what had happened.