Education Alois Hudal, the son of a shoemaker, was born on 31 May 1885 in
Graz,
Austria, and studied theology there from 1904 to 1908. He was
ordained to the
priesthood in July 1908. Hudal became a specialist on the liturgy, doctrine and spirituality of the Slavic-speaking
Eastern Orthodox Churches while a parish priest in
Kindberg. In 1911, he earned a
Doctor of Sacred Theology degree at the
University of Graz. He entered the
Teutonic College of Santa Maria dell'Anima in Rome, where he was a chaplain from 1911 to 1913 and attended courses in Old Testament at the
Pontifical Biblical Institute. He earned his
Doctor of Sacred Scripture degree with a dissertation on ("The Religious and Moral Ideas of the Book of Proverbs"), published in 1914. He joined the faculty for Old Testament studies at the
University of Graz in 1914. During the
First World War, he was a military chaplain. In 1917, he published a book of his sermons to the soldiers,
Soldatenpredigten, in which he expressed the idea that "loyalty to the flag is loyalty to God", though also warning against "national chauvinism". In 1923, he was named rector of the
Collegio Teutonico di Santa Maria dell'Anima (known simply as "Anima") in Rome, a theological seminary for German and Austrian priests. In 1930, he was appointed a consultant to the
Holy Office by Cardinal
Rafael Merry del Val, its prefect.
Early activities Ludwig von Pastor, an Austrian diplomat, introduced Hudal to
Pope Pius XI in 1922, and recommended Hudal's study of the
Serbo-Croatian National Church to him. On 5 February 1923, he recommended Hudal for a position at the Anima, mainly because he was Austrian. Von Pastor was concerned that Austria, which had just lost World War I and with it much influence, would lose the Anima to a German,
Dutch or
Belgian candidate. The pope agreed to name Hudal later that month. Hudal became the public face of advocacy for Austria, the Austrian bishops' conference, and Austrian prestige in the Vatican, as German groups attempted to reestablish their influence at the Anima. Pope Pius XI supported Hudal, though he rejected requests to make Hudal responsible for pastoral care of the German community. In 1924, Hudal, in a Vatican ceremony in the presence of
Pope Pius XI, Cardinal Secretary of State
Pietro Gasparri and numerous cardinals, delivered a speech in praise of von Pastor to mark the 40th anniversary of the publication of Pastor's
History of the Popes From the Close of the Middle Ages. In June 1933, Hudal was consecrated
titular bishop of
Aela by
Cardinal Eugenio Pacelli (future Pius XII), who had succeeded Merry del Val as the cardinal protector of the German national church at Rome. In April 1938, Hudal helped organise a vote of German and Austrian clerics at the German college of Santa Maria dell'Anima on the question of the German annexation of Austria (
Anschluss). The vote took place on the German heavy cruiser
Admiral Scheer, anchored in the Italian harbour of
Gaeta. More than 90% voted against the
Anschluss, an outcome partisans of German expansion named the "Shame of Gaeta" (Italian:
Vergogna di Gaeta; German:
Schande von Gaeta).
Nationalism and conspiracies From 1933 on, Hudal publicly embraced the pan-Germanic nationalism he had previously condemned, proclaiming that he wished to be a "servant and herald" of "the total German cause". His invective against Jews became more frequent, linking the so-called "Semitic race" – which "sought to set itself apart and dominate" – with the nefarious movements of democracy and
internationalism and alleged a Jewish bankers' conspiracy to become "the financial masters of the Eternal City". In 1935, he wrote a preface to an Italian biography of the Austrian politician
Engelbert Dollfuss without mentioning that he had been murdered by Austrian Nazis during a coup attempt the previous year.
Perception of Bolshevism and liberalism as enemies Hudal was a committed
anti-communist and opposed
liberalism. Before the rise of
Nazism, he was already critical of parliamentary governance. His ideas were similar to the political and economic ideas of such fascist politicians as
Engelbert Dollfuss and
Kurt Schuschnigg (Austria),
Franz von Papen (Germany), and
António de Oliveira Salazar (Portugal). According to author Greg Whitlock: "Hudal squarely fitted into a formula current at the time, the category of
Clerical-Fascism." Hudal was most concerned with the rise of the international communist movement and worker parties in Austria. Fear of
Bolshevism was his starting point, but this feeling turned into an aggressive political doctrine towards Russia: "Essential to understanding Hudal's politics is his fear that Bolshevist military forces would invade Italy through Eastern Europe or the Balkans and would be unstoppable until they destroyed the Church. Like many within the Church, he embraced the bulwark theory, which placed hope in a strong German-Austrian military shield to protect Rome. This protection involved a pre-emptive attack on communism, Hudal believed, and so he felt an urgent need for a Christian army from Central Europe to invade Russia and eliminate the Bolshevist threat to Rome".
"Good" and "bad" National Socialism Hudal is said to have received a
Golden Party Badge, but this is disputed. In Vienna in 1937, Hudal published a book entitled
The Foundations of National Socialism, with an
imprimatur from Archbishop
Theodor Innitzer, in which he enthusiastically endorsed Hitler. Hudal sent Hitler a copy with a handwritten dedication praising him as "the new
Siegfried of Germany's greatness". The Nazis did not officially ban the book but did not allow it to circulate in Germany. After the end of
World War II,
Franz von Papen declared that Hudal's book had "very much impressed" Hitler, and he blamed Hitler's "anti-Christian advisers" for not allowing a German edition to circulate. "All I could obtain was permission to print 2,000 copies, which Hitler wanted to distribute among leading Party members for a study of the problem", von Papen claimed. Hudal criticized the works of several Nazi ideologues, like
Alfred Rosenberg and
Ernst Bergmann, who despised Christianity and considered it "alien to Germanic genius". The condemnation by the Holy Office of Rosenberg's
The Myth of the Twentieth Century in 1934 and, shortly thereafter, of Bergmann's
The German National Church had been based on Hudal's assessment of those works. In his own 1937 book, Hudal proposed a reconciliation and a pragmatic compromise between Nazism and Christianity, leaving the education of youth to the churches, while leaving politics entirely to Nazism. This had been the line followed by German Catholic politician and former Reich Chancellor Franz von Papen. In the autumn of 1934, Hudal had explained this strategy to Pius XI: the "good" ought to be isolated from the "bad" in Nazism. The bad – Rosenberg, Bergmann, Himmler and others – according to Hudal represented the "left wing" of the Nazi party. The Nazi "conservatives", headed by Hitler in this interpretation, should be directed toward Rome, Christianized and used against the communists and the Eastern danger. Hitler's book,
Mein Kampf, was never put on the
Index by Rome, as censors continually postponed and eventually terminated its examination, balking at taking him on directly. By 1935, Hudal had become influential in creating a proposed list of "errors and heresies" of the era, condemning several
racist errors of Nazi politicians, the
Nuremberg Laws, and also condemning several statements taken directly from
Mein Kampf; this list was accepted by Pope Pius XI as an adequate condemnation, but he wanted an
encyclical rather than a mere syllabus or list of errors. Three years later, in June 1938, Pius ordered the American
Jesuit John LaFarge to prepare an encyclical condemning
antisemitism,
racism and the
persecution of Jews. Together with fellow Jesuits Gustav Gundlach (Germany) and Gustave Desbuquois (France), LaFarge produced
a draft for an encyclical which was on Pius XI's desk when he died. It was never promulgated by Pius XII. Rosenberg's reaction to Hudal's ideas was severe, and the circulation of
The Foundations of National Socialism was restricted in Germany. "We do not allow the fundaments of the Movement to be analyzed and criticized by a Roman Bishop", said Rosenberg. In 1935, even before he wrote
The Foundations of National Socialism Hudal had said about Rosenberg: "If National Socialism wants to replace Christianity by the notions of race and blood, we will have to face the greatest heresy of the twentieth century. It must be rejected by the Church as decisively as, if not more severely than ... the
Action Française, with which it shares some errors. But Rosenberg's doctrine is more imbued with negation and creates, above all in the youth, a hatred against Christianity greater than that of
Nietzsche". Despite the restrictions imposed on his book, and despite Nazi restrictions against German
monasteries and
parishes, and attempts by the Nazi government to forbid Catholic education at schools, going as far as banning the
crucifix in schools and other public areas (the
Oldenburg crucifix struggle of November 1936), and despite the Nazi dissolution and confiscation of Austrian monasteries and the official banning of Catholic newspapers and associations in Austria, Hudal remained close to some Nazi officials, as he was convinced that the Nazi new order would nevertheless prevail in Europe due to its "force". Hudal was particularly close to von Papen, who as the Reich's ambassador in Vienna prepared the German-Austrian agreement of 11 July 1936, which some claim paved the way for the
Anschluss. This agreement was backed by Hudal in the Austrian press, against the position of several Austrian bishops.
Vatican reaction When, in 1937, Hudal published his book on the foundations of Nazism, Church authorities were upset because of his deviation from Church policy and teachings. Hudal, without mentioning names, had openly questioned the Vatican policy of
Pope Pius XI and
Eugenio Pacelli towards Nazism, which culminated in the
encyclical Mit brennender Sorge, in which the Vatican openly attacked
National Socialism. The 1937 Hudal book froze his steady rise in Rome and resulted in his leaving the city after the war. His publication like his two previous, '
(1935) and ' (1935) did not have an
imprimatur or ecclesiastical approval, which was another reason for the cooling of relations with the Vatican. Hudal had proposed a "truly Christian National Socialism": education and church affairs would be controlled by the Church, while political discourse would remain exclusively National Socialist. However, the Nazis had no intention of giving up education to the Church. Together – according to Hudal – Church and state in Germany would fight against communism. Hudal saw a direct link between Jews and Marxism, lamenting their alleged dominance in academic occupations, and supporting
segregation legislation against Jews in order to protect against foreign influence.
Break with the Vatican Hudal, previously a popular and influential guest in the Vatican, lived from 1938 on, in isolation, in the Anima College. This position, he was forced to resign in 1952. Hudal's 1933 promotion to bishop has been cited as evidence that he had close ties to members of the
Roman Curia, particularly Cardinal Merry del Val (who died in 1930) and Cardinal Secretary of State Eugenio Pacelli, the future Pius XII, who had been papal nuncio in Germany. His close relationship with Pacelli and Pius XI stopped immediately after the publication of his book in 1937, which was seen as contradicting
Mit brennender Sorge and the 1933
Reichskonkordat.
Hudal during World War II Hudal's exile within Rome continued during World War II. He continued as pastoral head of the Anima Church and College but had no position in the Vatican and no access to Pope Pius XII or his senior staff. The French Jesuit historian Pierre Blet, co-editor of
Acts and Documents, mentioned Hudal only once, stating that the pope's nephew Carlo Pacelli saw Hudal, and after this meeting, Hudal wrote to the military governor of Rome, General
Reiner Stahel, and urged him to suspend all actions against Jews. The Germans suspended the actions "out of the consideration for the special character of Rome". According to another author, however, the idea of Hudal's intervention came from the German ambassador himself, who asked the rector of the Anima to sign a letter to the military commander of Rome, General
Reiner Stahel, requesting that the arrests be halted, otherwise the Pope would take a position in public against the arrests and the German occupiers. Ambassador
Ernst von Weizsäcker, it was argued, had chosen this ruse because Hitler might have reacted against the Vatican and the Pope if it had been the German embassy conveying the warning, instead of the Nazi-friendly bishop. and by Dr
Rainer Decker's discovery among Hudal's papers in the Anima of the original typewritten draft of the letter sent to Stahel. This draft, which is much longer than the excerpt from it sent to Berlin, contains Hudal's handwritten corrections, introductory greetings to Stahel recalling their mutual acquaintance Captain Diemert, and a final paragraph noting that, as had previously been discussed last March, Germany might need the good offices of the Vatican in the near future. These details could not have been known to Ambassador Weizsäcker or any of the other diplomats. And this leaves little doubt that the letter was written by Bishop Hudal himself and by no one else, and that it was initiated by a visit from Pius XII's nephew
Carlo Pacelli on the morning of 16 October 1943. During the war, Hudal sheltered victims of the Nazis at Santa Maria dell'Anima, used by the Resistance.
Lieutenant John Burns, a
New Zealander, gave a description of it when recalling his escape from an Italian POW camp in 1944. According to several sources, Hudal may have been a Vatican-based informer to German intelligence under the Nazi regime, either the
Abwehr of
Wilhelm Canaris or the
Reich Security Main Office. A Vatican historian, Father
Robert A. Graham SJ, expressed that view in his book
Nothing Sacred. Several other authors mention his contacts in Rome with SS intelligence chief
Walter Rauff. In September 1943, Rauff was sent to
Milan, where he took charge of all
Gestapo and
SD operations throughout northwest Italy. Hudal is said to have met Rauff then and to have begun some cooperation with him that was useful afterwards in the establishment of an escape network for Nazis, including for Rauff himself. After the war, Rauff escaped from a prisoner camp in
Rimini and "hid in a number of Italian convents, apparently under the protection of Bishop Alois Hudal".
Ratline organizer After 1945, Hudal continued to be isolated from the Vatican. In his native Austria, his pro-Nazi book was now openly discussed and critiqued. In 1945,
Allied-occupied Austria forced Hudal to give up his
Graz professorship; however, Hudal appealed on a technicality and regained it two years later. After 1945, Hudal worked on the
ratlines, helping former Nazis and
Ustasha families to find safe haven in overseas countries. He viewed it as "a charity to people in dire need, for persons without any guilt who are to be made scapegoats for the failures of an evil system." He used the services of the Austrian Office (
Österreichisches Bureau) in Rome, which had the necessary identity cards (
carta di riconoscimento), for migration mainly to
Arab and South American countries. It is also alleged that the president of the International Red Cross
Carl Jacob Burckhardt and Cardinal
Antonio Caggiano were also involved in the "ratlines". It is unclear whether he was an official appointee of the papal refugee organization
Pontificia Commissione di Assistenza ("Pontifical Commission of Assistance" – PCA) or whether he acted as
de facto head of the Catholic Austrian community in Rome. He is credited with helping, networking and organising the escape of war criminals such as
Franz Stangl, commanding officer of
Treblinka. Stangl told
Gitta Sereny that he went looking for Hudal in Rome as he had heard that the bishop was helping all Germans. Hudal arranged quarters in Rome for him until his
carta di riconoscimento came through, then gave him money and a visa to
Syria. Stangl left for
Damascus, where the bishop found him a job in a textile factory. Other prominent Nazi war criminals allegedly helped by the Hudal network were
SS Captain
Eduard Roschmann,
Josef Mengele, the "Angel of Death" at
Auschwitz;
Gustav Wagner, SS sergeant at
Sobibor;
Alois Brunner, organizer of deportations from France and Slovakia to German concentration camps; and
Adolf Eichmann, the man in charge of running the murder of European Jewry. In 1994,
Erich Priebke, a former SS captain, told Italian journalist Emanuela Audisio of
la Repubblica, that Hudal helped him reach
Buenos Aires, verified by Church historian
Robert A. Graham, a Jesuit priest from the United States. In 1945, Hudal gave refuge to
Otto Wächter. From 1939 onward, as governor of the
Kraków district, Wächter organized the persecution of the Jews and ordered the establishment of the
Kraków Ghetto in 1941. Wächter is mentioned as one of the leading advocates in the
General Government who were in favour of the Jewish extermination by gassing and as a member of the SS team who under
Himmler's supervision and
Odilo Globocnik's direction planned
Operation Reinhard, the first phase of the
Final Solution, leading to the death of more than 2,000,000 Polish Jews. After the war, Wächter lived in a Roman monastery "as a monk", under Hudal's protection. Wächter died on 14 July 1949 in the Santo Spirito hospital in Rome. While his official status was minor, Hudal clearly played a role in the ratlines. In 1999, Italian researcher Matteo Sanfilippo revealed a letter drafted on 31 August 1948 by Bishop Hudal to
Argentinian President
Juan Perón, requesting 5,000 visas, 3,000 for German and 2,000 for Austrian "soldiers". In the letter, Hudal explained that these were not (Nazi) refugees, but anti-communist fighters "whose wartime sacrifice" had saved Europe from Soviet domination. After the war, Hudal was one of the main Catholic organizers of the
ratline nets, along with Monsignor , himself an
Ustasha war criminal who fled to Austria and then to Italy after 1945, Father
Edward Dömöter, a Franciscan of Hungarian origin who forged the identity of Eichmann's passport, issued by the Red Cross in the name of Ricardo Klement, and Father
Krunoslav Draganović, a
Croatian professor of theology. Draganović, a smuggler of fascist and
Ustasha war criminals who had also been involved in pro-fascist espionage, was recycled by the U.S. during the
Cold War – his name appears in the Pentagon payrolls in the late 1950s and early 1960s – and was eventually granted immunity, ironically, in Tito's
Yugoslavia, where he died in 1983 at age 79. Monsignor
Karl Bayer, Rome's Director of
Caritas International after the war, also cooperated with this ring. Interviewed in the 1970s by
Gitta Sereny, Bayer recalled how he and Hudal had helped Nazis to South America with the Vatican's support: "The Pope [Pius XII] did provide money for this; in driblets sometimes, but it did come". Siri was regarded as "a hero of the
Resistance movement in Italy" during the German occupation of northern Italy. Siri's involvement remains unproven. According to
Uki Goñi, "some of the financing for Hudal's escape network came from the United States", saying that the Italian delegate of the American National Catholic Welfare Conference provided Hudal "with substantial funds for his 'humanitarian' aid". Since the works of Graham and Blet were published, historian
Michael Phayer, a professor at
Marquette University, has alleged the close collaboration between the Vatican (
Pope Pius XII and
Giovanni Battista Montini, then "substitute" of the Secretariat of State, and later
Paul VI) on the one side and Draganović and Hudal on the other, and has claimed that Pius XII himself was directly engaged in ratline activity. Against these allegations of the direct involvement of Pope Pius XII and his staff, there are some opposing testimonies and the denial by Vatican officials of any involvement of Pius XII himself. According to Phayer, Bishop
Aloisius Muench, an American and Pius XII's own envoy to occupied western Germany after the war, "wrote to the Vatican warning the Pope to desist from his efforts to have convicted war criminals excused". The letter, written in Italian, is extant in the archives of
Catholic University of America. In his posthumously published memoirs, Hudal instead recalls with bitterness the lack of support he found from the Holy See to give to
Nazi Germany's battle against "godless
Bolshevism" at the
Eastern Front. Hudal claims several times in this work to have received criticism of the Nazi system rather than support for it from the Vatican diplomats under Pius XII. He assumed that the Holy See's policy during and after the war was entirely controlled by the western Allies. Until his own death, Hudal remained convinced he had done the right thing, and said he considered saving German and other fascist officers and politicians from the hands of Allied prosecution a "just thing" and "what should have been expected of a true Christian", adding: "We do not believe in the eye for an eye of the Jew." Hudal said the justice of the Allies and the Soviets had resulted in
show trials and lynchings, including the major
trials at Nuremberg. In his memoirs, he developed a theory about the economic causes of World War II, which allowed him to plainly justify for himself his acts in favour of Nazi and fascist war criminals: After he was banned from Rome by Pius XII, Hudal withdrew to his residence in
Grottaferrata, embittered towards Pius XII. He died in 1963. His diaries were published in Austria 13 years after his death and describe perceived Vatican injustices he experienced under Pius XI and Pius XII after the publication of his book. Hudal maintained the opinion that a bargain among socialism, nationalism and Christianity was the only realistic way of securing the future. ==Selected works==