The Church policies after World War II of Pope Pius XII focused on material aid to war-torn Europe, the internationalization of the Roman Catholic Church, its persecution in Eastern Europe, China and Vietnam, and relations with the United States and the emerging European Union.
After 1946, Church policies, with wars ongoing in Korea, the Mandate of Palestine and other places, continued to propagate peace and aid the afflicted, especially in war-torn Europe. Pius XII began a process of worldwide reconstruction of war-damaged Catholic institutions. He promoted the internationalization of the Church with reforms of the Church, internationalizing the College of Cardinals in two consistories. For working women he repeatedly demanded equal pay for equal work.
Church policies
After World War II, some 60,000,000 Catholics were under the influence of Communist regimes in Eastern Europe. Relations with the United States were cordial. Faced with a war in the Middle East, Pius called for mutual respect for and between the three major religions, Christianity, Judaism and Islam. He insisted on their free access to Holy Sites, especially in Jerusalem. In his war-time message, Pius had called for an international order and the establishment of international organizations. He therefore welcomed the creation of such organizations after the war, and appointed papal representatives or observers to them. Pacelli supported a unification of Europe. In 1957, following the signing of the Treaty of Rome, he received the heads of government and State of the newly founded European Union, to express his gratification and give his blessings.
Papal charity: policies and practices
Displaced persons and prisoners of war
On 6 January 1946, the encyclical Quemadmodum issued an urgent call for charity. The Pope described the misery of millions of people in war-torn areas, and insisted that all persons must help. He was especially concerned with the millions of small children without families, food or shelter. As in the war years, the Pope offered material help. During the war, some 200,000 messages were sent via Vatican identifying displaced persons and prisoners to their respective families.
Pius was an outspoken advocate of clemency for those accused of war crimes, including Ernst von Weizsäcker, who was ambassador to the Vatican in the last two years of the war. The U.S. nuncio appealed to commute the sentences of several Germans convicted by the occupation authorities. The Vatican, opposed to the death penalty, asked for a blanket pardon for all those who had received death sentences after the ban on execution of war criminals was lifted in 1948. After the war, the Vatican continued its information services. Vatican Radio began a daily hour for prisoners and interned to South Africa, Belgian Congo, Kenya, North Africa, Australia, India, England and North America. The DPs created often special problems, because many thousands of them did not have any identification. Preliminary identity papers and food were distributed to long lines of persons, waiting for hours. Identity papers were issued throughout Italy by Vatican charity officials and Red Cross representatives. Forty years later, controversy arose as to whether some Nazi officials benefited from these Red Cross or Vatican papers, issued in the grand chaos of 1945–1947. Most certainly, neither the Red Cross nor the Vatican had the time or resources to check individual identity claims at the time. This situation was possibly exploited by the controversial Alois Hudal, who was later dismissed from his posts, the rat line, but by also many persons of other persuasions, who wanted to start a new life under a new name away from friends and family.
Immigration rights
As millions of refugees without any home or place to go, wandered all over the Europe, Pius XII insisted that immigration is a natural right and duty. In 1946, he declared, that all people have a right to immigration, because the Creator himself demands access to material goods. In addition, compassion supports immigration rights. Conversely, no state which can support additional people, has a right to close its immigration doors without reason.
Natural law even more than mere compassion compels States to secure people a chance of immigration, because the Creator demands that the goods of this world should be at the service of all mankind. Therefore, no state whose territory is in a condition to feed more people, has the right to refuse admission to foreigners without good and acceptable reasons.