Nazi euthanasia and the Catholic Church

During the Second World War, the Roman Catholic Church protested against Aktion T4, the Nazi involuntary euthanasia programme under which 300,000 disabled people were murdered. The protests formed one of the most significant public acts of Catholic resistance to Nazism undertaken within Germany. The "euthanasia" programme began in 1939, and ultimately resulted in the murder of more than 70,000 people who were deemed senile, mentally handicapped, mentally ill, epileptics, cripples, children with Down's Syndrome, or people with similar afflictions. The murders involved interference in Church welfare institutions, and awareness of the murderous programme became widespread. Church leaders who opposed it – chiefly the Catholic Bishop Clemens August von Galen of Münster and Protestant Bishop Theophil Wurm – were therefore able to rouse widespread public opposition. Catholic protests began in the summer of 1940. The Holy See declared on 2 December 1940 that the policy was contrary to natural and positive Divine law, and that: "The direct killing of an innocent person because of mental or physical defects is not allowed." In the summer of 1941, protests were led in Germany by Bishop von Galen, whose intervention, according to Richard J. Evans, led to "the strongest, most explicit and most widespread protest movement against any policy since the beginning of the Third Reich." In 1943, Pope Pius XII issued the Mystici corporis Christi encyclical, in which he condemned the practice of killing disabled people. The Encyclical was followed, on 26 September 1943, by an open condemnation from the German Bishops which denounced the killing of innocent and defenceless people, whether mentally or physically handicapped, incurably infirm, fatally wounded, innocent hostages, disarmed prisoners of war, criminal offenders, or belonging to a different race.

Aktion T4 While the Nazi "Final Solution" murder of the Jews took place primarily on German-occupied Polish territory, the murder of people deemed invalids took place on German soil and involved interference in Catholic (and Protestant) welfare institutions. Awareness of the murderous programme therefore became widespread, and the Church leaders who opposed it – chiefly the Catholic Bishop of Münster, Clemens August von Galen, and Dr Theophil Wurm, the Protestant Bishop of Württemberg – were therefore able to rouse widespread public opposition. The intervention has been said to be "the strongest, most explicit and most widespread protest movement against any policy since the beginning of the Third Reich." From 1939, the regime began its programme of euthanasia, under which those deemed "racially unfit" or "life unworthy of life" were to be euthanized. Those deemed by the Nazis to be senile, mentally handicapped and mentally ill, epileptics, cripples, children with Down's Syndrome and people with similar afflictions were all to be killed. The programme ultimately involved the systematic murder of more than 70,000 people. Among those murdered was a cousin of the young Joseph Ratzinger, future Pope Benedict XVI. By the time the Nazis commenced their programme of killing invalids, the Catholic Church in Germany had been subject to prolonged persecution from the state, and had suffered confiscation of property, arrest of clergy, and closure of lay organisations. The Church hierarchy was therefore wary of challenging the regime, for fear of further consequences for the Church. However, on certain matters of doctrine they remained unwilling to compromise.

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