Hilarius Breitinger

Last updated April 07, 2019

Hilarius Breitinger, OFM Conv (7 June 1907 – 23 August 1994) was a German Franciscan prelate made apostolic administrator of the Reichsgau Wartheland during World War II by Pope Pius XII, one of the most controversial examples of the reorganization of occupied dioceses during World War II. Breitinger's appointment and those like it were the justification of the Polish Provisional Government for declaring the Concordat of 1925 "null and void" in 1945.

The Reichsgau Wartheland was a Nazi German Reichsgau formed from parts of Polish territory annexed in 1939 during World War II. It comprised the region of Greater Poland and adjacent areas. Parts of Warthegau matched the similarly named pre-Versailles Prussian province of Posen. The name was initially derived from the capital city, Posen (Poznań), and later from the main river, Warthe (Warta).

World War II, also known as the Second World War, was a global war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. The vast majority of the world's countries—including all the great powers—eventually formed two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis. A state of total war emerged, directly involving more than 100 million people from over 30 countries. The major participants threw their entire economic, industrial, and scientific capabilities behind the war effort, blurring the distinction between civilian and military resources. World War II was the deadliest conflict in human history, marked by 50 to 85 million fatalities, most of whom were civilians in the Soviet Union and China. It included massacres, the genocide of the Holocaust, strategic bombing, premeditated death from starvation and disease, and the only use of nuclear weapons in war.

Pope Pius XII, born Eugenio Maria Giuseppe Giovanni Pacelli, was head of the Catholic Church from 2 March 1939 to his death. Before his election to the papacy, he served as secretary of the Department of Extraordinary Ecclesiastical Affairs, papal nuncio to Germany, and Cardinal Secretary of State, in which capacity he worked to conclude treaties with European and Latin American nations, most notably the Reichskonkordat with Nazi Germany.

Early life

Breitinger was born as Lorenz Breitinger on 7 June 1907 in Glattbach near Aschaffenburg.^[1] His parents were Martin, a carpenter, and Barbara Breitinger.^[1] He decided to study theology and enter the Order of Friars Minor ("Franciscans") after high school.^[1] He was ordained in 1932.^[1]

Glattbach is a community in the Aschaffenburg district in the Regierungsbezirk of Lower Franconia (Unterfranken) in Bavaria, Germany. It has around 3,300 inhabitants.

Aschaffenburg is a town in northwest Bavaria, Germany. The town of Aschaffenburg is not considered part of the district of Aschaffenburg, but is the administrative seat.

According to Phayer, Breitinger is the "key to unraveling" the contradictory accounts of Catholicism in Poland between Poles of German ethnicity (Nazi term Volksdeutsche) and those of Polish ethnicity.^[2] At the invitation of Primate Hlond, Breitinger (a German expatriate of Franconian descent) entered Poland in 1934 and began administering to Poles of German ethnicity in Poznań's church of St. Anthony of Padua,^[2] under the authority of the Bundestreffen der Landsmannschaft Weichsel-Warthe (LWW) as a pastor at a local Franciscan church.^[1] Breitinger wrote in a letter to Pius XII that he "did not like" pastoral work.^[2] While a pastor, Breitinger learned the Polish language.^[1]

In Nazi German terminology, Volksdeutsche were "Germans in regard to people or race", regardless of citizenship. The term is the nominalised plural of volksdeutsch, with Volksdeutsche denoting a singular female, and Volksdeutsche(r), a singular male. The words Volk and völkisch conveyed the meanings of "folk". These terms were used by the Nazis to define Germans on the basis of their "race" rather than citizenship and thus included Germans living beyond the borders of the Reich, as long as they were not of Jewish origin.

An expatriate is a person temporarily or permanently residing in a country other than their native country. In common usage, the term often refers to professionals, skilled workers, or artists taking positions outside their home country, either independently or sent abroad by their employers, who can be companies, universities, governments, or non-governmental organisations. Effectively migrant workers, they usually earn more than they would at home, and less than local employees. However, the term 'expatriate' is also used for retirees and others who have chosen to live outside their native country. Historically, it has also referred to exiles.

Franconia is a region in southern Germany, characterised by its culture and language, and may be roughly associated with the areas in which the East Franconian dialect group, colloquially referred to as "Franconian", is spoken. Because of this, the region can be roughly associated with the three administrative regions of Lower, Middle, and Upper Franconia in the state of Bavaria. Also part of the cultural region of Franconia are the adjacent Franconian-speaking region of South Thuringia, as well as Heilbronn-Franconia in the state of Baden-Württemberg, and small parts of the state of Hesse.

After the German invasion of Poland, Breitinger was arrested on September 1, 1939^[1] and asked to report to local police as "formality".^[2] Instead, Breitinger, the German expatriate, and Volksdeutsche were led around the countryside in a "three-week life-threatening ordeal".^[2] Forced to undergo a gamut of verbal and physical abuse, Breitinger was at one point hit in the head with a brick which he later theorized would have been fatal if not for his glasses.^[2] Some of his fellow captives succumbed to the ordeal or were murdered.^[2] Eventually, Breitinger was abandoned as the vigilantes found themselves between the retreating Polish and advancing German armies.^[3]

Glasses, also known as eyeglasses or spectacles, are devices consisting of glass or hard plastic lenses mounted in a frame that holds them in front of a person's eyes, typically using a bridge over the nose and arms which rest over the ears.

When the German army came upon Breitinger and the Volksdeutsche they sang "Deutschland, Deutschland über Alles'", the German national anthem.^[3] Similar accounts of abuse of Volksdeutsche, especially ethnic German priests, are common during this period, and Breitinger's story comports in large part to that of August Rauhut.^[3] However, for the next four years, Poland's 1.5 million Volksdeutsche "could literally cash in on the cruelties that the German occupational authorities heaped upon their Polish neighbors", until Polish and Soviet forces ended the German occupation.^[4] During this period, Breitinger came to regard Polish Catholicism as "superficial" as—in his letters—he tried to explain how "all this was possible in a Catholic country".^[5] However, Breitinger's formerly "disenchanted" opinion of Pius XII reversed in 1943 when he wrote that the pope's "heroic silence" would "create the foundation for a new peaceful order in the world".^[6]

<i>Wehrmacht</i> unified armed forces of Germany from 1935 to 1945

The Wehrmacht was the unified armed forces of Nazi Germany from 1935 to 1945. It consisted of the Heer (army), the Kriegsmarine (navy) and the Luftwaffe. The designation "Wehrmacht" replaced the previously used term Reichswehr, and was the manifestation of the Nazi regime's efforts to rearm Germany to a greater extent than the Treaty of Versailles permitted.

Assistant to Paech

In 1941, Pius XII appointed Poznań's Capitular vicar Joseph Paech (1880–1942), a Pole of German ethnicity, as apostolic administrator to the Catholic faithful of German language within Reichsgau Wartheland.^[1] Breitinger was Paech's right-hand assistant, who took part in the negotiations with the Reichsgau.^[1] Heart disease forced Paech to retire from the post in 1942, and Breitinger was appointed as his successor on May 2, 1942.^[1] For the Catholic parishioners of Polish language in Wartheland Cesare Orsenigo appointed Poznań's Auxiliary Bishop Walenty Dymek as apostolic administrator on 9 April 1942, however, in August the same year he declared his resignation due to the German obstruction and violence.^[7]

The Archdiocese of Poznań is one of 14 archdioceses located in Poland, with the seat located in Poznań.

Walenty Dymek (1888–1956) was the Archbishop of Poznań from 1946 to 1956.

Administrator to the Wartheland

In May 1942, Pius XII made Breitinger apostolic administrator to Catholics of German language in the Reichsgau Wartheland, a portion of Poland annexed into Nazi Germany.^[2] Though this action fell short of the German demand that a new German church administration be created for the occupied territories (subject to the terms of the Reichskonkordat , which would have given Nazi Germany a voice in appointments), "betrayal was exactly what the Poles felt".^[2] Breitinger was nominally responsible for the spiritual well-being of German Catholics living in Poland. Breitinger was the recommendation of Cesare Orsenigo, the nuncio to Germany. After Cardinal August Hlond, the Primate of Poland, was forced to flee, Breitinger assisted Bishop Dymek, whom Hlond had appointed vicar general of Poznań, in the administration of the Diocese of Gnesen-Posen (the diocese of the primate).^[2]

Breitinger was, however, more sympathetic to the condition of Polish Catholics than Cesare Orsenigo, the nuncio to Berlin (with his authority extended to Poland).^[8] For example, when relaying a letter critical of the Pope's silence on the condition of Poland to Orsenigo, he also gave a second copy to Bishop Michael von Faulhaber (correctly) trusting only the second to deliver the letter to Rome.^[8] Breitinger's second correspondence to Rome in 1942, he reported that unlike in Reichsgau Danzig-West Prussia, another Nazi Gau comprising also annexed Polish area, in Arthur Greiser's Nazi prototype region of Wartheland Volksdeutsche Catholics were pressured to "drop their affiliation with the church" to secure advancement and the other fruits of the occupation, while Polish Catholics were treated far more harshly.^[8]

Many members of the Polish Catholic hierarchy and the Polish government-in-exile regarded the appointment of Breitinger and other German bishops to Polish territory as a violation of the Concordat of 1925.^[9] However, Bishop Dymek, and Gniezno's Cathedral Capitular Eduard van Blericq, whom Hlond had appointed vicar general for Gniezno, had pleaded to comply Greiser's policy of ethnic segregation in order to prevent him suppressing any church life.^[10] For example, in September 1942, the exiled Bishop Karol Mieczyslaw Radonski wrote two letters to Rome protesting these appointments which—in his view—"signaled the Vatican's willingness to let Hitler have the northwest sector of Poland that he had incorporated into his Greater Reich".^[9] Radonski criticized Pius XII directly: "et Papa tacet, tamquamsi nihil eum interesset de ovibus" ("and the pope keeps quiet as though these matters are of no interest to him").^[11] The appointment of Breitinger and other German prelates was the pretext of the Polish Provisional Government for declaring the Concordat "null and void" in 1945.^[12]

Return to Germany

As the Red Army advanced, Breitinger fled Poland in 1944, returning to his Franciscan order in Germany.^[1] In 1947 he became the Guardian of the Franciscan monastery of Würzburg, transferring to the Upper Bavarian monastery of Maria Eck in 1953, and to a Vienna seminary and hospital chaplaincy in 1959.^[1] In 1964, he was elected the provincial leader of the Austrian Franciscans monasteries.^[1]

In 1972 he returned to the Guardian of the Graz monastery and the pastor of Graz-Mariahilf.^[1] In 1978, he returned to Maria Eck in Upper Bavaria.^[1] In Maria Eck, he began to write his memoirs, published in 1984.^[1] In 1992, Pope John Paul II gave a special blessing to Breitinger on his birthday, expressing his "appreciation of his tireless pastoral ministry and apostolic ministry deserving as Apostolic Administrator of German Catholics in the Warta".^[1] Breitinger died on August 23, 1994.^[1]

Works by Breitinger

1984. Als Deutschenseelsorger in Posen und im Warthegau 1934–1945: Erinnerungen. Mainz: Grünewald.

Notes

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 (in German) Martin Sprungala. "Breitinger, Hilarius". Ostdeutsche Biographie.
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 Phayer, 2008, p. 6.
1 2 3 Phayer, 2008, p. 7.
↑ Phayer, 2008, p. 8.
↑ Phayer, 2008, p. 9.
↑ Phayer, 2000, p. 29.
↑ Dymek's appointment had been delayed because he was under German arrest, when Paech was invested. After Dymek's release it was then carried out in secret in order not endanger his life. Cf. Jerzy Pietrzak, "Die politischen und kirchenrechtlichen Grundlagen der Einsetzung Apostolischer Administratoren in den Jahren 1939–1942 und 1945 im Vergleich", in: Katholische Kirche unter nationalsozialistischer und kommunistischer Diktatur: Deutschland und Polen 1939–1989, Hans-Jürgen Karp and Joachim Köhler (eds.), (=Forschungen und Quellen zur Kirchen- und Kulturgeschichte Ostdeutschlands; vol. 32), Cologne: Böhlau, 2001, pp. 157–174, here p. 163. ISBN 3-412-11800-1.
1 2 3 Phayer, 2008, p. 29.
1 2 Phayer, 2008, p. 30.
↑ Jerzy Pietrzak, "Die politischen und kirchenrechtlichen Grundlagen der Einsetzung Apostolischer Administratoren in den Jahren 1939–1942 und 1945 im Vergleich", in: Katholische Kirche unter nationalsozialistischer und kommunistischer Diktatur: Deutschland und Polen 1939–1989, Hans-Jürgen Karp and Joachim Köhler (eds.), (=Forschungen und Quellen zur Kirchen- und Kulturgeschichte Ostdeutschlands; vol. 32), Cologne: Böhlau, 2001, pp. 157–174, here p. 162. ISBN 3-412-11800-1.
↑ Phayer, 2008, p. 31.
↑ Diskin, 2004, pp. 28–29.

Related Research Articles

Maximilian Kaller was Roman Catholic Bishop of Ermland in East Prussia from 1930–1947, however, de facto expelled since mid-August 1945 he served as special bishop for the homeland-expellees until his death.

August Hlond was a Polish cardinal of the Roman Catholic Church, who was Archbishop of Poznań and Gniezno in 1926 and Primate of Poland. He was then appointed as the Archbishop of Gniezno and Warsaw in 1946.

Arthur Karl Greiser was a Nazi German politician, SS-Obergruppenführer and Reichsstatthalter of the German-occupied territory of Wartheland. He was one of the persons primarily responsible for organizing the Holocaust in occupied Poland and numerous other crimes against humanity. Arrested by the Americans in 1945, he was tried, convicted and executed by hanging in Poland in 1946.

Catholic clergy involvement with the Ustaše covers the role

Prince Adam Stefan Stanisław Bonifacy Józef Sapieha was a Polish cardinal of the Roman Catholic Church who served as Archbishop of Kraków. Between 1922–1923 he was a senator of the Second Polish Republic. In 1946, Pope Pius XII created him Cardinal.

Adolf Cardinal Bertram was archbishop of Breslau and a cardinal of the Roman Catholic Church.

Persecutions against the Catholic Church took place throughout the pontificate of Pope Pius XII (1939-1958). Pius' reign coincided with the Second World War, the commencement of the Cold War and the accelerating European decolonisation. During this time, the Catholic Church faced persecution under Fascist and Communist governments.

Pope Pius XII and Poland includes Church relations from 1939–1958. Pius XII became Pope on the eve of the Second World War. The invasion of predominantly Catholic Poland by Nazi Germany in 1939 ignited the conflict and was followed soon after by a Soviet invasion of the Eastern half of Poland, in accordance with an agreement reached between the dictators Joseph Stalin and Adolf Hitler. The Catholic Church in Poland was about to face decades of repression, both at Nazi and Communist hands. The Nazi persecution of the Catholic Church in Poland was followed by a Stalinist repression which was particularly intense through the years 1946–1956. Pope Pius XII's policies consisted in attempts to avoid World War II, extensive diplomatic activity on behalf of Poland and encouragement to the persecuted clergy and faithful.

Carl Maria Splett was a German Roman Catholic priest and Bishop of Danzig (Gdańsk); his role during World War II, especially as apostolic administrator of the Diocese of Culm, is controversial. After World War II he was put on trial and imprisoned in Poland for his alleged collaboration with Nazi regime, and later deported to West Germany.

Cesare Vincenzo Orsenigo was Apostolic Nuncio to Germany from 1930 to 1945, during the rise of Nazi Germany and World War II. Along with the German ambassador to the Vatican, Diego von Bergen and later Ernst von Weizsäcker, Orsenigo was the direct diplomatic link between Pope Pius XI and Pope Pius XII and the Nazi regime, meeting several times with Adolf Hitler directly and frequently with other high-ranking officials and diplomats.

The reorganization of occupied dioceses during World War II was an issue faced by Pope Pius XII of whether to extend the apostolic authority of Catholic bishops from Nazi Germany and Fascist Italy to German-occupied Europe during World War II.

Pope Pius XII's 1942 Christmas address was a speech delivered by Pope Pius XII over Vatican Radio on Christmas 1942. It is notable for its denunciation of the extermination of people on the basis of race, and followed the commencement of the Nazi Final Solution program to exterminate the Jews of Europe. The significance of the denunciation is a matter of scholarly debate.

Catholic bishops in Nazi Germany differed in their responses to the rise of Nazi Germany, World War II, and the Holocaust during the years 1933–1945. In the 1930s, the Episcopate of the Catholic Church of Germany comprised 6 Archbishops and 19 bishops while German Catholics comprised around one third of the population of Germany served by 20,000 priests. In the lead up to the 1933 Nazi takeover, German Catholic leaders were outspoken in their criticism of Nazism. Following the Nazi takeover, the Catholic Church sought an accord with the Government, was pressured to conform, and faced persecution. The regime had flagrant disregard for the Reich concordat with the Holy See, and the episcopate had various disagreements with the Nazi government, but it never declared an official sanction of the various attempts to overthrow the Hitler regime. Ian Kershaw wrote that the churches "engaged in a bitter war of attrition with the regime, receiving the demonstrative backing of millions of churchgoers. Applause for Church leaders whenever they appeared in public, swollen attendances at events such as Corpus Christi Day processions, and packed church services were outward signs of the struggle of ... especially of the Catholic Church - against Nazi oppression". While the Church ultimately failed to protect its youth organisations and schools, it did have some successes in mobilizing public opinion to alter government policies.

Filippo Cortesi was the Apostolic Nuncio to Poland from December 24, 1936 to February 1, 1947. Cortesi earlier served as nuncio to Paraguay in the interim. Cortesi was the only nuncio to Poland never to become a cardinal.

Dr. Kazimierz Papée was the ambassador from Poland to the Holy See from 1939 to 1958, during and after World War II. Due to the Nazi invasion of Poland months after Papée's appointment, Papée represented the Polish government-in-exile for the remainder of Pope Pius XII's papacy, before being dismissed by his successor, Pope John XXIII.

The Expulsion of Poles by Nazi Germany during World War II was a massive Nazi German operation consisting of the forced resettlement of over 1.7 million Poles from all territories of occupied Poland with the aim of their geopolitical Germanization between 1939–1944. The expulsions were justified by Nazi racial theory, which depicted Poles and other Slavs as racially inferior Untermenschen.

The Catholic Church in Poland was brutally suppressed by the Nazis during the German Occupation of Poland (1939-1945). Repression of the Church was at its most severe in Polish areas annexed by Nazi Germany, where churches were systematically closed and most priests were either killed, imprisoned, or deported. From across Poland, thousands of priests died in prisons and concentration camps; thousands of churches and monasteries were confiscated, closed or destroyed; and priceless works of religious art and sacred objects were lost forever. Church leaders were targeted as part of an overall effort to destroy Polish culture. At least 1811 Polish clergy died in Nazi concentration camps. An estimated 3000 clergy were killed in all. Hitler's plans for the Germanization of the East saw no place for the Christian Churches.

Several Catholic countries and populations fell under Nazi domination during the period of the Second World War (1939–1945), and ordinary Catholics fought on both sides of the conflict. Despite efforts to protect its rights within Germany under a 1933 Reichskonkordat treaty, the Church in Germany had faced persecution in the years since Adolf Hitler had seized power, and Pope Pius XI accused the Nazi government of sowing 'fundamental hostility to Christ and his Church'. Pius XII became Pope on the eve of war and lobbied world leaders to prevent the outbreak of conflict. His first encyclical, Summi Pontificatus, called the invasion of Poland an "hour of darkness". He affirmed the policy of Vatican neutrality, but maintained links to the German Resistance. Despite being the only world leader to publicly and specifically denounce Nazi crimes against Jews in his 1942 Christmas Address, controversy surrounding his apparent reluctance to speak frequently and in even more explicit terms about Nazi crimes continues. He used diplomacy to aid war victims, lobbied for peace, shared intelligence with the Allies, and employed Vatican Radio and other media to speak out against atrocities like race murders. In Mystici corporis Christi (1943) he denounced the murder of the handicapped. A denunciation from German bishops of the murder of the "innocent and defenceless", including "people of a foreign race or descent", followed.

References

Diskin, Hanna. 2004. The Seeds of Triumph: Church and State in Gomułka's Poland. Central European University Press.
Phayer, Michael. 2000. The Catholic Church and the Holocaust, 1930–1965. Indianapolis: Indiana University Press. ISBN 0-253-33725-9.
Phayer, Michael. 2008. Pius XII, The Holocaust, and the Cold War. Indianapolis: Indiana University Press. ISBN 978-0-253-34930-9.

Catholic Church titles
Preceded by Joseph Paech	Apostolic Administrator to the Reichsgau Wartheland 1942 – 1944	Succeeded by none

This page is based on this Wikipedia article
Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply.
Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.

[ms-1] 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 (in German) Martin Sprungala. "Breitinger, Hilarius". Ostdeutsche Biographie.

[p6-2] 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 Phayer, 2008, p. 6.

[p7-3] 1 2 3 Phayer, 2008, p. 7.

[p8-4] Phayer, 2008, p. 8.

[p9-5] Phayer, 2008, p. 9.

[6] Phayer, 2000, p. 29.

[7] Dymek's appointment had been delayed because he was under German arrest, when Paech was invested. After Dymek's release it was then carried out in secret in order not endanger his life. Cf. Jerzy Pietrzak, "Die politischen und kirchenrechtlichen Grundlagen der Einsetzung Apostolischer Administratoren in den Jahren 1939–1942 und 1945 im Vergleich", in: Katholische Kirche unter nationalsozialistischer und kommunistischer Diktatur: Deutschland und Polen 1939–1989, Hans-Jürgen Karp and Joachim Köhler (eds.), (=Forschungen und Quellen zur Kirchen- und Kulturgeschichte Ostdeutschlands; vol. 32), Cologne: Böhlau, 2001, pp. 157–174, here p. 163. ISBN 3-412-11800-1.

[p29-8] 1 2 3 Phayer, 2008, p. 29.

[p30-9] 1 2 Phayer, 2008, p. 30.

[10] Jerzy Pietrzak, "Die politischen und kirchenrechtlichen Grundlagen der Einsetzung Apostolischer Administratoren in den Jahren 1939–1942 und 1945 im Vergleich", in: Katholische Kirche unter nationalsozialistischer und kommunistischer Diktatur: Deutschland und Polen 1939–1989, Hans-Jürgen Karp and Joachim Köhler (eds.), (=Forschungen und Quellen zur Kirchen- und Kulturgeschichte Ostdeutschlands; vol. 32), Cologne: Böhlau, 2001, pp. 157–174, here p. 162. ISBN 3-412-11800-1.

[p31-11] Phayer, 2008, p. 31.

[12] Diskin, 2004, pp. 28–29.