Reviewed by: Pie XI: Un Pape contre le Nazisme? L'encyclique Mit brennender Sorge (14 mars 1937) ed. by Fabrice Bouthillon and Marie Levant John S. Conway Pie XI: Un Pape contre le Nazisme? L'encyclique Mit brennender Sorge (14 mars 1937). Edited by Fabrice Bouthillon and Marie Levant. Actes du colloque international de Brest, 4–6 Juin 2015. [Collection Nouvelles Ouvertures.] (Brest, France: Editions dialogues. 2016. Pp. x, 452. €28,00 paperback. ISBN 978-2-369-45.) Pope Pius XI (Achille Ratti), who reigned from 1922 to 1939, has not been intensively studied, even though the files in the Vatican Archives for his pontificate were opened several years ago. This is in contrast to the heated debates about the wartime policies of his successor, Pius XII (Eugenio Pacelli), whose papers are still not open for research. We should therefore be grateful to a group of French scholars, [End Page 365] based at the University of Western Brittany, for organizing this conference in June, 2015. Their focus is on the most sensational event in the latter part of Pius XI's reign, namely the publication of the papal encyclical, Mit brennender Sorge, which was smuggled into Germany, secretly printed and distributed to every Catholic parish, and read out at High Mass on Palm Sunday, 1937. The twenty papers printed in this volume, two of which are in English, explore the origins, scope, and impact of this forceful encyclical. As well a French translation is printed in full. This spectacular challenge to the Nazi regime was, however, a political failure. The reasons are clear. The majority of German Catholics supported Hitler in all but his religious policies. They approved of his anti-communism and were silent about the persecution of the Jews. In the following year, they welcomed the seizure of Austria and the Sudetenland. Millions of Catholics enlisted in Hitler's armies, and eagerly fought against the Soviet Union. There was never any attempt to build up a Catholic resistance movement. For their part, the Nazi leaders also recognized the value of an expedient silence. The Reich Concordat remained in place. Diplomatic relations with the Vatican were never broken off, and the nuncio remained in Berlin. Subsequent developments in the Vatican were marked by impatient frustration. The encyclical was, however, noted in the rest of Europe, as described in six later chapters in this book.. In Germany, the Gestapo quickly confiscated all copies they could find. In France and Britain, the denunciations of Nazi ideology were applauded, and the regime's anti-Catholic measures of persecution were deplored. In Franco's Spain and Mussolini's Italy, however, the need for Germany's political and military support led to a cool reception of the Vatican's initiative. The pope's later speeches became more and more apocalyptic. In the following year, he charged three Jesuit priests, an American, a German, and a Frenchman, with the task of drawing up a new encyclical, which was designed to spell out clearly the errors of Nazi racism. This document was allegedly ready for signature when Pius XI died in early February, 1939. But his successor, Pius XII, believed that such an anti-German demonstration was inopportune, and ordered all exiting copies to be destroyed. No similar defiant gesture or public protest was ever issued. The question mark in this book's title would therefore appear to be justified. John S. Conway University of British Columbia (Emeritus) Copyright © 2017 The Catholic University of America Press