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During the Second World War, the Roman Catholic Church protested against Action T4, the Nazi involuntary euthanasia programme under which the mentally ill, physically deformed, and incurably sick were to be killed. The protests formed one of the most significant public acts of Catholic resistance to Nazism undertaken within Germany. The programme began in 1939, and ultimately resulted in the murder of more than 70,000 people who were 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, and the Church leaders who opposed it – chiefly the Catholic Bishop August von Galen of Munster 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."〔Richard J. Evans; The Third Reich at War; Penguin Press; New York 2009, p.98〕 In 1943, Pope Pius XII issued the ''Mystici corporis Christi'' encyclical, in which he condemned the practice of killing the disabled. The Encyclical was followed, on 26 September 1943, by an open condemnation from the German Bishops which denounced the killing of "innocent and defenceless mentally handicapped, incurably infirm and fatally wounded, innocent hostages, and disarmed prisoners of war and criminal offenders, people of a foreign race or descent" ==Euthanasia programme== While the Nazi ''Final Solution'' liquidation of the Jews took place primarily on Polish territory, the murder of 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 Munster, August von Galen and Dr Theophil Wurm, the Protestant Bishop of Wurttemberg –; were therefore able to rouse widespread public opposition.〔Peter Hoffmann; The History of the German Resistance 1933-1945; 3rd Edn (First English Edn); McDonald & Jane's; London; 1977; p.24〕 The intervention led to, in the words of Evans, "the strongest, most explicit and most widespread protest movement against any policy since the beginning of the Third Reich."〔Richard J. Evans; The Third Reich at War; Penguin Press; New York 2009, p.98〕 From 1939, the regime began its program of euthanasia, under which those deemed "racially unfit" were to be "euthanised".〔Encyclopedia Britannica Online: ''Blessed Clemens August, Graf von Galen''; web Apr 2013〕 The senile, the mentally handicapped and mentally ill, epileptics, cripples, children with Down's Syndrome and people with similar afflictions were all to be killed.〔Anton Gill; An Honourable Defeat; A History of the German Resistance to Hitler; Heinemann; London; 1994; p.60〕 The program ultimately involved the systematic murder of more than 70,000 people.〔 Among those murdered, a cousin of the young Joseph Ratzinger, future Pope Benedict XVI.〔(The Church and Nazi Germany: Opposition, Acquiescence and Collaboration II ); Catholic News Agency; 3 October 2011; retrieved 17 September 2013〕 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 confiscations of property, arrests 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.〔Richard J. Evans; The Third Reich at War; Penguin Press; New York 2009, pp.95〕 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Nazi euthanasia and the Catholic Church」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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