Fifty-two years ago today, on April 4, 1973 (March 2, 1973), the Vatican claimed that the Pope knew about Nazi crimes. On April 4, 1973, the Vatican released a trove of documents indicating that an aide to Pope Pius XII, and perhaps the Pope himself, knew about the slaughter of millions of Jews by the Nazis. This revelation of the truth has once again sparked debate about why the Pope never spoke out publicly against the Holocaust. The secret documents include a report sent by Archbishop Loncari, later Pope John XXIII, to Cardinal Montini, then Pius's secretary and now Pope Paul VI. In the report, Loncari said he had met with a Hitler envoy and mentioned the Polish killing camps, suggesting that the Vatican knew about the killing camps.