to sign a new statement, issued on behalf of all the Austrian bishops, which provided: "The solemn declaration of the Austrian bishops... was clearly not intended to be an approval of something that was not and is not compatible with God's law". The Vatican newspaper also reported that the bishops' earlier statement had been issued without the approval of the Holy See, with the fairly neutral Pope Pius XI disagreeing totally with Innitzer. Nazi intimidation In April 1938, in honour of Hitler's birthday, Cardinal Innitzer had ordered that all Austrian churches fly the swastika flag, ring bells, and pray for Hitler. Despite this Innitzer called a day of prayer in the Cathedral of St. Stephen of Vienna for 7 October 1938, which was attended by almost 9,000 parishioners, mostly young people. In the sermon Innitzer declared that "we must confess our faith in our Führer, for there is just one Führer: Jesus Christ", which greatly angered the Nazi leaders: about 100 Nazis, among them many older members of the Hitler Youth, ransacked the archbishop's residence the very next day. In Britain, the Catholic Herald provided the following contemporary account on 14 October 1938: World War II Innitzer's ambiguous relationship with the Nazi regime brought him a lot of criticism after World War II (he was referred to as the "Heil Hitler Cardinal"). During the War Innitzer was critical of the anti-Semitic and racist policies of the Nazis towards the Austrian Jews and also the Catholic gypsies of the Austrian countryside. He openly, though moderately, supported the war effort against the Soviet Union, however. Years before, he had campaigned against Soviet policies. In 1933, based on data collected by undercover investigation and photographs, Innitzer sought to raise awareness in the West of the many deaths by hunger and even cases of cannibalism that were occurring in Ukraine and the North Caucasus at that time. In October 1944 Innitzer preached in the parish of Vienna-Reindorf, which also included members of the NSDAP local group who listened and wrote a report about it. In their report, they criticized that Innitzer's speech was "cleverly demoralized". Thereby, statements like the following are thought: “You don't know what will come. It is possible that Vienna will also become a theater of war.” However, Innitzer attributed the war to God directly; he saw it as a punishment for misconduct by the people. Innitzer also expressed his regret