VATICAN AND KREMLIN
DALLIN, DAVID J.
East and West Vatican and Kremlin By David J. Dallin THE EXCHANGES BETWEEN Cardinal Spellman and Mrs. Eleanor Roosevelt touch upon secondary issues only and are rather unfortunate at this...
...Nothing can be more harmful than to live and act solely on the basis of recollections of the past...
...Down to this day, the very word connotes torture, injustices, extreme cruelty...
...The Outer of Jesuits—those shock troops of Catholicism—was built on the principle that the overthrew of any government and the destruction ef its leaders are permissible where such governments and leaders fight against the interests of- the people, which interests are always identical with the aims and policies of the Catholic church...
...The Index JUbrortti» P^mtmum, containa»g books tajfrtSatiolic tfcttch teWfls its followers to rw't'laat far centuries leer...
...with few exceptions, the rest display great courage and discipline...
...In the broadest sense, embracing various shades and groups, liberalism was heir to centuries-old trends, to humanism, to the Renaissance...
...While many readers of political parties and their adherents are losing faith and fighting spirit, and are traveling the road of subservience to the powers-to-be, the Catholic church has maintained an admirable toughness, and a deep faith in its cause...
...His showtrials against Catholic monasteries are fresh in memory...
...Religious leaders have been executed...
...a coalition of the Catholic Zentrum with the Socialists constituted the base of the Republic up to the end of 1933...
...and supported* the secular power against the supposedly omnipotent head of the Catholic church...
...It never did it, however, with such completeness and consistency as does communism today...
...Differences between liberalism and Catholicism will continue to exist as far as problems of philosophy and Weltanscliauung are concerned...
...During the 19th century, J<beralu>m developed and grew hi antagonism to Catholicism...
...Today the cartoon-type of a stout, conceited, well-to-do priest has become obsolete in Europe...
...While he easily subdued the Protestant church, he never made peace with the Catholics...
...a target ef passionate attseks...
...In Germany, after the overthrow of the old monarchy in 1918...
...The mfalTibiliry of the Pope was proclaimed by the Vatican in 1870...
...Eleanor Roosevelt touch upon secondary issues only and are rather unfortunate at this particular time...
...It emphasized the individual and his inalienable rights as against the ascetic ideas of the Middle Ages...
...they must be regularly sharpened, like a good knife, if they are not to become blunt...
...Communism has picked up these ancient ideas, elaborated upon and modernized them, and adopted them as part of its own ideology...
...rected in the modern world by communism, and in extent and brutality the new one far exceeds anything known to man...
...Likewise Mussolini consistently viewed the Vatican as an opponent, even concluding agreements with it...
...This has been constantly criticized and ridiculed by the other side...
...Principles and rules of eondue* have to be revised every day...
...Belief in program and science animated these trends and movements, often contrary to the attitude of the church...
...As an institution, the Inqusition has been resur...
...LIKE EVERY OTHER GREAT movement in human history, Catholicism has had its ups and downs...
...it tried to stop the growing Nazi movement...
...The Inquisition was once a tool of the Catholic church...
...In the I830's and '40's, Russian communism reverted to the harshest form of family law...
...Today, the world leader of communism rivals the Pope's claim of infallibility...
...Catholicism is most conservative in its rules regarding marriage and divorce, v/hile other religions and political parties often try to liberalize the law in these respects...
...More than once the Vatican has condemned and banished independent science and "modernist"trends in the arts...
...today, such Indexes exist mainly in nations tinder/ communist control...
...The church entered a new period of martyrdom and heroism after the second World War when communism extended its power over Central and Eastern Europe with its prevalent Catholic population...
...The resistance of Catholic leaders to the new dictatorships is all the more admirable because they realize their weakness in the face of an enemy resolved to destroy them and to reduce their church in Central Europe to the same level as in Russia—to that of a servant of the government...
...COMMUNISM'S IDEOLOGICAL ORIGIN extends to the liberal movements of the' 19th century and, reaching deeper into the past, to the traditions of laic science and the Renaissance On the other hand, is it not paradoxical that communism has revived and strengthened many traits once opposed by it aj jypfcal of the Cathadic church...
...When Hitler reached power in Germany, he had to persecute not only the leftist political groups, but the Catholic too...
...hundreds are in prison...
...In regard to political issues, however, their rapprochment, which has in fact been taking place over the past two or three decades, should become closer under the present circumstances...
...It would be mora important to reassess the relationship between liberalism and Catholicism In general, In ttoe light of what has happened in recent decades...
...In France,the cure was a mainstay of resistance to Hitlerism, and the Catholic MRP emerged out of the war as one of the strongest popular political movements...
Vol. 32 • August 1949 • No. 32
