SELECTIONS BY PAULY FONGEMIE
Left Turn
Communist influence upon the Council was certain to be
considerable if only because of the presence of Russian Orthodox
observers. It scarcely needs pointing out that they were present only
because the Soviet government felt that this would further its policy
of détente - and it is
also unnecessary to lay stress on the fact that for the Russians' détente is simply a tactic
to be used wherever it will help in their campaign for world
domination. The changing relationship
between the Vatican and the Kremlin since the death of Pope Pius XII
has involved a great deal of give and take - but the giving has all
been on the part of the Vatican and the taking on the part of the
Kremlin.
Communists have never made a secret of the fact that they regard
"dialogue" as a weapon in their bid for power. Once power is achieved
it is normally the sincere if naive dialoguer who is the first to be
eliminated. Fr. Henri Chambre, S.J., has provided a very
perceptive analysis of the Communist "outstretched hand" technique in
his book Christianity and Communism.
He explains how this policy is based
upon Communists making common cause with Catholics in political and
ideological campaigns during which the Communists refrain from overt
attacks upon the Christian religion but attempt to alienate the
ordinary faithful from the hierarchy and the Vatican:
The policy of the "outstretched hand" to Catholics with its corollary -
a cleavage between the faithful and the hierarchy - ultimately implies
the claim that in practice the Communist Party should be the arbiter
and the guardian of the Christian faith and Christian attitudes of mind
for those Christians who accept such a situation ...
From even a brief analysis of the
Communist tactic in a country like France, where Communists are not in
the majority - and the same situation is found elsewhere - one fact is
evident, namely, that under the pretext of advocating certain social,
economic and political claims, an effort is made to win increasingly
large groups of Christians over to Communism, with all that this
implies.
To achieve this, Communism monopolizes
the great ideals of justice, brotherhood and peace and asks the
Christian masses to work with it in order to make them realities. Communists
believe that common action along Communist lines is the best means of
winning the wavering masses over to its side. All the more so since
common action is always accompanied by Communist explanations of the
situation which, little by little will commend the justice of the
Communist position to the man who is carried along by this action and,
since he has no leisure, forgets to reflect upon all the suggestions
that are made to him. Further, the
Communist criticism of the real or imaginary weaknesses of the Church
leads the Christian who listens to it without submitting it to serious
examination - and this in many cases could not be undertaken - to doubt
the mystery of the Church's holiness which cannot be immediately
identified with that of her members, clerical or lay. At the same time
Communism shakes a man's faith in the God-man, Jesus Christ, and
prepares the ground for the acceptance of the Marxist concept of
religion as a product of human social activity caught up in and
conditioned by given economic, social and political factors. [Christianity and Communism,
Hawthorn Books, 1960, pp. 37/38]
Another description of the manner in which Communists use dialogue can
be found in an analysis of the Marxist-Vatican détente,
published by the Institute for the Study of Conflict, which is
certainly the most reputable and authoritative body in Britain
concerned with the study of Communist subversion on a world wide basis.
[Conflict Studies, ed. Brian Crozier, No. 45, Marxism and the Church of Rome,
London] In this analysis, a principal contributor to the Jesuit journal
Civilta Cattolica is quoted as
follows:
Communist parties tend to use dialogue to expand their audience and
make the conquest of power easier. The Christian-Marxist contradiction
is insoluble, insofar as every solution implies that one or the other
renounces part of its very essence.
Commenting on this, the author of the analysis explains:
This statement was simply a repetition
of the fundamental reason why the Church has always condemned Marxism,
namely, because of its essentially atheistic character which renders
any reconciliation with Christianity impossible. The whole
structure of Das Kapital, as
of the Communist Manifesto,
rests on the belief in philosophical materialism, which requires man to
be an end in himself and the explanation of all things. The idea of God
enters into it only as a contrast and as an example of the suspension
of the intellect, and evasion of effort and the survival of a
prehistoric mentality. Marxism and
Christianity are like fire and water and any mixture resulting from an
encounter can only leave the one or the other unrecognizable.
Notwithstanding the numerous experiments - invariably failures - this
same dialogue is still being pursued both in the political and
religious spheres which merge through the ecumenical movement. [Ibid., pp. 11/12]
Communist tactics are essentially
pragmatic. Their aim is to achieve power and the means they use to win
converts who will further this aim is a matter of indifference to them.
All that matters is to find "those who will further its ends." [Ibid.,
p. 12] It is worth noting
that the fundamental Marxist belief, that "man is an end in himself and
the explanation of all things," is not simply an axiom held in common
with the mainstream of European Masonry but has clearly become,
implicitly or explicitly, the basis of contemporary Modernism in both
its Catholic and Protestant varieties. As was made clear in Chapter
VIII, the ecumenical movement, as it exists at present, is moving not
towards Christian unity but unity in Rationalism.
When interviewed in September 1974,
Cardinal Mindszenty explained how Communists and democrats do not use
the word "co-existence" in the same sense. "What does the word mean? To
speak of co-existence between East and West is to speak of two
different and unequal concepts. On the one side, the Communist side,
you have an unswerving system which is disciplined despite the fact
that it is based on intrinsic falsehood. On the western side, you have
only a watered-down philosophy, and a lack of any effective unifying
principle.
"It is a hopeless contrast. Ever since the Second World War, the West
has gone on giving up political terrain step by step, merely to appease
the aggressors and traducers." [Sunday Telegraph, Sept. 15, 1974]
... Pope Pius XII had refused to yield one inch to Communist pressure
at the time of the Cardinal's "trial" and imprisonment in 1949. "Can
you imagine a successor of St. Peter who would bow to such demands?" he
had asked a vast crowd present at a public audience. "No!" they roared
back. Pope Pius continued: "The Pope, by Divine promise is, even in his
human weakness, invincible and unshakable, herald of truth and justice,
and of the various principles governing the unity of the Church."
What had been unimaginable in 1949 had become undeniable in 1974. What
brought about this calamitous volte-face
in the Vatican attitude towards Communism? The process began under Pope
John XXIII when, in Pacem in Terris,
he made a distinction between error and the one who errs, and between
false philosophical teachings and the historical movements to which
they have given rise. It was claimed that although once defined the
false teachings always remain the same, the movements to which they
give rise are influenced by historical situations and are subject to
changes of a profound nature. Thus
the condemnation of Communism by earlier Popes could not necessarily be
considered as applying to present day Communists in any particular
country. Communism as such remained wrong, but Communists, either as
individuals or as the Party in a particular country, were not
necessarily so. "Besides," states Pacem in Terris, "who can deny that those movements, in so
far as they conform to the dictates of right reason and are
interpreters of the lawful aspirations of the human person, contain
elements that are positive and deserving of approval?"
... What is quite certain is that
the Russians were delighted with the way the First Session went.
"In an interview published by Novosli,
the Soviet news agency, the two Russian Orthodox observers at the
Council, Archpriest Vitali Borovoy and Archimandrite Vladimir
Kotlyarov, praised the Council's favorable and auspicious beginning as
shown by the appeal of the Council Fathers for peace and by Pope John's
pronouncements. They said they had both been treated with every
consideration in Rome and received by the Pope with 'a real
friendship.' The 'growing prestige of the Russian Orthodox Church in
ecumenical relations and its contributions to the struggle for peace'
had also been reflected by the special attention shown to them by the
Council Fathers, the press and the Roman public generally, they
observed." [The Tablet, Dec.
1, 1962, p. 1169]
... Cardinal Ottaviani had made his own views very clear in 1960 in a
speech which was seen at the time as an explicit criticism of the
projected visit of the Italian president to Russia and has since been
interpreted as an implicit criticism of Pope John's new attitude to
Communism.
"In the twentieth century it is still
necessary to deplore genocide, mass deportations, slaughters like Katyn
Wood and massacres like Budapest. But some still stretch out their
hands to the new Antichrist and even race to see who can first shake
hands with him and exchange sweet smiles. Can a Christian confronted by
one who massacres Christians and insults God smile and flatter? Can a
Christian opt for an alliance with those who prepare for the coming of
Antichrist in countries still free? Can we consider any relaxation of
East-West tensions when the face of Christ is once more spat upon,
crowned with thorns and slapped?" [Inside The Council, R. Kaiser,
London, 1963, p. 44]
There have been suggestions from the fringe of the traditionalist
movement that Pope John had Communist sympathies. Such a suggestion is
quite ludicrous to anyone in the least familiar with his life,
particularly through his own writings such as Journal of a Soul. It is quite certain that Pope John's
policy of replacing anathema by dialogue played into the hands of the
Communists - but this no more indicates that he was sympathetic to
Communism than does Chamberlain's policy of appeasement to Hitler
indicate that the British Prime Minister was pro-Nazi. History contains countless examples of
political and religious leaders whose errors of judgment have been most
costly to those for whom they were responsible.
On 15 November 1960, Pope John
received birthday greetings from Khrushchev who called him "a man of
peace." It is hardly likely that anyone needs telling that to be
praised by a Soviet leader as "a man of peace" is equivalent to being
called "a man whose policies are helping the Soviet plan for world
domination."
... There had been considerable pressure within the Council for
explicit teaching on Communism as such. The Rhine-controlled
commissions which prepared the texts referred only to "atheism".
Cardinal Wyszynski, who had more to fear from speaking out against
Communism than any of his liberal counterparts in the West, demanded
that there should be a schema on
Communism. "... if there is one error
today which is serious and which endangers the world it is indeed this
one." [Un Eveque Parle, Mgr.
M. Lefebvre, Paris, 1974 p. 195] Another Bishop with ample experience
of Communism in action,
Archbishop Paul Yu Pin of Nanking, China, asked in the name of seventy
Fathers for a chapter on Atheistic Communism to be added to the
Constitution. He insisted that the Council must not neglect to discuss
one of the "greatest, most evident and most unfortunate of modern
phenomena" particularly in order to meet the expectations of "those who
groan under the yoke of Communism and are forced to endure
indescribable sorrows unjustly." [Wiltgen, p. 273] During the Second
Session 200
Fathers from 46 countries had demanded a clear refutation of the
errors of Marxism.
... On 13 November 1965, the Commission responsible for the schema of the Constitution on the
Church in the Modern World distributed
the revised version of the schema which, contrary to the rules of the
Council, contained no mention of the 450 interventions and no reference
to Communism. Bishop Carli sent an official protest to the Council
Presidency quoting the Rules of Procedure which stated that "all
amendments must be printed and communicated to the Council Fathers so
that they can decide by vote whether they wish to admit or reject each
one." He quite correctly pointed out that if the Commissions, and all
the Commissions were Rhine Group Commissions, were to decide what the
Council Fathers could and could not be allowed to vote on, then they
rather than the Fathers, constituted the Council. [Wiltgen,
p. 275]
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