Relations between the State and the Roman Catholic Church in Croatia, Yugoslavia in the 1970's and 1980's (original) (raw)
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The Croatian Catholic Church since 1990
Religion, State and Society, 1996
Throughout the existence of Yugoslavia the Roman Catholic Church was always made aware that it was a minority Church. Already in the Kingdom of Yugoslavia the Church was unable to obtain a concordat even though the Vatican had obtained similar concordats with most other European governments. Later, after the Second World War, the communist government used the fact of fascist collaboration by a certain sector of the clergy to tarnish the entire Church, even though both the Vatican and Archbishop Stepinac had spoken out during the war to criticise the involvement of Catholic priests within the Ustasa and-at least on Stepinac's part-to condemn Ustasa policies of genocide and expulsion. I Much later, after the election of Karol Wojtyla to the papacy in 1978, despite the strong desire on the part of Slovene and Croatian Catholics to receive their pontiff the communists repeatedly vetoed plans to invite John Paul 11 to the country. In old Yugoslavia-whether the Kingdom of 1918-41 or the socialist state of 1945-912-the Roman Catholic Church was a minority church and was kept in a position of inferiority. Although I have elsewhere explored the 'victim complex' of the Serbian Orthodox Church' the Catholic Church clearly occupied a position inferior to that of the Serbian Orthodox Church in the interwar kingdom, was attacked far more bitterly in communist Yugoslavia than was the Serbian Orthodox Church or the Islamic community, and was from time to time painted as an 'Ustasa Church'; neither the Serbian Church nor the Islamic community suffered any comparable indignity. Under such circumstances the Catholic Church could only breathe a sigh of relief when socialist Yugoslavia broke up. Whatever we might conclude about the benefits and liabilities of socialist Yugoslavia, and about the merits and demerits of its dissolution, from the standpoint of the Catholic Church and Vatican interests the breakup of multiconfessional Yugoslavia was virtually an unmixed blessing. It was therefore no surprise that the Vatican was one of the first states to extend diplomatic recognition to the new Croatian state in 1991. 11 In the days of the Socialist Federative Republic of Yugoslavia (SFRY), the Croatian Catholic Church maintained a presence not only in Croatia but also in Bosnia, in Serbia proper (principally in Belgrade) and in Vojvodina. The number of Croats
On 28 November 1951, Ivo Mallet, British ambassador to Belgrade (1951-1954), 1 sent a telegram to the Foreign Office about an article published in Borba, the official daily paper of the Yugoslavian Communist Party (YCP). The article was the written version of the interview of the YCP Party Secretary, Josip Broz Tito with Drew Pearson, an American journalist. The Yugoslav Party Secretary answered one of the questions the following way: "Finally, I am in a position to tell you that, with or without Vatican consent, we shall settle the question of Stepinac, 2 within the next month at the latest, though it is obvious that he can no longer perform the functions of a high dignitary of the church inside our country." 3 That was the first time that Tito directly indicated the release of the Croatian archbishop, who had been in prison since autumn 1946. Indeed, the archbishop was released on December 5,1951. 4 The event seemed to indicate that the regime started a more liberal religious policy as opposed to the complete subjugation of the Christian faith and the Christian churches, which had characterized the line of * The research for this paper was written was in part supported by the Hungarian Scholarship Board Office Hungarian State Eötvös Scholarship and is based on archival research that took place in the National Archives -Public Records Office, Kew Gardens, London between August-October 2007. 1 Sir William Ivo Mallet, British ambassador to Yugoslavia between 1951 and 1954, and to Spain between 1954 and 1960. 2 Alojzije Stepinac (1898-1960), archbishop of Zagreb, cardinal. He was appointed archbishop in 1937. During World War II he pursued a controversial policy. Even if he did not condemn openly the ustase regime, he criticized the mass conversion of the Serbs to the Catholic faith. For the above-mentioned controversial role, he was sentenced to 16 years of imprisonment in a show trial in 1946. He was released in 1951 to house arrest at his native village. His beatification in 1998 divided public opinion again. 3 Foreign Office Papers, Political Files, The National Archives -Public Records Office, London, (henceforth: PRO FO) 371/95572 RY1781/79. 4 The archbishop was transferred to his native village, KraSnic, where he was put in charge of the local parish. PÉTER VUKMAN 203 PÉTER VUKMAN
The Croatian Catholic Church And The Long Road To Jasenovac
Nordic Journal of Religion and Society, 2011
In Croatia, the relationship of the Catholic Church to the wartime Fascist Ustaša regime has been a bitterly divisive issue. The ecclesiastical leadership does not send official representatives to the main commemoration of the victims of the Ustaša terror, held in April each year at Jasenovac concentration camp, thereby giving the impression that the Church has something to be ashamed of. Indeed, the Church has been accused of complicity in the Ustaša crimes. After considerable vacillation, the Church in September 2009 decided to organize a large priestly pilgrimage to Jasenovac at another date, an event that made big headlines in Croatia. This article chronicles the tortuous road traversed by the Croatian Catholic Church before finally confronting 'the Jasenovac issue' head on. The central questions asked are 'why did it take the Church so long? And what does this tell us about the role of the Catholic Church in Croatian society? 1
Church in Croatia as the Opposition to Itself: Ecumenism as the Victim of Inner Conflicts
Occasional papers on religion in Eastern Europe, (36/3) 2016, p. 51-68, 2016
Taking into consideration the youthful and more mature periods of the life of Frane Franić, the late Archbishop of the Archdiocese of Split-Makarska, and Josip Bozanić, Cardinal of the Roman Catholic Church and the current Archbishop of Zagreb, as one of the most essential and prominent persons in the contemporary history of the Catholic Church in Croatia, whose life and work can serve as a kind of paradigm of the nature of the respective institution, I tried to portray a change in the social activity of the Croatian Catholic community “then and now.” The line that separates these two periods is the years of intensifying inter-ethnic conflicts in the territory of the former Yugoslavia and the bloody disintegration of the respective federation in the nineties. In this sense, this paper shows the discrepancy between the goals and actions of Franić and Bozanić “before and after” this social turbulence, for it indicates the massive change of the entire narrative that took place within the Croatian Catholic community towards the social situation and ecumenism as such. By the symbolic gap between Franić's and Bozanić's youthful and more mature periods, one has tried to create a vivid picture through which it will be much easier to understand the frustration within Croatian Catholicism that arises due to the realization of where it could be today if it followed the progressive spirit of Vatican II and where it finds itself now when it is immersed in the ethnonational mud and struggles with various ideological challenges.
NJRS The Croatian Catholic Church And The Long Road To Jasenovac
Nordic Journal of Religion and Society, 2011
In Croatia, the relationship of the Catholic Church to the wartime Fascist Ustaša regime has been a bitterly divisive issue. The ecclesiastical leadership does not send official representatives to the main commemoration of the victims of the Ustaša terror, held in April each year at Jasenovac concentration camp, thereby giving the impression that the Church has something to be ashamed of. Indeed, the Church has been accused of complicity in the Ustaša crimes. After considerable vacillation, the Church in September 2009 decided to organize a large priestly pilgrimage to Jasenovac at another date, an event that made big headlines in Croatia. This article chronicles the tortuous road traversed by the Croatian Catholic Church before finally confronting ‘the Jasenovac issue’ head on. The central questions asked are ‘why did it take the Church so long? And what does this tell us about the role of the Catholic Church in Croatian society?1
Vladimir Bakarić's stance towards the Catholic church in Croatia 1945-1953
Review of Croatian History, 2007
The goal of this work is to show, based on available sources, the positions and actions of Vladimir Bakarić toward the Catholic Church. In literature which has previously appeared, historians have in large part only indirectly discussed Bakarić’s stance concerning and actions taken toward the Catholic Church. In this work, authors seek to chronologically collect his statements as well as his actions concerning this topic and analyze same within the political and other contexts.