Pius XII's Decree Excommunicating Catholics Who Supported Communism
The Vatican excommunicated communists in July 1949 by a decree of the Holy Office. The instrument answered four questions put to it and answered them all in the strictest sense: Catholics may not join communist parties, may not publish, read or distribute their literature, may not vote for them, and those who profess the doctrine are excommunicated as apostates. The timing was Italian. The election of April 1948 had been fought as a straight contest between the Christian Democrats and a Communist-Socialist front, with the church organising civic committees in every parish, priests preaching from the pulpit, and American money and food arriving conspicuously; the Christian Democrats won 48 per cent. The decree consolidated it and applied everywhere. Eastern Europe is where it bit. Cardinal Mindszenty had been tried in Hungary in February 1949 after torture and a show trial, Archbishop Beran was confined in Czechoslovakia, and the Catholic churches of Poland, Hungary and Romania were being brought under state control by the arrest of their bishops and the sponsoring of compliant clergy. The decree gave a clear line to hold and made accommodation impossible for anyone who accepted it. The cost was to Catholic workers and voters in France and Italy who had voted communist for material reasons and were now told they were outside the church. Pius XII's wider record — his silence on the deportation of Europe's Jews — was already being argued about and has been ever since. John XXIII opened negotiations with the eastern governments in 1962.
- Year: 1949 CE
- Category: Religious
