By Philip H. Rand, Senior Wickliffe Preacher
* This article appeared in The English Churchman in November, 1962, and was sent in by Rev. D. MacLean. We received permission to reprint it some time ago.—Editor.
Yugoslavia is one of the most interesting states in Europe and unique in its political set up. It is under a Communist Government but owes no allegiance to Russia. The story is told of a man who soon after the second world war shouted, ‘Down with Stalin’ and was jailed for four years. On his release he determined to become more popular with the state and shouted, ‘Long live Stalin.’ He was quickly arrested and jailed for another four years. Although the tale is probably apocryphal it illustrates the modern and dramatic change in Yugoslavia during recent years.
Yugoslavia is also unique in its national composition, for it has two alphabets, three religions, four languages, five nations and six republics. Broadly speaking the Croats and Slovenes are Roman Catholics, while the Serbs and Macedonians belong to the Orthodox Greek church. There is a strong minority of Turks and some inland towns have a large Turkish population complete with their mosques. Protestants are weak numerically but the Baptists have thirty-four churches and the Methodists eleven. It is a land of strange contrasts where the east meets the west. In a day’s journey one may see Roman Catholic steeples, Greek Orthodox domes and Moslem minarets silhouetted against the sky.
When the second world war commenced Yugoslavia was neutral but under great pressure by the Nazi powers. In March 1941 Germany made demands requiring total support. Prince Paul complied but at once there was a popular uprising, and a military coup d’état deposed him, set up a new government and established Peter as king. Within two weeks the Nazis invaded the land and after an easy victory the whole of Yugoslavia was partitioned among the enemy powers.
Forced Conversions
Anton Pavelic became the quisling ruler of Croatia and his Ustasi (Catholic Action) carried out a violent suppression of the Serbs, with mass executions and forced conversions to the Roman Catholic religion. The Ustasi took their oath before a table covered with the Croat national flag on which was placed a knife, a revolver and a crucifix. Dr. Pavelic decreed that Croatia was to be purged not only of the Serbs but also of the Jews and Gypsies. His minister of Education and Religion, Dr. Mile Budak said, “We shall kill some of the Serbs, we shall expel others, and the remainder will be forced to embrace the Roman Catholic faith.” Among the first to welcome the quisling leader Dr. Pavelic, was Monsignor Stepinac, Roman Catholic Archbishop of Zagreb and Metropolitan of Croatia. Stepinac issued orders for special masses of thanksgiving that the Ustasi had taken power. “The Schismatics,” he said, “are the curse of Europe—almost worse than the Protestants.” Hundreds of priests served with Pavelic’s Ustasi troops. For a period of four years the Roman Catholic church in Yugoslavia, with Archbishop Stepinac as its head, carried out the most spectacular attempt in modern times to liquidate its opponents and win another trophy for the Pope.
Immediately Dr. Pavelic came to power he regarded it as his sacred mission to clear Bosnia of Schismatics, although Orthodox Serbs alone outnumbered Roman Catholic Croats by more than two to one. Pavelic went to Rome to see Mussolini and to be received in special audience by the Pope.
The Roman Catholic church by its Ustasi officials now began forcibly converting Orthodox Serbs to the Roman religion. In the town of Glinia seven hundred people were executed in the church itself. Sometimes as an alternative to murdering the inhabitants of a village they were offered immediate conversion to the Roman church. Soon throughout the country Roman priests were besieged by crowds of panic stricken men, women and children clamouring to be received into the Pope’s church in the hope that their lives would be spared.
The deputy mayor of Mostar stated that in one day seven hundred Schismatics were thrown into a pit. From the same district six railway truck loads of women and girls under 18 were taken to Surmnaci and thrown from mountains over a precipice. Many Roman Catholic priests wholeheartedly supported the massacre and in one parish a priest said, “Until now we have worked for the Catholic faith with missal and crucifix. Now the time has come to go to work with rifle and revolver.”
The Bishop of Mostar however became truly alarmed at the ferocity of Catholic Action. Not only were “heretics” done to death but actual converts. His report stated, “While the new converts are in church attending Mass, they seize them, young and old, men and women, drag them outside and send them to eternity in droves.” The brutalities at this time caused Archbishop Stepinac to send a moderate letter of protest to Dr. Pavelic, but as he retained all his decorations and office it had little influence.
On the other hand Archbishop Saric of Sarajevo went all out to win the favour of Pavelic and celebrated Christmas 1941 by addressing a fulsome verse in his honour stating,
“Thou, great leader, guard our homeland
Guard our freedom and our life.”
These crimes by Pavelic and Catholic Action produced an effect that had not been foreseen. It caused the Serb population of Bosnia to rise almost to a man and take to the mountains, determined to sell their lives dearly. The coming of Tito in person at the head of a Partisan army strengthened the Bosnian resistance yet further.
Pavelic lived at Zagreb with his family and went daily to Mass in the private chapel he had built to prove his Catholic piety. From here he organised massacres throughout the land. Bosnia ran with blood. Bands of Ustasi roamed the countryside with knives, bludgeons and machine guns slaughtering Serbian men, women and little children. Pavelic enlisted the help of Bosnian Moslems to help in the murder and made them a present of a handsome new mosque in the centre of Zagreb.
Cardinal Stepinac
By the end of 1942 Archbishop Stepinac was Chaplain General of the Croat Armed Forces. He accepted and wore high decorations which Pavelic had bestowed on him. The horrors and massacres increased. At Veljun all the men of the village between 16 and 60 were rounded up one morning and shot. It was not a case of fighting, not even a reprisal but sheer murder. A horde of invaders without the slightest notice collected the men and shot 620 of them. A monument has been erected that commemorates the tragedy. The activities of the Roman Catholic clergy were particularly intense throughout Slavonia.
The hatred and ferocity of Catholic Action in Yugoslavia was akin to Hitler’s insanity against the Jews. During the war they murdered 600,000 Serbs. While these massacres proceeded with increasing horrors the Roman Catholic Archbishop of Sarajevo and Cardinal Stepinac himself received high honours from the head of the puppet state and retained to the end their posts in the Ustasi forces. When Cardinal Stepinac was asked during his trial about the Glinia massacre when Serbs were butchered in front of their altars and were forced to be baptised at the rifle’s point he replied, “We can readily take the blame for that, my conscience is clear.” His answer became a byword all over Yugoslavia.
Throughout Yugoslavia in shops, restaurants and hotels can be seen pictures of President Tito, and to all appearances he is the most popular figure in the land. People remember his courage and exploits during the war when he and his partisans fought the invaders against overwhelming odds.
Tito’s real name is Josip Brog and he was born in May, 1892, in the Croatian village of Kumrovec. Tito was brought up in the Roman Catholic religion and attended St. Roko’s church at Kumrovec. He himself mentions an experience when as a boy he served as an acolyte to the parish priest. To quote Tito’s own words, “Once after the service I could not remove the vestments from the big fat priest, who was in a hurry. He was irritated and slapped me. I never went to church again.”
Kremlin Defied
Tito was wounded and taken prisoner by the Russians during the first world war. While in Russia he imbibed Communism and returned to spread its beliefs in his land. He spent periods in prison and became one of the chief leaders of the party. Russia was his Utopia and Stalin his ideal.
Later experiences, however, disillusioned him and there came the break with Stalin in 1948. Tito was heard to say, “Now that I have defied the Kremlin I have never been gladder of anything in my life.” Tito was helped by the west and in March, 1953, he visited England. He was met by the Duke of Edinburgh, lunched with the Queen at Buckingham Palace and dined at 10 Downing Street. The visit aroused vigorous opposition among the Communists and Roman Catholics of Great Britain.
The most popular foreign language in Yugoslavia is English. This is not only being taught in the schools but people in all walks of life are learning it. I had a happy thought almost at the last moment to slip in our cases a number of English Gospels with our Croatian booklets. These we found most useful.