The Red Book

A likely international bestseller, just published by Catholic Action in Rome, is a careful analysis of Communist tactics and techniques in its war against Roman Catholicism. Red Book, a 378-page volume by Albert Gaiters, a Swiss, ticks off the Red record of persecution country by country in documented detail. But most interesting to the general reader is the overall survey of the subject, presented in the first chapter.

"If the church's strength consisted only of its external organization," writes Gaiters, "one would be compelled to say that the Communist regimes had been successful against her because, as things are today, there no longer exists an independent ecclesiastical organization beyond the Iron Curtain: all is directed and controlled by the state." State bureaus of ecclesiastical affairs even write pastoral letters for bishops' signatures.

Captured Canons. Communist regimes use two methods of taking over a diocese. First they find that standard fixture, the "frustrated canon," a clergyman of some intelligence and much ambition who needs little convincing that he can run things better than the bishop. The bishop, the seduction speech runs, is so conservative that he will end by bringing the Communists clamping down on the church, and then how about the souls unshriven, the infants unbaptized? Thus, "bishops, priests and faithful are placed continually before a crisis of conscience. The bishops in particular find themselves faced with the gravest decision: if they refuse to acknowledge the appointment of the candidate [the frustrated canon] he will be nominated without the bishops' consent. This will cause confusion in the diocese and there will be no one left to resist the further demands of the Communists. If, on the other hand, the bishops accept the Communist-nominated priest, the bishop finds himself collaborating with the Communists."

When this corruption from within the local church has been completed, the Communists move into the second phase to damp down the religious zeal so that gradually the Marxian "economic man" will supplant the Christian.

Catacombs an Escape. "Communism has come to the conclusion that it will never succeed in destroying religion with brutal force; open persecution will never suppress the faith but only destroy its public and exterior manifestations. The Communists don't want this. They don't want a church in the catacombs which would escape the Communist Party's and government's control. They want a church that may be active, with administration of the sacraments and even large church attendances, but controlled by them through the choice of the priests in charge. The most tragic aspect of today's persecution is that the church is in servitude, tricked into serving the ends of the godless.

"Communism is the greatest, most dangerous power that the church has ever faced. Mohammedanism wanted to destroy the church materially but left her her soul. Communism would pervert the soul of the church. This is because the church is the greatest obstacle in the path of materialism. There are more Communists who see in Christianity their chief enemy than Christians who see their enemy in Communism.''

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