Church Against State

Britain last week recalled its Ambassador to Chile -- for an unusual reason: Chilean maltreatment of a British citizen. The citizen was Sheila Cassidy, 37, a surgeon who worked at an emergency clinic in a working-class area of Santiago. Dr. Cassidy had been summoned by a Roman Catholic priest to treat a leftist political fugitive for gun shot wounds in October. She was arrested in November and finally released last week. Upon landing in London, she declared that after her arrest she was stripped by Chilean police, subjected to electric-shock torture and spent 2 1/2 weeks in solitary confinement. Britain's Labor government had previously been restrained in its criticisms of the Chilean junta -- a major buyer of British products. But Foreign Secretary James Callaghan denounced the ordeal of Dr.

Cassidy. "No British government," he said, "can accept such uncivilized, brutal treatment of a British subject in the hands of a foreign government." At week's end Chile denied that Dr. Cassidy had been tortured.

Tense Face-off. Apart from the diplomatic confrontation between London and Santiago, the case of Dr. Cassidy highlighted one of the central dramas in Chile today: a tense face-off between church and state over the is sues of human rights and torture. In the months since the military coup that toppled Salvador Allende, the country's Christian leaders have emerged as the principal opposition to the repressive measures imposed by President Augusto Pinochet and his junta. As a result, priests, nuns and Christian laymen have become the objects of roundups by DINA, the dreaded Chilean secret police.

The government has tried to avoid a fight with the Roman Catholic Church, to which 84% of Chileans belong. Last April, Pinochet privately assured Raul Cardinal Silva Henriquez, the Archbish op of Santiago, that "things would improve." A conference of the country's bishops agreed to say nothing about the torture of political dissidents. Things seemed to improve somewhat. Political arrests in Santiago decreased from 100 in March to 80 in April. But by August, the monthly arrest figure was up to 141; by September, it stood at 205. The bishops were particularly disturbed by the mounting evidence that Pinochet was not living up to his pledge.

Dr. Cassidy, who has indicated her desire to become a nun and had been sympathetic to Chile's Liberal clerics, got involved in the developing church-state conflict almost by accident. Two priests -- one an American-born Chilean, Father Gerald Wheelan, 48, and the other a native Chilean, Monsignor Rafael Maroto -- had given sanctuary to Martin Hernandez and Nelson Gutierez, members of a small remnant of the Movement of the Revolutionary Left (MIR). Gutierez, wounded in a Shootout with the secret police, was brought to a convent in Santiago. Monsignor Maroto summoned Dr. Cassidy, who drained abscessed bullet wounds in Gutierez's leg. Another priest, Fernando Salas, later smuggled Gutierez and a guerrilla companion, Maria Elena Bachman, into the embassy of the Holy See. Wheelan and Maroto were arrested along with Cassidy; Salas and another priest gave themselves up. All were subsequently released. None of the priests has charged that he was tortured.

Two of the priests were members of the Committee for Peace, an autonomous, church-supported group dedicated to helping political prisoners. Angered, Pinochet asked Cardinal Silva to close down the committee. After the cardinal reluctantly agreed, the government announced an amnesty for political prisoners--which, as it turned out, applied only to those neither convicted nor charged. With at least five of its members still under arrest and with Dr.

Cassidy providing convincing evidence that its work with political prisoners is far from over in Chile, the church announced that its mission would continue --this time under the official auspices of individual dioceses.

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