THE CHURCH IN ELECTION CAMPAIGN

AIM Zagreb, 10 April, 1997

At mess in a Zagreb suburb, a priest saluted the present Minister of justice and, by the way, called the believers to give their votes to this "honest man" in the elections. The same Minister allowed to have his picture taken while receiving holy communion. Campaigning of the priests for representatives of the ruling party is no exception. Vice Chairman of the Assembly happened to visit the Carmelites during the election campaign. In HDZ tv spots, Tudjman is often shaking hands with Cardinal Kuharic and the Holy Father, so it turns out that the Kaptol and the Vatican have blessed the HDZ. At a specific pre-election rally in Medjugorje, the Croatian President even explicitly said so. He bragged, very arbitrarily, that during his visit to Zagreb the Pope "gave full support to our policy". Tudjman's visit to Herzegovina should have shown his closeness with the Church. Embracing with friars from Herzegovina, the Croatian President demonstrated a high level of intimacy. The official Church did not protest against election abuses of the Pope and the Cardinal.

In answer to the question whether it was true that the lower clergy was again openly advocating in favour of the HDZ, Zagreb Bishop Marko Culej denied that it had anything to do with the "general stance" of the Church. "If any such case occurs, then it is not the Church which is behind it, but that particilar priest, the individual", he said. "All the parties wish to have the Church for themselves, but the Church does not wish to be drawn into party policy, but fights for the general good", claims Culej. The Bishop who is believed to be one of the candidates who might succeed Kuharic, reminds that the Church has called the believers in a special message to vote in the elections, but did not wish to tell them who to vote for, it "left this to their conscience". It was recommended to them to responsibly and conscientiously choose a political program and persons they thought to be the best, and the bishops, it was said, "have set their hearts on having candidates elected who will advocate social life in accordance with Christian conceptions of man, family, society, nation and state".

Contrary to Culej, in the Easter column in Feral Tribune weekly newspaper, priest and publicist Luka Vicentic claims that the Church participates in the election campaign of the ruling party: "Church dignitaries, all dressed up, are blessing most frequently Potemkin's villages created and controlled by the Croatian authorities", writes Vicentic. The general impression is that the stance of the Church is, to say the least, ambiguous. Underneath the principled neutrality, bishops and priests are hiding that they are working in favour of the ruling party. Such an impression is intensified by the fact that the Church has lately completely blunted its social criticism. Social stratification in Croatia, on the one hand - social poverty, on the other - social ruthlessness, was for some time the main separation line between the Kaptol and the Presidential Palace. Nowadays, the Church is silent about it.

It can be understood that there are two reasons for such, indeed ambiguous behavior. Apart from social issues, the top of the Church profoundly agrees with Tudjman's policy. This has especially become evident lately by the tolerant attitude of Croatian bishops to ethnic engineering. For example, representatives of the Church played a significant role in colonization of Kistanje. Before the fall of Krajina, mostly Serb population had lived there, and nowadays people from Janjevo in Kosovo are arriving to their houses as colonizers. Priests and bishops have encouraged these people to take such a step. People hesitated to enter someone else's homes, it was neither convenient nor safe. The Church organized special "spiritual preparation" for great migration and on the occasion Zadar Archbishop Ivan Prendja said to the people from Janjevo that their "moving to Kistanje was the will of God", that they were "coming to their own", that "our state and those who are responsible know what they are doing". "Even if there were some unresolved problems - they will be solved by inter-state contracts", Archbishop Prendja tried to convince them. Practically open approval of some bishops to projects of exchange of the population and property of displaced person, is explained by connoisseurs by their conviction that return of the Serbs conceals the threat of a new rebellion and war.

The other reason is fear of return of communists. The Church is afraid that the leftists could win the elections, that is the SDP. As the rating of this party is rising in the public, the Church is becoming closer to the HDZ. Beginning his public litanies by open propaganda in favour of the ruling party, retired Archbishop Frane Franic will demand public confession "that the wonderful Croatian Army, led by its commander-in-chief Franjo Tudjman, liberated our Croatian people from the communist and Serb aggression". Franic also said that it was "impossible to acquire moral guarantees that these neo-communist parties, especially the SDP would respect freedom of the Church".

Perhaps the best example of this alleged partisan neutrality of the Church which in fact conceals crude campaigning for the HDZ, are statements of priest Ivo Martinic, "the best known Catholic preacher from Dubrovnik". Stressing that he is formally not a member of any party, he says: "I have been and I remain with the people, in favour of their aspirations and desires which are best and most consistently represented by the Croat Democratic Community. According to my opinion, it is still the most massive historical movement for revival and consolidation of independent Croatia". Contrary to the HDZ, Martinic assesses, "the communists have nothing to fascinate us with, they have nowhere to lead us". From his words, it is also easy to make out why the Church has suddenly rejected social issues. He says that the HDZ will know when time comes to expropriate its nouveaux riches, and even "the Church itself, if it becomes that". That is how the HDZ has drawn a confession from the clergy itself that it was a greater moral authority than the Church. The circles around the Church have even begun proving that freedom was more important than bread, so that people must not allow themselves to be imprisoned by bread, in other words by social issues, that the important thing was to preserve "freedom". What this freedom implies - these preachers do not precisely say, but it is quite clear from their statements why the Church is not concerned about social injustice any more.

There are opinions that Kaptol could repeat the mistake of the Polish Church. Afraid of the return of the "reds", the Church hierarchy in that country openly advocated denial of election support to Social Democrats. The Poles did not obey, so in fact the Polish Church lost the elections. Luka Vicentic announces that the Catholic Church in Croatia will have to reply how it endured "the challenge of freedom which was almost given to it on a platter after the fall of communism", why it failed to recognize local pharisees, whether it resisted abuses. Instead to "unite with all those whose eyes were fixed on the new world", primarily the workers, the Church fails to recognize signs of the time, so Vicentic concludes that the new world in Croatia will be created in Croatia without it.

JELENA LOVRIC