Pacelli sends a report to Gasparri about political dangers to the Church arising from the Socialist government in Bavaria - June 19, 1919
Source: Timeline
June 19, 1919 Archbishop Faulhaber writes his fellow Bavarian Bishops about steps to exercise better control and influence in matters of Church-State relations and Bavarian Government cultural policy.
Also on June 19th, Pacelli sends a report to Gasparri about political dangers to the Church arising from the Socialist government in Bavaria. English translation
June 19, 1919 Faulhaber to the Bavarian Bishops:
Your Bishop-Graces!
The Most Reverend Lord Archbishop of Bamberg is giving today the suggestion by express mail, for the parliamentary consultations about the constitution outline, that a theological commission be placed at the disposal of the Bavarian People’s Party as a quiet adviser, in order to review in advance the ecclesiastical harmlessness and acceptability of individual provisions to formulate public statements and modifications and additions. It is expressly remarked that the delegates of the Bavarian People’s Party themselves desire the establishment of such a commission, which can make decisions in the name of the Bishops. Given the enormous significance of such advice about the new constitution, which will decide about the State-Church life of Bavaria, nothing in this matter may be delayed.
The Lord Archbishop declared himself ready if needed to summon to Bamberg the commission members specified by the individual Bishops, whereby the named members can also be empowered by the several Bishops. Since this commission must work on the one hand as expeditiously as possible, and on the other hand as inconspicuously as possible, it is recommended that a not overly large number of experts be engaged, and to the extent possible, those who otherwise are already in Bamberg. I am thinking that Auxiliary Bishop Dr. Senger, a professor at the Bamberg University, Dr. Wohlmuth, Dr. Eggersdorfer (to whom I assign the representation of my Diocese) would be sufficient, if it would be possible for His Excellency the Archbishop of Bamberg to take part personally in the most important consultations, or if His Grace the Bishop of Eichstätt were reachable in individual cases and not, like most of us presently, committed to trips for confirmations. For the formulation and presentation of an issue in the press, Cathedral Deacon Dr. Kiefl has a very special knack.
Thereby I allow myself the following remarks:
First of all, the parliamentary side of the Government must be brought around to putting themselves in contact with Church authorities as to Church-related issues, and not merely through delegates as intermediaries. In decisive essential points, where we bear heavy responsibility, we can indeed only ourselves make the decision and not hand it over to the members of a commission.
Secondly, the commission must also not forget that insofar as points under negotiation touch upon the relationship between Church and State, and thus more or less the Concordat, neither the Episcopate nor the commission is competent, but rather only the Nunciature. Here the People’s Party must remind the Minister for Education and Religion, either in a private meeting or in a public session, that the Concordat is a bilateral treaty under international law and therefore cannot be handled unilaterally by the Bavarian Government like a mere piece of paper without diplomatic interaction with the ecclesiastical side. If the Bavarian Government were to deny diplomatic respect again and unlawfully violate even one point of a lawful treaty, then the political representation would have to, either directly or via the Bishops, inform the Apostolic Nunciature, so that the Holy Father can register a timely protest or otherwise say a clear word to Catholics in Bavaria about our situation.
The Lord Nuncio has at the moment, upon the orders of His Holiness, taken up residence in Switzerland (Rorschach); but our correspondence is sent daily to him under seal. I can observe confidentially that the “agreement” between the Bavarian Government and the People’s Party about the Government program, which indeed outlined the new culture policy, namely in the unsettling sentence at the top: “The People’s Party obligates itself to the implementation of the following program,” was received with great distress by the competent Church authorities, as this text must have aroused the impression that all further negotiations and amendments of the outline were ruled out in advance. In any case, the religion policy of the Bavarian Government cannot be established constitutionally without a clear enunciation of its relationship to the Concordat.
I am thinking that the advisory commission should prepare the question of school policy, which is ... that of church policy, and prepare them both in the same way. Also on this point I request that the answers of the Most Reverend Lords be sent directly to Bamberg, since from Sunday on I will be out for three weeks for confirmations. The April decree [about school policy] which frees male and female teacher candidates who were not in the war to send themselves into religion and music as examination subjects, has meanwhile occasioned my Diocesan Ordinariate to register a protest with the Ministry, with the agreement of the other Ordinariates...
June 19, 1919 Pacelli to Gasparri:
Re: Political-religious situation in Bavaria
Most Reverend Eminence,
The situation in Bavaria, not only from a social point of view, but also from a political-religious perspective, continues to appear full of dangers, and the interests of the Church appear to be seriously threatened, so that there is increasing fear that the prediction of the Archbishop of Munich may be realized, from the sermon he delivered on December 31st last year, when he warned the faithful even then that if separation of Church and State is carried out in Bavaria, it will be done not according to the American system, but in the French manner.
The object of new concerns has been the text of the proposed Constitution, presented by the Hoffmann Government at the end of this May (Enclosure I). In it is clearly revealed the influence of two different tendencies, both of them, however, hostile to the Church: on the one hand, that of the liberal-bureaucratic spirit reigning from the times of the famous von Lutz Ministry, and on the other hand, radical anticlericalism, begun by the first revolutionary Ministry. In this way Bavaria, as during the Bolshevik agitation, would seem to want to be first in Germany also in anti-religious evolution.
Yet such a proposal could not produce surprise, since it emanated from a purely Socialist Ministry. Shortly after its publication, however, a Coalition Cabinet was constituted in Bavaria, as is certainly well known to Your Most Reverend Eminence. In it the Bavarian Volkspartei (former Center Party), although it was the most numerous party in the Landtag, obtained only two portfolios, those being the Ministry of Agriculture (Baron Freyberg) and that of Finance (Mr. Speck), just like the Democratic Party which, although it could count on half the Deputies, also has two Ministries (Justice – Dr. Müller; and Commerce – Mr. Hamm), while the Socialist Party, which is the strongest party only after the Center Party, counts in the new Government all of five members, among whom Hoffmann has the Minister Presidency and the Ministry of Education and Cultural Affairs. But what is even more serious, contemporaneously with the announcement of the formation of the said Cabinet, the agreements (Vereinbarungen) concluded on this occasion among the three said parties were also published, to the implementation of which the respective delegations in the Landtag had jointly obligated themselves. In truth, in the part of these agreements regarding Culture Policy, there are various points which cannot fail to cause grave concerns. Such as, for example, the Catholic religion no longer has any prerogatives vis-à-vis the State, since all religious societies without distinction enjoy equal rights and equal protection from the State; their property rights and the existing obligations of the State toward them are to be suppressed by means of a law (at least as to this aspect), etc. In what then concerns the most important school question, the doctrine of the Socialist Party prevails. The well known decree of Minister President Hoffmann of this past January, which bestowed the right of parents and guardians not to have their children attend religious instruction, is not only accepted in the aforementioned agreements, notwithstanding all the protests of the Catholic population, but even made worse, to the extent that the option is given to students, who have reached the age of sixteen, of not attending such instruction, even without the agreement of their parents. Also permitted is the inter-denominational school if desired by a majority of the parents and guardians, etc. Certainly it is impossible to fail to recognize the extraordinary difficulties of the present hour, especially the danger of new political-social upheavals, while I also do not believe that the good intentions of the leaders of the Bavarian Volkspartei can be called into doubt. But in religious questions there are limits that Catholics are not allowed to transgress, just as there are other points that they can endure but not endorse. In particular, then, it is deplorable that the aforesaid party has accepted those fundamentals without taking account that they, at least in part, are in opposition to the Concordat and thus violate the rights of the Holy See. And that is why, as soon as I became aware of the agreements in question, by means of the public press, I immediately wrote to the Archbishop of Munich expressing my surprise at the Catholics having straightaway given in on extremely serious matters that have not only previously been the subject of public demonstrations by the Bavarian Bishops, but also touch upon the Concordat. I therefore asked him courteously to furnish me news in this regard and above all to inform me how, why and in virtue of what authorities the Bavarian Volkspartei presumed to conclude agreements that also contradict Concordat provisions, and what guarantees this party had moreover obtained eventually in compensation, for the future of the Catholic Church.
Archbishop von Faulhaber has now responded that he has been able to ask about the reasons from the priest and Professor Dr. Eggersdorfer, member of the Bavarian Volkspartei. He stated that the program of the new Government as published in the press does not correspond fully and literally with the official text. Moreover, the passage that is found at the head of the agreements in question: “The parties obligate themselves and their delegations in the Landtag to the implementation of the following program,” is not understood by Dr. Eggersdorfer in the sense that the points there contained are definitively fixed and the way closed to modifications during the public deliberation in the Landtag. Concerning the genesis of these agreements that have very much surprised and terrified the Catholics in Bavaria, the aforesaid Professor recounted that about three weeks earlier, Minister Hoffmann had the leaders of the Bavarian Volkspartei and the Democratic Party come to him, and he declared to them that either both those parties enter the Ministerial Cabinet or the Majority Socialists would have left the government and abandoned Bavaria to Bolshevism. In order to preserve the land from a return of the horrible Councils Republic, the aforementioned parties would be disposed to participate in the government. In the negotiations in this regard, the leaders of the Bavarian Volkspartei would have had before them moreover the even more radical provisions of the ...
The Archbishop, who did not fail to remind this party by means of Dr. Eggersdorfer of the points that must be upheld in conformity to the doctrine of the Church, adds in his letter that it would not currently be difficult to take away from the Bavarian Volkspartei the loyalty of the Catholic Bavarians, but that it would be very difficult to succeed in substituting a new political organization for the one already existing. Archbishop von Faulhaber also notes that the concessions by the leaders of the party on the school question are all the less understandable in that the Bavarian Bishops had already explained the line to take in this regard, in a Memorandum sent to every Landtag deputy (Enclosure III).
I thanked the said Archbishop for the information he communicated to me, exhorting him to continue his work in defense of religion and insisting anew upon the rights due the Holy See in virtue of the Concordat, rights that are not licit for Catholics to compromise.
The famous Corpus Christi procession could not take place this year in Munich. Archbishop von Faulhaber indicated to me that he had done his part to have it celebrated, even though the military authorities maintained they could not give any guarantee of security; but the Military Command for the city declared categorically that in Munich a state of war is proclaimed, and not just a state of siege as in other cities of Bavaria, and thus all public gatherings were prohibited. It was feared, moreover, that if religious processions were permitted, it would not be possible to prohibit demonstrations and parades of the Independent Socialists. Thus, notwithstanding the regret of the Catholic population for this omission, it was necessary to yield to force majeure.
This past Sunday, the 15th of the month, the elections in the regions, districts and local communities took place in Bavaria. These had a complex result, on the one hand, a considerable increase in votes for the Bavarian Volkspartei (formerly Center Party), on the other, within the ambit of the Socialist Party, a very notable shift of power in favor of the Independents. The collapse of the old Majority Socialist Party, which shows how much, in a very short time, the process of radicalization of the masses has progressed, is especially apparent in Munich, the city of the Bolshevik Councils Republic. In contrast with the elections to the Landtag this past January, the percentage of votes for the Majority Socialists fell there from 43 to 19%, and increased for the Independents from 5 to 32%, for the Democratic Party went from 19 to 14% and for the Bavarian Volkspartei increased from 26 to 28%. The 18,331 votes obtained by the Independents in the Bavarian capital this past January leaped on Sunday to 77,284, while those for the Majority Socialists diminished from 117,363 to 45,559.
Closing, I humbly bow to kiss the Sacred Purple ...
Source: www.Pacelli-Edition.de, Dokt 260