Security v. Morality?

"Communism is intrinsically wrong and no one who would save Christian civilization may collaborate with it in any undertaking whatsoever."*

In these plain-spoken words, the late Pope Pius XI defined the Roman Catholic Church's implacable stand against the modern world's biggest heresy. Last week, the Vatican's newspaper advocated compromise with Soviet Russia, widely regarded as Communism's headquarters.

The front-page editorial in L'Osservatore Romano, which rarely escapes the eye of Pope Pius XII, sounded as though it had been written by Henry Wallace instead of Editor Count Giuseppe Dalla Torre. It declared that the U.S. and Soviet Russia must learn to live together in one world, must "learn that in their realm of thought all opposing ideas can exist--must learn that or repeat 'Your death is my life.' " The conflict between Russia and the West is not primarily ideological, but material, said L'Osservatore, and to be understood in terms of security. "Russia . . . fought not for the Communist idea but for the life of the nation." Since ordinary people place survival above ideological triumphs, "all peoples, both victors and vanquished," should do the same.

Some readers of L'Osservatore's astonishing editorial concluded that it might be a tactical move in Italy's domestic politics, or that it might reflect Vatican hopes of a deal in friendship with Russia. Others decided that it made no sense at all.

* For a related estimate of Communism see RELIGION.

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