!'A Positive Attitude"

The Roman Catholic Church and the Czech Communist government were heading for a showdown. Since March, when the church refused to agree to the nationalization of all Catholic schools or to recognize the state's right of veto on church appointments, the Communist propaganda machine has been screaming that the higher clergy and the Vatican are allied with "Anglo-American imperialists and fascists." Last week the new Communist-front Catholic Clergy Gazette unsubtly intimated that some priests could expect a higher income if they would only show "a positive attitude."

Well aware of what had happened to Hungary's Cardinal Mindszenty, Prague's Archbishop Josef Beran nevertheless decided to talk back. In a circular letter made public last week, Josef Beran, veteran of Dachau, charged that the government was silencing the Catholic press, that church collections had been prohibited in many places, and that church schools were being "liquidated step by step." Said the archbishop: "The Catholic Church should enjoy the absolute freedom to which it has a right, both God-given and guaranteed by the existing Constitution."

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