Kremlin Cooperation

Pope John XXIII, for all of his dislike for Communism, is willing to be polite about it. Gone is the defiance that Pius XII used to hurl at the Kremlin; instead Rome makes such amicable gestures as inviting Russian Orthodox observers to the Vatican Council. Last week the Pope produced in Rome a living gain from his policy of easing tensions: Ukrainian Archbishop Josyf Slipyi of Lvov, freed after 18 years of Soviet confinement.

The spiritual leader of the Ukraine's 2,000,000 Byzantine-rite Catholics, tall, bearded Archbishop Slipyi, 71. is a Jesuit-trained theologian who was elevated to the episcopacy in 1939. Slipyi (pronounced slee-pay) protested a postwar Russian attempt to force Byzantine-rite Ukrainians into the Russian Orthodox Church, and in 1946 was imprisoned, charged with "political crimes during the German occupation." Confined to a tiny cell with four Catholic priests, he said Mass in secret, using dried crusts of bread for hosts and wine made by letting grapes and raisins ferment in a glass. In 1953 his hard-labor sentence was reduced to house arrest in Lvov, but two years later, Slipyi was shipped to a Siberian old people's home, where he was put to work as a servant.

Meeting with Two Russians. Slipyi's release is the diplomatic handiwork of two close Curia friends of Pope John--Augustin Cardinal Bea, chief of the Secretariat for Promoting Christian Unity, and Gustavo Cardinal Testa, secretary of the Sacred Congregation for the Oriental Church, which supervises Byzantine-rite Catholics. Late last November, Bea arranged a quiet meeting between Testa and the two Russian observers at the Vatican Council. Testa smoothly pointed out that the Pope had officially disavowed a protest prepared by a group of Ukrainian bishops at the council objecting to the presence of the Russians, tactfully brought up the subject of Archbishop Slipyi's long confinement. The Russians promised to do what they could, and last month notified Cardinal Bea that Slipyi would be freed. A fortnight ago, Bea's chief assistant. Dutch Monsignor Jan Willebrands, flew secretly to Moscow, escorted Slipyi by train to Vienna and then on to Rome. Slipyi had a personal audience with the Pope, has since been resting at the Byzantine-rite monastery of Grottaferrata. 15 miles southeast of Rome. He hopes eventually to return to Lvov.

Only the Beginning. The Vatican regards Slipyi's release as only the beginning. "This was a simple act of personal respect by the Russian government for Pope John." says one Vatican official. "It also gives us hope that other negotiations will work out." There is little doubt as to who would be the subjects of other negotiations: Hungary's Josef Cardinal Mindszenty. a political refugee in the U.S. legation at Budapest since the 1956 uprising, and Archbishop Josef Beran of Prague, who was seized by Czech Communists in 1950, has not been heard from since.

This file is automatically generated by a robot program, so reader's discretion is required.