The Nuclear Issue Gets Personal

By Richard N. Ostling

Britain's papal nuncio says a peace priest may be a Soviet dupe

Disarm, cried a cleric called Kent.

The same message nice Andropov sent:

Just lay down your arms,

Embrace Socialist charms,

Then wonder where your freedom went.

Delivering that limerick in the House of Commons, Conservative M.P. Robert Adley last month twitted a Roman Catholic priest who particularly nettles the Tories: Monsignor Bruce Kent, 53, the tireless general secretary of the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament, Britain's most important peace group.

Kent's advocacy of unilateral nuclear disarmament by Britain has touched off a controversy among the nation's Catholics about the proper approach of the church to nuclear arms policy. Kent's main ecclesiastical opponent is Archbishop Bruno Heim, Pro-Nuncio (ambassador) of the Holy See to Britain, who is strongly opposed to unilateral disarmament. In an amazingly candid letter to several British Catholics, which quickly became public, Heim suggested that the monsignor might be either an "idiot" or a conscious agent of Soviet designs.

The sharply polarized views of the two clerics are the latest, and certainly the most dramatic, signs of the growing Catholic debate on nuclear morality. Three weeks ago, the U.S. hierarchy issued a pastoral letter that challenges Administration policy by calling for a halt to the production and deployment of nuclear weapons. West European bishops have been more cautious in their antinuclear pronouncements.

Sharpening the debate in Britain is the fact that the views of Kent and the C.N.D. have become explicitly political issues: they parallel those of the Labor Party in its fight against Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher's Conservatives in the June 9 national election. Although the C.N.D. insists that it is nonpartisan, British Defense Minister Michael Heseltine has written to Conservative candidates in marginal constituencies warning that the C.N.D. is out to defeat them.

A lieutenant in a tank regiment before he entered the priesthood, the Oxford-educated Kent became head of the C.N.D. in 1980. He led a drive that has expanded the membership from 3,000 to 50,000--in addition, there are at least 200,000 politically active sympathizers--and mobilized effective mass demonstrations against the Bomb. Last month C.N.D. members and their allies held hands to form a 14-mile chain between Greenham Common in Berkshire, where the first U.S. cruise missiles are scheduled to be installed later this year, and Burghfield, site of Britain's nuclear warhead factory.

Kent is opposed to the cruise missiles because "their accuracy is high and their destabilizing effect on arms agreement is very great." He also contends that the Trident missiles that Britain is obtaining from the U.S. for its submarines "take us to the edge of fear of first strike." Kent wants Britain to get rid of both its nuclear weapons and the U.S. bases, no matter what the U.S.S.R. does in terms of its nuclear weapons. Says he: "We are not waiting for the Soviets to reciprocate." As to which superpower had made the most constructive proposals in the current nuclear arms talks, Kent said last week, "I have the greater sympathy for the Soviet position than for the U.S. position."

Kent's arguments have angered many conservative British Catholics, who have protested to Archbishop Heim. He responded with a May 4 letter that was soon leaked to the press. Writing on his own and not at the Vatican's instruction, Heim stated that he favors multilateral and verifiable disarmament, and regards unilateral disarmament proposals as "mistaken." He also quoted Pope John Paul's qualified acceptance of nuclear deterrence if nations worked for disarmament. "Unilateralists are carrying out a one-sided campaign," Heim wrote, "and it is clear which side it benefits most." He continued, "Whether those doing so are consciously sharing the Soviet aggressiveness and ideology or belong to the well-known useful idiots or, again, are blinkered idealists would have to be judged in individual cases, even in that of Bruce Kent."

Caught in the middle of the dispute is Kent's religious superior, George Basil Cardinal Hume, the Archbishop of Westminster. He gave Kent permission to run the C.N.D., al though its activities have clearly had a political impact; Kent's position could be construed to be against the wishes of the Pope, who has warned Catholic clergy to avoid direct involvement in politics. In mid-April, Hume listed the reasons he agreed to let Kent run C.N.D.: 1) disarmament is a moral issue and Kent considered it to be a ministry; 2) the C.N.D., in the Cardinal's view, is more educational than political; 3) Kent did not claim to be an official church spokesman. "Should the political aspects of C.N.D. develop further and become predominant in its work," Hume wrote, "it would be difficult for a priest to hold responsible office" and a lay leader would be more suitable. He added that "recent developments" had caused him "serious misgivings" and that he was monitoring the problem.

Hume, however, clearly felt that Heim's attack on Kent went too far. The Cardinal made a point of appearing publicly with the monsignor and expressed his personal regard for the priest's integrity. The Cardinal's office also declared, "We are reaffirming the church's permission to allow Monsignor Kent to continue his work with C.N.D." At week's end it appeared that the Pro-Nuncio's attack had succeeded not so much in clarifying church teaching as in provoking Hume to back the monsignor's antinuclear ministry, at least until the elections are over. -- By Richard N. Ostling. Reported by Arthur White/London

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