Beatification of Cardinal Stepinac

This letter is in response to your Oct. 4, 1998, article Pope beatifies contentious wartime Croatian Cardinal.

1. In reference to the alleged collaboration of Cardinal Stepinac with the Nazis please be informed about the excerpts from a Nazi police document published in the latest issue of the weekly Slovene Catholic publication Druzina. The secret order issued by the Reichssicherheitshauptamt (State Security Service) in 1941 stated that Cardinal Alojzije Stepinac was amongst organizations aligned against the Germans because of his opposition to Nazism. The Cardinal was charged with leading an anti-German front together with Jewish organizations linked to the British and French intelligence services.

2. The article claims that Cardinal Stepinac was beatified "despite Jewish accusations that he was soft on Fascism and Nazism." On Sept. 30, 1998, the Coordination of Jewish Municipalities in Croatia issued the following statement: "The Jews in Croatia are grateful to Cardinal Stepinac for advocating during the Ustasha Independent State of Croatia (NDH, 1941-1945) the salvation of many Jews, and for succeeding in saving from Ustasha and Nazi genocide the residents of the Lavoslav Schwartz retirement home, several groups of Jewish children and several hundreds of converted Jews in mixed marriages ... The beatification of Cardinal Alojzije Stepinac is an autonomous decision of the Catholic church and the Coordination of Jewish Municipalities in Croatia will not object to it." The Jews also thank Stepinac for advocating the salvation of those belonging to other religions, nationalities and peoples.

3. Cardinal Stepinac is contentious or controversial only to those who are embarrassed by the emergence of the truth surrounding him -- the truth having this "embarrassing" quality of exposing lies, sooner or later. Cardinal Stepinac was not imprisoned because of he was a collaborator, nor because he refused to weaken links with the Vatican, he was imprisoned because he refused to completely cut ties with the Vatican and establish a national church. Luis Breir, leader of American Jews at the time, wrote in October 1946: "This man, now a victim of disgraceful trial, spoke openly and fearlessly against the Nuernberg racist laws during the Nazi regime, and his protests against Nazi terror never ceased."

MARIJAN ORESNIK

Counselor

Croatian Embassy

Jakarta