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.After the war the church claimed that 24 percent of its clergy inPrague and 11 percent of its total clergy were imprisoned for resistance ac-tivities, although only twenty-eight were sent to concentration camps, wherea half-dozen died.Among the church members who lost their lives was JanOpletal, the student killed during the 28 October 1939 demonstrations.111Despite these losses, the hardships placed on the church were relativelyslight.Obviously, after the creation of the Protectorate of Bohemia andMoravia and an independent Slovakia, the church could not maintain the for-mer state s name in its title.The Reich Protector s office demanded a changeafter the protests in which Opletal was killed, and the church leadership re-sponded by renaming itself the Czecho-Moravian Church (Církev %0Å„esko-moravská).Apart from this cosmetic alteration, the church was little hin-dered in the early part of the war, as Rudolf Urban has described:In the first years of the German occupation the Czechoslovak Church could workcomparatively undisturbed.For a long time the Czechoslovak Church seemedto German authorities to be a suitable partner in their politics directed against theCatholic Church.Because the development of the Czechoslovak Church dis-played clear similarities to the Movement of German Christians promoted by theReich government, it was believed on the German side that the two churchmovements must cooperate in some way.112 80 Part I: Czech Intellectuals Enter the Postwar WorldWith an eye toward such cooperation, church patriarch Adolf Procházkamet with Reichsbischof Ludwig Müller in 1940 and 1941, although the dis-cussions proved fruitless because of the national and political gulf that sep-arated the two.After the assassination of Reinhard Heydrich, the church suf-fered to the same degree as the general population and its primary organ, theweekly eský zápas (The Czech Struggle), was limited to biweekly distribu-tion and later also limited in length.113 Nevertheless, the church and some ofits primary functionaries were accused of collaboration after the war s end,and the church was placed under the temporary administration of a com-munist-dominated Central Action Committee.It is certainly possible that thiscontributed to the church s procommunist stance in the postwar years, as thechurch perhaps attempted to unite with a surging Communist Party andovercome the charges of a less than pristine wartime past by subsuming it-self in revolutionary politics.The church had two other, internally compelling reasons to place itselfclose to the radical left.One arose from the church s stance in the matter ofthe expulsion of the ethnic Germans.The World Council of Churches raisedsignificant opposition to this measure generally, and the methods with whichit was being carried out particularly, while the Czechoslovak Church was oneof its most vocal supporters.The church broke off contact with the Council,not reestablishing links until 1947 (after the vast majority of the expulsionshad taken place), and not rejoining until 1962.114 The motives for thechurch s radical stance were likely not purely nationalistic, however.Thepossibility of material gain surely contributed: the church wanted the Na-tional Front government to turn over to it the abandoned German evangeli-cal churches and pastoral residences in the Sudetenland.115 Since the distri-bution of the lands and property seized from the Germans was in the handsof a Communist-controlled government department, the church had much togain by standing close to the Communists.116The second internal reason for the Czechoslovak Church s close relationsto communism arose directly from the war years.These brought severalchanges in the leadership of the church, changes that pushed it further to thepolitical left.Patriarch Procházka died in February 1942, and although the va-cancy was not officially filled until 1946, Frantiaek KováY took over the lead-ership of the church at that time.The bishop of Prague, the most importantof the church s four dioceses, also died during the war and was replaced byMiroslav Novák, a representative of a younger, more progressive generationand a staunch ally of the Communist Party.These changes and the morewidespread replacement of the founding generation of clergy by a youngerone reflected a situation in which the new church leadership was deter-mined to engage itself more strongly in Soviet-style socialism. 117 Also im-portant in this regard was the formation of a Communist group inside theleadership of the church s institutions and administration.As Karel Kaplan Chapter 3: Four Groups of Postwar Czech Intellectuals 81has pointed out, Communist Party members occupied leading positions andin 1946 they pushed through support for the socialist changes in the land atthe church s general assembly. 118The result of these circumstances was a Czechoslovak Church that wascommitted to radicalism and quite popular, indicating the strength of boththe church and its idea of social revolution.Without delving too deeply atthis stage into the church s view of socialism, a few examples of the tone ofits rhetoric should serve to establish its revolutionary pedigree.The first twotasks that the church set itself in national life after the war were to supportthe transformation of the republic into a People s Democratic state and tostrengthen the moral conviction of the Czechoslovak people in favor of so-cialism. In the liberated homeland, the church promised to place itself con-sistently and with the whole weight of its spiritual authority behind the striv-ing towards constructing the republic as a national, People s Democraticstate heading towards socialism. The gallop towards socialism in thechurch s rhetoric often affected even its theological formulations.For exam-ple, a letter from the leadership to the first postwar prime minister, Zden%1Å‚kFierlinger, stressed that in its works the church would give expression toits conviction that the ethos of Jesus Gospel is the ethos of the classlesssociety. 119Although the leadership, particularly after the communist assumption ofpower, revealed itself to be more radical than its followers, the voice of theCzechoslovak Church was one of the most unequivocal to be heard in theimmediate postwar era.Because of the democratizing principles adoptedin 1946, the church had no single dominant figure.Nonetheless, there was agroup of central leaders who largely represented the public face of thechurch.Primary among these was Patriarch KováY, who served asthe church s leader from 1946 until 1961.In 1928, he had founded one of thechurch s most influential journals, Nábo~enská revue (The Religious Review)and published widely in it after the war.KováY s second-in-command,Miroslav Novák, also played a large role in formulating church policy fromhis position as Bishop of Prague.Outside the church hierarchy, FrantiaekHník and Alois Spisar (a cofounder of the church) forcefully furthered thechurch s views on cultural, social, and political issues [ Pobierz caÅ‚ość w formacie PDF ]
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.After the war the church claimed that 24 percent of its clergy inPrague and 11 percent of its total clergy were imprisoned for resistance ac-tivities, although only twenty-eight were sent to concentration camps, wherea half-dozen died.Among the church members who lost their lives was JanOpletal, the student killed during the 28 October 1939 demonstrations.111Despite these losses, the hardships placed on the church were relativelyslight.Obviously, after the creation of the Protectorate of Bohemia andMoravia and an independent Slovakia, the church could not maintain the for-mer state s name in its title.The Reich Protector s office demanded a changeafter the protests in which Opletal was killed, and the church leadership re-sponded by renaming itself the Czecho-Moravian Church (Církev %0Å„esko-moravská).Apart from this cosmetic alteration, the church was little hin-dered in the early part of the war, as Rudolf Urban has described:In the first years of the German occupation the Czechoslovak Church could workcomparatively undisturbed.For a long time the Czechoslovak Church seemedto German authorities to be a suitable partner in their politics directed against theCatholic Church.Because the development of the Czechoslovak Church dis-played clear similarities to the Movement of German Christians promoted by theReich government, it was believed on the German side that the two churchmovements must cooperate in some way.112 80 Part I: Czech Intellectuals Enter the Postwar WorldWith an eye toward such cooperation, church patriarch Adolf Procházkamet with Reichsbischof Ludwig Müller in 1940 and 1941, although the dis-cussions proved fruitless because of the national and political gulf that sep-arated the two.After the assassination of Reinhard Heydrich, the church suf-fered to the same degree as the general population and its primary organ, theweekly eský zápas (The Czech Struggle), was limited to biweekly distribu-tion and later also limited in length.113 Nevertheless, the church and some ofits primary functionaries were accused of collaboration after the war s end,and the church was placed under the temporary administration of a com-munist-dominated Central Action Committee.It is certainly possible that thiscontributed to the church s procommunist stance in the postwar years, as thechurch perhaps attempted to unite with a surging Communist Party andovercome the charges of a less than pristine wartime past by subsuming it-self in revolutionary politics.The church had two other, internally compelling reasons to place itselfclose to the radical left.One arose from the church s stance in the matter ofthe expulsion of the ethnic Germans.The World Council of Churches raisedsignificant opposition to this measure generally, and the methods with whichit was being carried out particularly, while the Czechoslovak Church was oneof its most vocal supporters.The church broke off contact with the Council,not reestablishing links until 1947 (after the vast majority of the expulsionshad taken place), and not rejoining until 1962.114 The motives for thechurch s radical stance were likely not purely nationalistic, however.Thepossibility of material gain surely contributed: the church wanted the Na-tional Front government to turn over to it the abandoned German evangeli-cal churches and pastoral residences in the Sudetenland.115 Since the distri-bution of the lands and property seized from the Germans was in the handsof a Communist-controlled government department, the church had much togain by standing close to the Communists.116The second internal reason for the Czechoslovak Church s close relationsto communism arose directly from the war years.These brought severalchanges in the leadership of the church, changes that pushed it further to thepolitical left.Patriarch Procházka died in February 1942, and although the va-cancy was not officially filled until 1946, Frantiaek KováY took over the lead-ership of the church at that time.The bishop of Prague, the most importantof the church s four dioceses, also died during the war and was replaced byMiroslav Novák, a representative of a younger, more progressive generationand a staunch ally of the Communist Party.These changes and the morewidespread replacement of the founding generation of clergy by a youngerone reflected a situation in which the new church leadership was deter-mined to engage itself more strongly in Soviet-style socialism. 117 Also im-portant in this regard was the formation of a Communist group inside theleadership of the church s institutions and administration.As Karel Kaplan Chapter 3: Four Groups of Postwar Czech Intellectuals 81has pointed out, Communist Party members occupied leading positions andin 1946 they pushed through support for the socialist changes in the land atthe church s general assembly. 118The result of these circumstances was a Czechoslovak Church that wascommitted to radicalism and quite popular, indicating the strength of boththe church and its idea of social revolution.Without delving too deeply atthis stage into the church s view of socialism, a few examples of the tone ofits rhetoric should serve to establish its revolutionary pedigree.The first twotasks that the church set itself in national life after the war were to supportthe transformation of the republic into a People s Democratic state and tostrengthen the moral conviction of the Czechoslovak people in favor of so-cialism. In the liberated homeland, the church promised to place itself con-sistently and with the whole weight of its spiritual authority behind the striv-ing towards constructing the republic as a national, People s Democraticstate heading towards socialism. The gallop towards socialism in thechurch s rhetoric often affected even its theological formulations.For exam-ple, a letter from the leadership to the first postwar prime minister, Zden%1Å‚kFierlinger, stressed that in its works the church would give expression toits conviction that the ethos of Jesus Gospel is the ethos of the classlesssociety. 119Although the leadership, particularly after the communist assumption ofpower, revealed itself to be more radical than its followers, the voice of theCzechoslovak Church was one of the most unequivocal to be heard in theimmediate postwar era.Because of the democratizing principles adoptedin 1946, the church had no single dominant figure.Nonetheless, there was agroup of central leaders who largely represented the public face of thechurch.Primary among these was Patriarch KováY, who served asthe church s leader from 1946 until 1961.In 1928, he had founded one of thechurch s most influential journals, Nábo~enská revue (The Religious Review)and published widely in it after the war.KováY s second-in-command,Miroslav Novák, also played a large role in formulating church policy fromhis position as Bishop of Prague.Outside the church hierarchy, FrantiaekHník and Alois Spisar (a cofounder of the church) forcefully furthered thechurch s views on cultural, social, and political issues [ Pobierz caÅ‚ość w formacie PDF ]