ANTI-CATHOLIC DECREES

Wairarapa Times-Age, 15 December 1938, Page 7

ANTI-CATHOLIC DECREES

4 BERLIN. DENIES KNOWLEDGE. (Independent Cable Service.) (Received This Day, 9.30 a.m.) BERLIN, December 14. Official quarters claim that they have no knowledge of anti-Catholic decrees. VATICAN REPORT. NO OFFICIAL INFORMATION. (Independent Cable Service.) (Received This Day, 9.30 a.m.) ROME, December 14. i The Vatican has no official know-! ledge of anti-Catholic decrees planned l by Germany.

The Vatican City correspondent of the Exchange Telegraph Company says that though the Nazi measures against the Catholic Church have not yet been published, the gist of them is known. They are reported to provide that relations between the Church and the State are no longer governed by the Concordat but by the laws of the Reich; that processions and pilgrimages are forbidden; that'sermons based on communications between the Pope and Bishops must be submitted to the Reich authorities in advance; and that a religious order in which any! member is convicted of immorality will be dissolved and have its property confiscated. Other decrees are understood to handicap religious orders severely and to forbid priests baptizing Jews. The Pope is preparing a reply to the decrees, which are at present before the legal authorities.