OCCUPIED LORRAINE

Wairarapa Times-Age, 26 February 1942, Page 4

OCCUPIED LORRAINE

DE-CHRISTIANISING PROCESS BY NAZIS.

News from occupied Lorraine shows that the Nazis are living up to their reputation, states an overseas publication. At Longueville, the priests were driven from their monastery, confiscated for the “Arbeitsdienst” (Works Services).-, At Augny, same brutal throwing out of priests, this time by German police who came hammering on the door at 11 o’clock at night, compelling all the priests to muster in the hall and go with them to the refectory. There the Nazis ate all they could. In the chapel they confiscated the communion plate, seized all documents, and took what cash 1 there was. A rough sort of tubunal was set up, and the priests questioned, one by one, as to their political views. When day dawned they were told to collect up their personal affairs, and were taken off to the local railway station. The Germans took over the building the same day. The expulsion of Monsignor Heinz, Bishop of Metz, on August 15, last year, was followed by the expulsion of Monsignor Schmitt and members of the episcopal household. There are now only three priests in Metz. Catholic colleges have been emptied and taken over by the Nazis. The college of St. Clement, at Metz, the apostolic school of the Marist Fathers at Aulnoy, that at Phalsbourg belonging to the Franciscans, of Morhange, of Scy, have been closed, and the closing o these religious institutions w T as not carried out with particular gentleness.