RIGHTS OF MANKIND

Wairarapa Times-Age, 20 June 1942, Page 3

RIGHTS OF MANKIND

AS WELL AS RELIGIOUS RIGHTS ASKED FOR BY CATHOLICS IN GERMANY. PASTORAL READ IN CHURCHES. (British Official Wireless.) RUGBY, June 18. “We wish particularly to stress that we are not only asking for religions rights, but also for the ordinary rights of mankind. Without these the whole of western culture must collapse,” states an outspoken Roman Catholic pastoral letter, recently read ■ from German pulpits and now available in London. The pastoral refers to the war against Christianity, which “lies like a horrible nightmare on Germany.” It states that a battle against Christianity is raging in Germany and has increased in bitterness during the war, Catholicism being squeezed out of public life altogether and its observance inside churches being extremely limited and greatly suppressed. It asserts that youth organisations are turning the youth of the country against Christianity, the Catholic Press has been destroyed, schools and churches have been closed and priests banished. The Bishops insist on the rights of personal freedom, consideration of the common good, and the duty to just commands and lawful authority, and demand the release of all who, without evidence, have been robbed of their liberty and the return of church property. The pastoral adds that Nazi activities have been designed to kill the Catholic Church while men are at war.