Religion: Vatican Plot

The Communists, to whom the Vatican is anathema, rarely pass up a chance to remind their subjects of the dangers inherent in any contact with the Church of Rome. Sometimes the attacks are vicious, sometimes merely amusing. At the opening of the Olympic Games in Rome last week, Pope John XXIII welcomed an assembly of Olympians, including some athletes from Iron Curtain countries, to St. Peter’s Square. “We hope,” said His Holiness, “that this evening’s happy event may reach into your hearts so that each of you may have a higher appreciation of an athlete’s dignity … We cannot wish victory to any particular team or athlete. Therefore, may the best man win. This does not prevent us, however, from expressing our fervent wish that these days’ contests will benefit you all and afford you untold advantages.”

Even this was too much for the Communists. It was window dressing, cried the Moscow press and radio, and beneath the smiling surface, sinister Vatican plots were being hatched. The Reds issued a four-alarm warning that priests, monks and nuns in civilian clothes had been detailed to mingle with athletes and officials from the Soviet and its satellites to persuade them to defect. According to Moscow’s daily Trud, a special receiving center for defectors had been set up in a monastery outside Rome, and “thousands of clergymen and monks and young people from the lower echelons of Catholic organizations are to make contact with visitors of all nationalities . . . and subject them to an intensive anti-Communist workout, while praising Catholicism and the Western way of life.” Pope John himself, fretted the Communists, might be watching TV to take note of any Iron Curtain athlete who crossed himself before competing.