Although Communists in Europe have recently been advocating "nonviolent" methods in the war against religion, the Ceechoslovak regime bas passed eightand nine-year prison sentences on two priests and a layman for "underground Catholic activity."
Fr. Josef Blahnik and Fr. Josef Kristof were acused of clandestine administration of the Sacraments of Confirmation and Matrimony, and Mr. Francis Kradl of failure to report these "illegal activities." Other and vaguer charges were also preferred against Fr. Kristof.
A Red publication in Czechoslovakia, Novo Myst, urged last month that the workers should not be persecuted because of their religion, but should be taken into the party and re-educated.
Edward Kardelj, .a vice-president of the Yugoslav executive council, recently advised that Catholics should be induced into Red Trade Unions and cultural organisations, where they could be more easily separated from the Church. Violence would only divide the workers.