'WE ARE READY TO

SHED OUR BLOOD'
Last free Iron Curtain Cardinal stands firm
HE Primate of Poland, Cardinal Wyszynsky the only free Cardinal behind the Iron Curtain— has denounced the Communist Government's attempts to stifle the Church in Poland and has declared that the hierarchy is ready to shed its blood in the defence of the Church.
The Cardinal took his stand in a sermon in Warsaw on Corpus
Christi, the Osservatore Romano reported last week-end.
He recalled how for centuries the Church has fought against attempts by the State to put itself between the priests and their flocks, between the Bishops and their priests, and said: "The Polish hierarchy will follow this example, if necessary to the extent of bearing witness with their blood, because otherwise the Church would not be Catholic.
"Our second fatherland is Rome, because in Rome is our first priest, he who receives the power of Jesus Christ—the Pope, our supreme hOe sasder:. v More Romano says: "All this Commenting on the sermon,
indicates that the gravest hours are being prepared for the faithful of Poland, for their priests and for their Bishops."
RISING UP
The paper recalled that Polish suffering has continued for 15 years, with two successive invasions and finally "a government imposed by foreign arms which oppresses the people, not only materially but now assails their conscience."
The paper added : "We do not want to make predictions about the immediate future which appears so much more dark than the past," the article continued, "but all those who believe in God and the liberating forces of Christianity are rising up against the unheard-of moral violence which the hypocrisy of the legislative jargon. far from concealling, shows up in all its dramatic gravity."
Because of Poland's ancient tradition of Christianity, Osservatore Romano said, the Communist regime did not feel it could at first proceed with anti-Church measures with the same violence used in other countries behind the Iron Curtain.
LOS7 TIME
"The Warsaw Government seems anxious to regain lost time and to catch up as soon as possible with the other 'People's Demoeracies'."
"The immediate aim is the usual one. It is, either with or against the Bishops, to bring the clergy into line. to transform them into a class of state officials in the service of Communist atheism, so that they may join other officials in oppressing the Polish people."
The reaction of the Polish faithful, the article said, is to turn out in even greater strength on Church occasions. These very reactions, it concluded, are a major factor in causing the State to try to tighten its grip on the Polish Church,