PARTY POLICY COMES

Peron piles on the attack
TN spite of President Peron's assertion that the "Intervention" of the Argentine clergy in associations of workers, students and professional men is so "limited" that it cannot affect the State's support of the Catholic Church, his attacks on the Church's teaching and influence are becoming more and more open in decree after decree.
legelises prostitution through
out the country and nullifies a 934 Buenos Aires mu n ici pal enactment and a 1936 national law prohibiting prostitution in all parts of the Argentine.
The decree of legalisation. the climax of a national campargn to preeare public opinion tor the move. was sternly resisted by the Ilierierhy, who alao fo reht vigorously against other recent legislation recognising divorce and equal rights for children born out of wedlock.
The prohibition of religious processions in Buenos Aires is now followed by a police communique stating that all outdoor religious gatherings and processions are prohibited throughnut the State and that religious meetings inside the churches will he permitted with full notice protection."
On Friday the La Roia provincial chief of police ordered the faithful to cancel their traditional New Year processions. On Saturday Fr. Normand° Cool. of Rafaela. Santa Fe. was dismissed from his post as Professor of Religion in the National Hieh School.
Others removed
Other priests in many parts ot the country have been removed from similar pasts and the Church has been deprived of her control over the appointment of such teachers.
Religious syllabuses are no longer subject to episcopal approval, Underlying all this, as the Vatican newspaper Ovservotore Romano sees it. Is the Argentine Government's hostility to the Church's inmistence on her right to apply her social teachings to current need.: and events Moreover. ft points out, the Peronist policy seems to "consecrate the pre-eminence of party reasens over religious duty and conscience."
The Inter-American Bulletin, a periodical published by a labour group embracing North and South America. has asserted that it is a " sell-out" of the workers in Argentina by Peron that has " caueed some priests to extend their interest in the labour movement in that country?'
President Peron, it says, has forced the workers to accept a scale of wages "entirely wow the increased cost of living. '
When the priests "offered their aid to the labour movement?' Peron "struck back with. .custom. ary methods of slander innuendoes, persecution and even arrests,"
Disaster threat
The Bulletin adds that "socially minded" Argentine priests extended their interest in a "purely moral and spiritual advisory capacity to some sectors of the labour movement. particularly in the provinces of Cordoba and Santa Fe.
"When we think of the constructive results of the co-operation with the Labour movement given by elements of the Catholic Churchin Costa Rica. Columbia, Chile, Guatemala, [avast:ay. British Honduras. Surinam and other countries, we well understand thc reasons for Peron's hostility."
A South American observer has told THE CATHOLIC ReRALD of his belief that Peron is threatening his country's economy with disaster by impoverishing its vast. natural agricultural productivity in favour of subsidised and artificially maintained new industries. dependent on heavy imports ot raw materials.
Catholic associations ot workers, professional men and students, says the Osservatore, are not new nor confined to the Argentine. They exist "wherever the life and activity of the Church arc not hampered or stifled" and are sponsored by the clergy to provide a "solid Christian formation."
But the Os.servatore expresses more serious concern with "the repetition of statements and principles that in themselves are incompatible with the doctrine and rights of the Church' and quotes the following examples from the Peronist Press and official speeches "We must fight against all ideo. logical conviction and all religious credence or sectarian division that seeks to infiltrate into our trade unions."
"The cult of the trade unions is practised within those unions; the cult of the Catholic religion in the churches."
"Dogma is tor conscience and the trade union is for action."
"Religion must serve one's neighbour in his supernatural necessities, Politics, however. must serve him in his human necessities."
Pointing out that these expressions imply the complete separation of religion and politics and also the pie-eminence of party reaso is over religious duties and consciences. the Os.servatore continues: The Peronist who accepts the responsibility of leadership must liberate his conscience from any other sentiment whatsoever that can be superior to Peronism
Observers familiar:with the political scene in the Argentine, have told THE CATFIcti IC HERALD that it may be true to say that the people ere turning in increasing numbers to the clerey in resentment against Peron's own idolatrous words: "Peronism, for a Peronista. must conic before all things
g Very restricted' Thm say that Peron and his partisans tale "very restricted" in their Catholicism at the best of times. They point, too. to what must be widespread dissatisfaction with the laws prohibiting any trade union movement other than the General fehour Confederation whose leaders are State appointed.
Retaliating against the clergy's insistence on Papal social teachings, they say. Peron is playing upon certain anti-clerical elements, more prominent in the towns. still under the influence of the philosophical impact on South America of the French Revolution and of the separation of Church and State in the United States constitution.
The Osservatore points out the applopriateness in time of the Holy Father's warnings in November against "tendencies of mind presuming to check and limit the power of the Bishops."
This power. said the Holy Father. Ear from being "hound by the limits of matters strictly religious." embraces "the whole matter of the natural law, its foundation, its interpretation and its application. in so far as their moral aspects extend."
An' the Osservatere recalls Pope St. Pies X's reminder that the social question is not a matter of mere economics, outside the Church's authority. It is primarily a religious and moral question. said that Pope. and must be settled chiefly in accordance with the moral law and itidgment based on religion.
Church's duty
Dealing with charges hat the clergy interfere with the education of youth "as given by the State" and in student associations, the Osservatore quotes theEncyclical Letter "Divini illius Magistri" which lays down the Church's "inalienable right and indispensable duty to watch over all the education of her children."
This extends to every "institution, public or private, and not only with regard to the religious teaching there given, but also to all the other subjects and arrangernents in so far as they relate to religion and morality." This is not undue interference, but the "precious maternal care of the Church."