ROME HEARS OF DECLARATION Keen Disappointment

Disappointment is quite openly expressed here at the Declaration of the Austrian Bishops.
The " explanatory note," the text of which was published in the Osservatore Romano, but in no Italian paper, was welcorned as an improvement, but it is felt that it should never have been necessary and that anyhow it has come too late and the damage has been done.
It is taken for certain that this was added at the instigation of the Vatican. As regards the main declaration it is known that this was by no means unanimous as given in the German and many foreign papers and your correspondent can state on good authority that it was not read in all the dioceses of Austria; it is also believed that the Declaration was not signed by the Archbishop of Salzburg as stated.
Italians are Scandalised
Be this as it may, the damage has been done, and the prestige of the Church has really suffered among the ordinary Italian rank and file.
Cardinal Innitzer's visit to the Fllrher was given a headline in the Italian Press: " Cardinal Innitzer visits Hitler and expresses the joy of Austrian Catholics."
It must be slated that many Romans were profoundly shocked by this. As the Vatican must be aware of the scandal that this has caused, a denial would have been published if it had not been true.
The whole cause of German Catholicism has been compromised in the eyes of the ordinary Italian and there will be no sympathy for Austrian Catholicism if the persecution starts with a vengeance after April 10, as it did in the corresponding case of the Saar. Your correspondent, who has had the opportunity of speaking with many Italian lay Catholics since the events in Austria, finds that the expression " olerical cowardice " has been used more than once.
Odious Comparisons The action and words of the Austrian episcopate, coming after Mit Brennender Sorge. are inevitably compared to the magnificent stand of Cardinals Faulhaber and Bertram. Even as a policy it is hard to see how this opportunism is thought likely to succeed or how a promise from Hitler or 13iIrckel can be trusted for a minute. The persecution has already begun and the campaign against the morality of the clergy is to be the piece de resistance.
German Bishop in Rome
Meanwhile, if this is the view of affairs in Rome and Italy, it can be well imagined that. the German Catholics are equally dis satisfied. Two days ago Mgr. von Gallen, the Bishop of Munster, arrived in Rome by air and proceeded at once to the Vatican. It is believed that the communication that Mgr. von Gallen made to Cardinal Pacelli caused the appearance of the note in Saturday's Osservatore Romano in which the Holy Sec repudiates having given any previous or subsequent approval to the Austrian Episcopate's Declaration.
This little note, tucked away on the front page of the Osservatore of only twelve lines, has caused an immense sensation in Rome.
The Vatican dementi of any association with the Declaration appeared at the same time as Cardinal Innitzer's new letter to Herr Bfirckel in which he confirms the Declaration.
The situation is considered very serious indeed in competent ecclesiastical circles in Rome.