Page 5, 8th March 1974
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Boell, Te Deum and Chile junta
On January 4 you printed a front-page news report about Heinrich Boell, the German novelist who won the Nobel Prize For literature in 1972.
He was quoted as saying that he still considered himself a Catholic "fiscally speaking," by which he meant he still paid the Church Tax levied by the Statutory Laws, but he went on to say that when he heard, for example, that the Cardinal Archbishop of Santiago participated in a Te Deum for the military junta of Chile he wondered how much longer he would remain a Catholic.
It is sad that a man of Boell's eminence should cite an event of this kind as almost the last straw before he finally left the Church, when there are far more weighty and more plausible reasons for doing so if one wants them. And it is sadder still since the event in question was at least doubtful.
I was so certain that Cardinal Silva had not taken part in a Te Deum for the military junta that I wrote to the Cardinal's secretary to verify it. I received an answer a few days ago.
The Te Deum which the Cardinal took part in was the annual service of prayer for Chile which is held every year on September 18 and which commemorates the liberation of the country from Spanish domination in 1810 and the establishment of the first National Junta or Council of Government.
It had nothing to do with the present junta, whose activities any Christian would call into question. It was a case of mis
reporting and m s-representation by the Press.
(Fr.) J. Staunton 147a Du Cane Road, London W12.
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