Vatican concern at theft of Church art treasures

FROM A SPECIAL CORRESPONDENT
CHURCH authorities are disturbed by the recent spate of thefts of art treasures from Italian churches. Pope Paul, in addressing the Sunday crowds in St. Peter's Square, referred to them as "these thefts, crimes and scandals which dishonour civilisation."
Italy, over the past year, has experienced an unprecedented increase in the theft of art treasures from churches. Among priceless paintings stolen recently from their ageold sites in churches have been works by Titian, Bellini, and Tintoretto. Most of them have been recovered by police.
But growing fear among art lovers. government officials and Church authorities has not been calmed by efficient police action, The problem is that many of Italy's churches are storehouses of the great masterpieces of the most important periods of Italian art. By modern standards they are poorly protected, if at all.
TRANSFER CALL While the Pope was lamenting the new robberies, Signor Ernilo Colombo, the Italian Premier, called for the transfer of privately-owned art works which are not sufficiently protected to State museums — an obvious reference to art treasures in churches. Signor Colombo said he had already discussed the matter with officials of the Vatican's Commission for Sacred Art in Italy.
Church spokesmen, including the Vatican newspaper L'Osservato re Romano, are opposed to the proposal to move religious art from churches into state museums. Its editor. ' Signor Raimondo Manzini, wrote in a frontpage editorial on September 18: "The fate of art works
even when taken 'provisionally' from their sites is easy to predict. It is unlikely they would be returned."
His point is not without reason. Many of the great paintings housed in Europe's major museums originally came from churches, monasteries and convents. Some were seized, some inherited or willed to a town or state, and others were acquired through non-payment of taxes.
PARISHIONERS' GUARD Signor Manzini also argued that these paintings and other items were not only works of art but also objects stimulating devotion — a function he seemed to feel they would no longer have in a museum. "Objects in museums remain works (I' art," he wrote, "hut they are no longer related to religious thought, no longer living in spiritual dialogue."
Some churches are following the example of the parishioners of the Church of Santa Maria del Popolo in Rome, a jewel of Italian art.
With chapels designed by Raphael, paintings by Caraveal° and sculpture by Bernina the parishioners have taken it on themselves to mount a night guard to discourage would-be robbers who not long ago got away with several valuable Renaissance candelabra.
But many churches in Italy cannot protect or keep in good repair the treasures of the past. Despite the prohibitions of Church authorities and the Vatican's own art commission for Italy, many minor works of art and ornament have found their way to private dealers.
Thefts from churches are by no means confined to Italy. Last week thieves stripped the Church of St. John the Baptist at Malines, near Brussels, of most of its valuable masterpieces which the parish could not afford to insure against theft.