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book reviews503 tory. In composing the message, the Pope reUed upon the assistance ofJoaquin Salaverri, a Jesuit aide to the Assistant for Spain in Rome. The author uses Salaverri's unpublished diary to provide some interesting detaU. AU of these chapters were pubUshed as articles in Miscelánea Comillas from 1986 through 1995, and it is convenient to have them bound in one volume.As a most helpful addition, the book includes a complete annotated bibUography of aU the bishops' statements, letters, and other pastoral concerns from aU ofthe diocesan buUetins of the period. This alone takes up nearly 200 pages of text and in itself makes this a valuable resource. The author succeeds in his task of showing the mentaUty of the clergy. He proves beyond a doubt that the bishops'primary concern was the protection of the Church,not the support ofa government that was more ideologicaUy suited to their class needs.The Nationalists were in fact supported by the clergy because of the anticlerical fury of the first few months of the war that resulted in the death of nearly 8,000 clerics.The bishops would have supported any government that protected them.The diocesan buUetins reveal over and over again the detaüs of the persecution. This book does not change any ofthe standard interpretations ofthe Church's role in the war, but it does include a great deal of interesting detail. A slight drawback is some detail on the mUitary struggle that detracts from the author's main purpose, but aU in aU, this is a most useful work. José M. Sánchez Saint Louis University Kirche und Staat im kommunistischen Polen, 1945-1989. By Jan Siedlarz. (Paderborn: Ferdinand Schöningh. 1996.Pp.4l6.DM 52,- paperback.) This book capably summarizes most of what we already knew about the relations of church and state in Poland during its phase of Communist dictatorship .Although the author, a PoUsh priest and theologian, has little to say that is original, what he does teU the reader is informative, well documented, and unexceptionable ,including his assertion of the importance ofhis topic as a crucial element in the coUapse of Communism in his homeland, and perhaps, by extension , in much of the rest of Central Europe as weU. After noting the depth of Poland's Christian heritage and the venerable association of Catholicism with Polish identity and patriotism, Father Siedlarz recites a detailed account ofhis subject according to the formula that has become standard among those observers incUned to celebrate the ultimate success of the PoUsh Church in its dramatic forty-five-year struggle against totaUtarianism. After seizing the reins ofgovernment at the end ofWorldWar II, the Polish Communist regime strove to extirpate reUgion and break the Church, driven by ideology and thirst for unchecked power.The Church weathered this assault, 504book reviews largely owing to the astute and courageous leadership of Cardinal Wyszynski, leaving the ruling cUque no choice but to coexist grudgingly with its ecclesiastical rival and even to seek common ground In certain limited respects.Through it aU, the Church consistently upheld Christian truths and values, especiaUy an insistence on the subjectivity of man.The author stresses, with justice, that this was a reUgious message, not overtly poUtical, but under the circumstances it amounted to much the same thing, as everyone understood. The unimpeachable integrity ofthe Church lent it unmatched prestige and authority among the great majority of Poles and contributed to a noteworthy surge of reUgiosity in the country that culminated Ln the astonishing election of a PoUsh pope in 1978. Now Ln effect operating from the Vatican, the PoUsh Church picked its way cautiously through the last decade of the Cold War, encouraging and instructing the Poles, supporting SoUdarity in its infancy, and succoring a stricken nation through the rigors of martial law, but never severing Unes of communication with the increasingly frustrated and isolated Party. By the time "People's Poland" reached the end of its rope in 1989, the Church was uniquely positioned to mediate the peaceful and orderly Communist abdication of power to the democratic opposition, the first of the Soviet bloc dominoes to topple in that momentous year. In conclusion, Father...

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