Involvement of Croatian Catholic clergy with the Ustaša regime

Involvement of Croatian Catholic clergy with the Ustaša regime refers to the role of the Catholic Church in the Independent State of Croatia (NDH), founded by the Ustaše in 1941 as a Nazi puppet state. NDH pursued the same genocidal policies as the Third Reich. The Croatian branch of the Church, headed by Aloysius Stepinac, never broke its ties with the Ustaše regime. With forced conversions on one hand and condemnations of the Ustaše atrocities on the other, the involvement of the clergy is still a controversial chapter in the history of the Catholic Church in Croatia.

Initial Church position
In 1941 the Independent State of Croatia was established by the Ustaša puppet regime with Ante Pavelić as its leader (Poglavnik). The Independent State of Croatia was one of several Nazi puppet states. The Ustaša regime pursued a genocidal policy against the Serbs (who were Eastern Orthodox Christians), Jews and Roma. Indeed, even SS officers are known to have protested against the senseless killings by the Ustaše.

There were several meetings and public sightings of Ante Pavelić, the leader of the Ustaše, with the bishops and the archbishop Alojzije Stepinac. The creation of the Independent State of Croatia was welcomed by very many Roman Catholic priests and the entire hierarchy of the Church. In then aftermath of the declaration of independence on April 10, 1941, the vast majority of leading churchmen viewed the rise of the Croatian puppet state in the context of a rebirth of a Catholic regime intent on following what were viewed as Christ's laws. At first, Stepinac was an active supporter of the Ustaša regime headed by Ante Pavelic, praying for the well-being of the puppet state.

Author Hubert Butler reviewed documents and newspaper accounts from the period in Zagreb after the war. According to Butler:


 * I did not expect to find outspoken criticism or condemnation in the Church papers because, if it had been published, the papers would certainly have been suppressed. But I was wholly unprepared for the gush of hysterical adulation which was poured forth by almost all of the leading clergy upon Pavelitch, who was probably the vilest of all war criminals. He was their saviour against Bolshevism, their champion against the Eastern barbarian and heretic, the Serb; he was restorer of their nation and the Christian faith, a veritable hero of olden time.


 * Turn, for example, to Katolicki Tjednik (The Catholic Weekly), Christmas 1941, and read the twenty-six verse ‘Ode to Pavelitch’, in which Archbishop Sharitch praises him for his measures against Serbs and Jews. (Butler, cited in Agee).

Implication in murders and conversions
During World War II a number of Croatian Catholic priests, not only cooperated with the regime but were implicated in murders and forced religious conversions of Serbs and Jews. In a few cases the whole population of villages was killed because they were Serb Orthodox; conversely, there have been cases where villagers were superficially converted and remained alive. There were cases of local involvement in genocide, including Friar Majstorović. The military vicariate of the NDH armed forces was increased unproportionately and was involved heavily in the mass murders, it's members never even reprimanded by their Church superiors, while some even encouraged them. According to Dr. Mišić, the Bishop of Mostar, even newly-converted Serbs were rounded up and murdered:


 * While the newly-converted are at Mass they seize them, old and young, men and women, and hunt them like slaves. From Mostar and Chapljina the railway carried six waggons full of mothers, girls, and children under eight to the station of Surmanci, where they were taken out of the waggons, brought into the hills and thrown alive, mothers and children, into deep ravines. In the parish of Klepca seven hundred schismatics from the neighbouring villages were slaughtered. The Sub-Prefect of Mostar, Mr Bajitch, a Moslem, publicly declared (as a state employee he should have held his tongue) that in Ljublina alone 700 schismatics have been thrown into one pit. (Mishitch, cited in Butler, 1956).

Church protests against crimes
Beginning in May 1941, Archbishop Stepinac protested against the crimes of the Ustaše, including the massacre of Serbs at Glina and the establishment of the Jasenovac concentration camp. The bishops Aksanović and Mišić began to protest to the Ustaše authorities regarding its crimes (a very dangerous activity). The protests however were nearly fruitless and the military vicariate of the Ustaše army, though deeply invloved in forced conversions and murders was not forbidden to carry them out or even reprimanded, leading many to believe the protests were a public show. Many among the clergy actually felt that forcible conversion offered an opportunity:


 * The Archbishop’s letter reveals the regret and revulsion which the violent methods used by Pavelitch’s missionaries inspired in the Catholic hierarchy. The formal resolution, which was passed in conclave in November, 1941, was an attempt to bring the conversion campaign under the control of the Church, and to check the rule of violence. The attempt was belated since the fury had spent itself by July, 1941, three months earlier.


 * If we exclude Archbishop Sharitch [of Bosnia], the author of the celebrated odes to Pavelitch and the fervent advocate of all his designs, the letters of Mgr Stepinac and the four bishops, whom he quotes, are moderate and humane. Why was the hierarchy so utterly impotent to check this inroad of fanatical barbarians into the purely ecclesiastical domain of conversion? I think the answer can be seen by a close examination of the letters [of the four bishops]. Pity for the heretic had always to be qualified, and was sometimes neutralized, by zeal for the extension of the Catholic Church. Never once did they say, ‘Let there be an end to conversions! There can be no talk of free will and voluntary change of faith in a land invaded by two armies and ravaged by civil war!’ Their concern is all for the right ordering of things…. A great opportunity had come to them. They must use it wisely, and not barbarously, for the saving of souls, but use it they must. . .  (Butler, cited in Agee).

Aftermath
By the end of the war, a large number of Croatians fled Croatia. This number included at a minimum several hundred Croatian priests. It is clear many were involved with the Ustase regime. Though the exact number is unknown due to the coverups.

After the war, Cardinal Stepinac was indicted by the Yugoslav government for collaboration with the Nazi regime. Stepinac was found guilty and sentenced to 16 years of hard labour. He served 5 years in the Lepoglava prison before the sentence was commuted to home arrest. He was appointed a Cardinal in 1952. He was transferred back home to the village of Krašić in 1953 and died in his residence seven years later. In 1998 Pope John Paul II declared him a martyr and beatified him; steps which divided public opinion in former Yugoslavia and elsewhere.