By Dr. Gjon Boriçi
Part One
Memorie.al / The great debate that has unfolded over the last two centuries following the birth of Marxist theory and Christianity would undoubtedly leave its mark in the fierce political clashes within countries where the communist ideal, inspired by the teachings of Marx, would persecute societies under single-party communist systems. In 19th-century Europe, after the conclusion of the Congress of Vienna and the establishment of the new system in international relations that ended the wars of the French Revolution, a variety of radical, republican, and socialist ideas began to flourish on the old continent. The years 1830–1840 were years of political and ambitious inspirations, taking as examples Frederick the Great, Jacobin ideas, the thoughts of Kant and Fichte, and the innovation of the new era. Marx’s political thought was shaped precisely in this epoch. The rational heritage was particularly important for separating identity from what became known in the 1830s–1840s as ‘socialism’.
Instead of an Introduction – Marxism vs. Christianity
Marx’s criticism of religion was based on the confrontation between the “Christian State” and the “State of Reason.” Contrary to the former, which according to him was not a moral union of human beings but a union of believers, philosophy required that “the state be a state of human nature.”
The identification of the Prussian state of Marx’s era with Christianity and civil society pushed Karl Marx himself to devise a path for the great upheaval. For Marx, Christian society was identical to civil society and the feudal order, which he called the ‘animal order’.
It would be Feuerbach who would add that “Christianity educated individualism and did not allow the birth of a communal ethos (character).” According to him, Christianity had separated the I from the you, through the unique union of every individual with an external personal being: Christ.
It would be this strong clash of ideas to “seize” as many supporters as possible that would pave the way for the great overthrow through a dishonest alliance between those who think and those who suffer.
Identification of the Catholic Clergy as the No. 1 Adversary of the Communist Regime in Albania
As early as 1945, specifically after the elections of December 2, the Politburo of the Central Committee of the Albanian Communist Party (PKSH), in meetings held from December 6 to 10, 1945, began identifying the opportunistic tendencies that had dominated the line of the Democratic Front.
According to the conclusions of these meetings, it had been a mistake to allow those “currents” which, according to the Politburo of the PKSH, had fought against the victory, to compete in the elections for the Assembly.
Three were the forces identified from the beginning of communist power and its legalization via the December 2, 1945 elections as the most potential opponents of the installed regime: the bourgeoisie, the Catholic Clergy, and reactionary intellectuals.
The lectures held against the Catholic Clergy were all wrapped in great historical inaccuracies, which demonstrate the extremely low theoretical level of those who delivered them. Many of the documents I have researched do not have a first and last name of the person who referred them, nor are they signed at the bottom. In these lectures, the struggle of the Soviet Union (hereafter: SU) and its foresight regarding the Nazi danger threatening the world were praised to the heavens.
This is not true at all, as it was the Soviet Union that signed the non-aggression pact with Nazi Germany on August 23, 1939, giving Hitler a free hand in the partitioning of Poland with the SU and Eastern Europe. Interestingly, the Albanian Communist Party had sought to make an alliance with the Catholic clergy for the Shkodra district for the December 2, 1945 elections.
For this reason, to conduct the electoral campaign, the PKSH sent Sejfulla Malëshova to Shkodra, who began his speech by evoking the great work of Shkodra’s revivalists: Vaso Pasha, Abbot Doçi, Fishta, Mjeda, and Luigj Gurakuqi.
However, the PKSH’s attempt to form an alliance with the Catholics in Shkodra failed, as the Catholic Clergy had even refused Sejfulla Malëshova’s request to found a Christian Democratic Party, according to Father Zef Pllumi. This party was to be created on the condition that it be part of the Democratic Front, but Bishop Gaspër Thaçi had refused it because he did not want the Catholic Clergy to get involved in political matters.
In a party lecture/instruction of the Berat District, the problems that the communist power would have with the Catholic Clergy are highlighted. Although this lecture states that the issue of the Catholic Clergy was not a problem in the Berat district, it was an important problem for the party. According to the lecture, the Catholic Clergy had become the axis of reaction in Albania, especially in the north of the country. Quite significant is the part where it is written:
“They (the Catholics) have their own organization; they are not with us. Considering their high level, their capacities, and their anti-popular spirit, they are a danger to us today.” The lecture gave the instruction that no communist should enter into a polemic with the Catholic Clergy, as this was not favorable, but rather they should try to prevent them from playing an important role in the reactionary movement of the country.
The inability to forge an alliance with the Catholic Clergy, and through it with the majority of Albania’s Catholics, ignited the harshest communist propaganda against this thousand-year-old Albanian structure. From the party activist structures in Shkodra, hundreds of reports continued to “pour” into the Central Committee of the PKSH regarding the hostile work of the Catholic Clergy during the war years.
An interesting fact emerging from this document is that the city of Shkodra, according to the party archives, was liberated without a fight. Another interesting fact in this document is a handwritten addition to the information: “Characteristic is the cold attitude of the Catholic layers.”
In the information presented on January 16, 1945, regarding the city of Shkodra by the PKSH envoy Mihal Prifti, the situation appeared far from promising for the communists. According to Mihal Prifti, the people in the city were cold, indifferent, and spectators to everything happening around them. The people did not participate in anything, and moreover, the Catholic element was very much connected to the Clergy and the reaction.
The Catholic element in Shkodra was organized into various associations, which also constituted the largest divide among various elements, with slogans against the movement and to sabotage mobilization. According to Mihal Prifti, the lower classes should be the base from which mobilization should begin to bring the people closer to the movement.
The Catholic Clergy and Catholics as Opponents of the Regime
From the beginning of 1946, in the reports coming from the Shkodra district, it is seen that the emphasis was placed on the campaign against elements of the Catholic Clergy. In the report dated October 3, 1946, sent by the PKSH District Committee for Shkodra, it was reported that the head of the reaction was the Catholic Clergy, supported by the British secret service.
However, no facts are given as to how the British service supported the Catholic Clergy in the city of Shkodra. Simply, the Catholic Clergy was the main enemy working day and night for the overthrow of the people’s power in Albania. According to the report, the Catholic Clergy worked in silence and in a very conspiratorial manner. The Clergy tried to present the power of the PKSH as anti-religious, according to the report.
According to State Security statistics compiled in Shkodra in January 1979 (the document is undated), in 1945 there were 145 Catholic priests in Albania. In the report of November 2, 1946, it was stated that the Catholic Clergy, despite its withdrawal, remained the leading head of the reaction and that it had not been hit as hard as it should have been.
By November 1946, the Catholic Clergy was the element that had suffered the heaviest blow from the communist power in Albania. From the files I have researched, recently declassified, it appears that from 1945 to 1946, dozens of Catholic priests were arrested and, above all, six of them were executed. Meanwhile, four Catholic priests had died in prison from torture.
According to the PKSH District Committee for the Shkodra branch, this was not called a hard blow? What had to happen to be called a hard blow? By the end of the communist regime in Albania, the number of Catholic clergy executed, according to a State Security statistic compiled in Shkodra on December 22, 1978, is 26. Meanwhile, the number of Catholic clergy who died in prisons, according to the same document, is 18.
In the month of November, other arrests of Catholic clergy followed, including Monsignor Frano Gjini, because on November 14, 1946, weapons were found at the Friars’ Church (Franciscan Convent). How was this possible? The truth about the weapons in the Franciscan Convent was “burst” by a former Security officer named Pjerin Kçira on May 19, 1949, when he himself was arrested and appeared before the court as a member of Koçi Xoxe’s group. In court, Kçira would say to the presiding judge:
“Do not think you can do with me as we have done with the Catholic clerics, by planting weapons in the church and forcing them through inhuman torture to admit they are theirs… to cover your filth and that of Enver Hoxha, you want to condemn innocent people. You were the ones who forced me to torture Catholic priests and religious, after you had accused them without any basis. You were the ones who ordered me to place weapons at night in churches, convents, and objects of worship, in order to find a pretext to eliminate the clergy and the Catholic Church.”
The communist power, through the State Security, sought to close every Catholic “nest,” as it called the convents and houses of nuns, so that there would be no possibility of speaking against the PKSH.
Nevertheless, the Security was vigilant even toward its own employees, as in the case of Brahim Shpari, a Security officer in Shkodra, simply for the fact that he had associated with Catholic youth. Meanwhile, for the Catholic communist Kol Ashta, the report stated that he could not be considered reliable for the party because he was big-hearted and merciful.
Tirana was no exception in the strike against the Catholic clergy. The blow given in Shkodra in the years 1945–1947 would undoubtedly be felt in Tirana as well. In the report sent to the Central Committee by the Tirana party activists on March 4, 1947, it is reported that among the Catholics of Tirana, due to the blow they had suffered, a great intimidation is observed. Since most of the Catholics of Tirana were originally from Shkodra, undoubtedly the ties with that city were strong – familial and friendly.
Living in this city for more than 30 years had identified them as people of business and culture. According to the report, the number of Catholics was good, but they stayed away from party activities. Most of them, according to the report, were intellectuals and old employees who had held important positions in the state and were in constant contact with one another, maintaining their friendship.
The ranks of the party in Tirana were “filled” by the poor and uneducated layers, and Catholics did not belong to either of the aforementioned layers. Not a single line in the report mentions that Catholics from Tirana were recruited into the ranks of the PKSH. All this led to the Catholics of Tirana being called opponents of the regime. Among the slogans, according to the Tirana party circular that the Catholic Clergy released was that “the Catholic religion is being fought while the Orthodox and Muslims are given subsidies by the state.”
Nevertheless, from Shkodra to Tirana, reports did not cease informing on the “hostile” activities of the Catholic reaction against the people’s power of the PKSH. Every reckless word, even in the form of a joke (the Shkodra humor regarding countless jokes about the regime is well known), and all this activity was called disorienting to the party’s work.
The Party Committee of the Shkodra district demanded an even stronger blow against the clergy and the Catholic reaction, as they had not been hit enough. Before the problems of the beginning of the disagreements between Albania and Yugoslavia, reports from the Shkodra district regarding the activity of Catholic clerics became more frequent.
According to them, it was the only opposing district that, despite the heavy blows it had suffered in 1945–1947, still spoke against Enver Hoxha and Koçi Xoxe. In fact, whatever political problem the communist power in Albania had with foreigners, the Catholic Church of Albania certainly had a hand in it.
In a State Security report for the years 1944–1947, the Catholic Church of Tirana was the node of connection between the internal reaction, the Vatican, and foreign intelligence.
In the State Security report on the Catholic Clergy, it appears that the latter had been responsible for all the foreign occupations that had occurred in Albania since the time of the Ottoman occupation (which in the report is written as “Automan”).
In almost every trial held against Catholic clerics, as Father Zef Pllumi also testifies, one of the accusations was: “you are responsible from the crusades to the efforts to overthrow the people’s power.”
Thus, the Catholic Clergy – the one that had built the first Albanian schools in Albania and had kept this ancient language alive – was supposedly obscurantist and had opposed at all times the best traditions and customs of the Albanian people. The Catholic bourgeoisie and the Catholic Clergy were one, and since they were clearly anti-communist, consequently, they were also anti-Albanian.
Nevertheless, according to the State Security report, even though the Catholic Clergy had suffered heavy blows, it still had not interrupted its anti-communist activity and consequently its treason against the fatherland and the people. But despite the occasional blows the Catholic Clergy received, it continued to be a sworn enemy of the socialist order. / Memorie.al
To be continued in the next issue
