THE SPANISH QUESTION

Press, Volume LXXIII, Issue 22198, 15 September 1937, Page 6

THE SPANISH QUESTION

I 111 THE BDJTOii or IHJE fItJCSS. Sir, —Your correspondent. L. A. Efford, says Garcia Morales is still a priest. Of course he is. Once a man is validly ordained he remains a priest for ever. The Church cannot deprive him of his priesthood, but she can deprive him of his "faculties," i.e., his right to exercise the ministry of the priesthood for bad conduct. And this is what his bishop did to Garcia Morales 10 years ago—long before the present civil war started. Nor does the fact that Garcia Morales writes scurrilous anti-Christian articles for Communist newspapers prove, as your correspondent thinks, that Garcia Morales is a good priest. On the con* Lrary it proves up to the hilt that he is a very bad one. Morales is a renegade from Christianity. He has demoted himself for many years to scurrilous journalism. He frequently wrote 'or th<3 "Hereldo de Madrid," one of

the most violent of the Madrid “Red" papers. He is a person avoided by all good Catholics in Madrid and is in no way fit or competent to speak for the clergy of the Catholic Church in that city or anywhere else. His broadcast from Madrid was a tissue of false and stupid statements, that no sensible, fair-minded person could possibly accept, especially when one knows the history of Garcia Morales—Communist and atheist—who gave it. Umberto Colonna’s letters in “The Press" of yesterday and to-day are pitiable and childish attempts to wriggle out of his dilemma. His hero has let him down. Garcia Morales has

failed to answer Mr Colonna's letter and defend his character. Instead of apologising to your readers for his misleading statements concerning the real character of Garcia Morales, Umberto Colonna is not in the least abashed, but, on the contrary, tries to hide his retreat by raising a smokescreen consisting of a lot of absurd statements about the Vatican. Mussolini, the morality of the priests on the Continent, etc.,—Yours, etc., P. J. COONEY. Lyttelton. September 14, 1937. [Subject to the right of reply of "Interested," this correspondence is now closed.—Ed., "The Press."!