NEGOTIATIONS IN BUDAPEST

Press, Volume LXXXV, Issue 25737, 24 February 1949, Page 5

NEGOTIATIONS IN BUDAPEST

Church And State

APPROACH MADE

BY BISHOP (N.Z. Press Association —Copyright) (Rec. 8 p.m.) BUDAPEST, Feb. 23. The Bench of Roman Catholic

Bishops of Hungary has communicated with the Government about a letter said to have been written in prison

by Cardinal Mindszenty offering “to be of service now for an agreement between the Church and the State.” The official Hungarian news agency has published what is said to be the text of Cardinal Mindszenty's letter to the Archbishop of Kalcsa. The letter said: “The thread of discussion should be resumed without violation of dogma and the laws and rights of the Church. I should now at least like to help the cause of peace. I realise today that we viewed the problem from one side only and did not. try to understand the Hungarian democracy’s problems. I would appreciate it if the Bench of Bishops would begin negotiations with the Government.” In Vatican City the Vatican news□aper “Osservatore Romano,” com-

menting on Cardinal Mindszenty’s letter, said: “The prisoner in the letter declares that he saw problems onesidedly when he was free but that while he was in his cell he was able to see them from all sides. We repeat that we believe the word of the free man and not of the prisoner.”