GESTAPO MISRULE

Gisborne Herald, Volume LXVIII, Issue 20603, 3 November 1941, Page 4

GESTAPO MISRULE

BISHOP’S WARNING ASSAULT ON CHURCH DEMAND FOR JUSTICE (Elec. Tel. Copyright—United Presa Assn.) (British- Official Wireless.) Reed. 9 a.m. RUGBY, Nov. 1. An outspoken protest against the Gestapo misrule in Germany was made by the Roman Catholic Bishop of Munster in a sermon on July 13, the text of which has now been received in London. In the sermon, which followed the bombing of Munster by the Royal Air Force, the Bishop said: “I see myself obliged to speak of another terrible happening that has befallen at the end of a horrifying week. Munster had not recovered from the appalling devastation which the external enemy caused when the Gestapo confiscated both houses of the Society of Jesus and forced reverend fathers and lay brothers to leave without delay, not only their houses and not only our city, but also the province of Westphalia and the Rhine province. The same hard fate has overtaken the convent. Nuns expelled from Westphalia must leave Munster by 6 o’clock. The houses in the possession of the two orders have been sequestrated for the gauleitung of northern Westphalia. Seizure of Monasteries “So we see that the assault on monasteries which has been raging in Austria, southern Germany, western Poland, Luxembourg, Lorraine and other parts of the German Empire, has now been let loose on Westphalia. We must be prepared for a repetition of such terrible news in the next few days, when one monastery alter another will be seized by the Gestapo and the inmates, true German patriots, be cast out into the streets like criminals and slaves and hurried out of the country like obnoxious vermin.

“And why? We are told for political reasons. No inmate of these monasteries has been accused of any offences or crime or summoned before a court, or indeed sentenced. We have seen the Gestapo imprison blameless, honoured Germans without a verdict from the courts and without the opportunity to defend themselves. They have been deprived of liberty and expelled from their native places and interned. Deprived of Liberty

“Two members of my cathedral chapel were suddenly dragged from their dwellings by the Gestapo, deported from Munster, and banished to distant places. No one is certain, even though he is conscious of being a most conscientious citizen and even though he knows he is completely innocent, that he will not one day be fetched out of his house, deprived of liberty, and shut up in dungeons or concentration camps by the Gestapo. “I am well aware that this may happen any day to myself. I then would no longer be able to speak publicly, so I speak publicly to-day. “I openly warn them not to continue on this course, which I am firmly convinced will call down God’s punishment on mankind and bring our people and country to misery and ruin. “The right to life, inviolability and liberty is an indispensable part of the moral and social order. Any State which oversteps this divinely-imposed limit and permits or causes the punishment of innocent men undermines its own authority. “Therefore, as a German, as an honourable citizen, as a representative of the Christian religion, and as a Catholic bishop, I cry aloud—we demand justice. If this cry remains unheeded, the nation and country will perish from inner corruption.”