„Kauza Dechet” očami Svätej stolice
The Dechet Case” through the Eyes of the Holy See

Summary/Abstract: One of the most radical interventions of the communist regime in Czechoslovakia against the Catholic Church was the forcible installation of the administrator Jan Dechet in the Banska Bystrica diocese after the death of Bishop Andrej Škrabik, and later his staged election as Vicar Capitular. Its aim was to break the unity of the Church, to create within its ranks collaborating groups of “patriotic priests” and thus to dominate the Church not only by external violent means, but also from within. Previous historical reflection on these events has been limited to the reconstruction of Church-State relations on the basis of domestic historical sources. The present study, based on recently released Vatican documents from the pontificate of Pius XII, puts the events into an international context and analyses for the first time the attitude of the Holy See towards the draconian intervention of the communist state, which unfolded in a field of tension between, on the one hand, a resolute rejection of communism and its encroachments on the freedom of the Church and an international anticommunist mobilisation, and, on the other hand, an attempt, at least in part, to reorganise and tolerate the situation, and, through a series of extraordinary measures and faculties, to allow for the proper administration of the diocese and the running of ecclesiastical life.

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