crimes committed by totalitarian regimes - Ministrstvo za pravosodje

Crimes committed by totalitarian regimes
the sacraments. Bishop of Seckau, Dr Ferdinand Pawlikowski, first sent 12 priests; by March 1943,
the number increased to 13. Every two weeks, 49 priests came to help in the parishes. Although it
was strictly forbidden and dangerous, some of the German-speaking priests learned Slovene. Bishop
Rožman also sent priests-volunteers secretly over the border to help in pastoral care. That was very
dangerous work and German police searched for them.
Many deported priests later came back to Slovenia; some clergymen managed to escape their
deportation and came to Ljubljana at once, seeking refuge in the diocese there. Through the intervention
of Bishop Rožman with the Italians, 95 priests of Lavant Diocese were able to settle in the Province of
Ljubljana. A number of priests was sent to concentrations camps – 20 from Lavant Diocese alone. Four
priests died in Dachau, one in Mauthausen, and eight in the Croatian concentration camp Jasenovac.
Ten clergymen were shot by Germans – most as hostages – and the Italians killed one.
Church properties, prebend (praebenda) and ecclesiastical goods (Bona mensae) were seized
for the benefit of “Reichskommissar für die Festigung des deutschen Volkstums” (RKFDV: “Reich
commissioner for reinforcing the Germanhood”). Whereas in Styria, churches remained for church
services (though one was torn down, another used as a storeroom), in Upper Carniola also churches and
parsonages were seized for the benefit of Reichsgau Kärnten or local political authorities. Properties
of monasteries and religious orders were confiscated. From all the religious orders of women, only the
Sisters of Mercy were allowed to remain, because of their work in hospitals. The Ljubljana Diocese lost
forest properties (24,758.2 hectare). The oldest Slovenian high school, at the Institute of St. Stanislaus in
Št. Vid (St. Veit), also owned and operated by the diocese, was confiscated. Students and their teachers
were forced to leave their school in half an hour. (The Communists would close the Institute in 1945,
but it reopened to a new generation of students decades later in independent Slovenia.) Schools in
nearby Ljubljana, then under Italian occupation, remained open and classes could continue.
After the Italian capitulation on 8 September 1943, Germans occupied the Ljubljana Province.
It became part of the “Operationszone Adriatisches Küstenland” (Operationzone Adriatic Littoral).
Because of the negative attitude of the Nazi regime, Church activities for the benefit of the pursued
were very much reduced. Bishop Rožman had no leanings towards the Germans; in October 1941 he
even protested against what was going on in the occupied part of his diocese. But he was later accused
of collaboration, because in the absence of German soldiers and officials, he celebrated a mass for
the Home-guards (slovenski domobranci) just before they were forced to swear an oath on 20 April
1944 – and also because he attended a parade in front of the Church of the Holy Trinity (“Cerkev Svete
Trojice”, known as the Nuns’ Church) on 30 January 1945. To him, the eternal welfare of individual
souls was more important than political considerations.
2.2. Territory occupied by Italians
In the so-called Province of Ljubljana, the situation was essentially different. Political activities
were prohibited, newspapers were censored but could publish in Slovene, cultural institutions and
schools were allowed to continue their work. The relationship of Italian occupiers to the Church as an
institution was completely different from that of the German occupation. The Catholic Church could
continue with its activities almost without disturbance and was therefore able to help many people.
Bishop Tomažič was not able to help his clergy. The only one who could do something was the
Bishop of Ljubljana, Dr Gregorij Rožman. Already in May 1941, he had asked the Vatican to request
that the Italian government intervene with the German government on behalf of the arrested Slovene
clergy in the German occupied dioceses of Ljubljana and Lavant. His collegue Bishop Tomažič asked
him explicitly to do so for his diocese. But finally the Italian ambassador had to inform the Vatican on
20 October 1942 that the interventions in Berlin had not been successful.
The Bishop of Ljubljana intervened for numerous people with Italian authorities directly and
through the Vatican: children, Jews, clergymen, people under arrest, prisoners of war, Yugoslav officers,
hostages, people condemned under death sentences, internees in Rab (Arbre), Treviso (Monigo),
Renicci, Gonars. To date, some 1,500 names of people for whom the Bishop personally intervened,
can be identified. To those names we must add his interventions for groups that are not specified by
numbers or recorded by names. We can definitely state that he intervened for at least 2,000 persons.
Recently documents have been found that had been given to Dr Alojzij Vrtačnik (a lawyer assigned
to the Bishop’s trial), documentation that later disappeared after that trial. Those documents certainly
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