Did communists try to infiltrate the Catholic Church

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I have been reading various stories on how communists wanted to infiltrate the Catholic Church to change it from within. If they did try to do this, were they somewhat successful in changing the Church? Please give some information to me to either say yes they did or no they didn’t. Here is a sample of some of the information I had read:

Two former Communists, Bella Dodd and Manning Johnson, spoke on Communist infiltration of the Catholic Church. Dodd, an important Communist party lawyer, teacher and activist, converted to Catholicism in April 1952 under the tutelage of Bishop Fulton J. Sheen. Stating that the Communist infiltration was so extensive that in the future “you will not recognize the Catholic Church,” Dodd also asserted that:
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"In the 1930's, we put eleven hundred men into the priesthood in order to destroy the Church from within."

"Right now they are in the highest places, and they are working to bring about change in order that the Catholic Church will no longer be effective against Communism."
Manning Johnson, a former Communist Party official and author of “Color, Communism and Common Sense” testified in 1953 to the House un-American Activities Committee regarding the infiltration of the Catholic Church:
"Once the tactic of infiltration of religious organizations was set by the Kremlin ... the Communists discovered that the destruction of religion could proceed much faster through infiltration of the (Catholic) Church by Communists operating within the Church itself. The Communist leadership in the United States realized that the infiltration tactic in this country would have to adapt itself to American conditions (Europe also had its cells) and the religious make-up peculiar to this country. In the earliest stages it was determined that with only small forces available to them, it would be necessary to concentrate Communist agents in the seminaries. The practical conclusion drawn by the Red leaders was that these institutions would make it possible for a small Communist minority to influence the ideology of future clergymen in the paths conducive to Communist purposes This policy of infiltrating seminaries was successful beyond even our communist expectations."
 
Most of us can only offer opinions, but I’d guess many groups have attempted to infiltrate and undermine the Church.

One example we can be pretty certain of though:
In the Masonic document, The Permanent Instruction of the Alta Vendita, a plan is outlined for the subversion of the Church.
 
They not only tried, they succeeded. Why do you think we even have the modernist church today?
 
"Through a message given on October 13th (the anniversary day of the Miracle of the Sun and coinciding with the year of the Roe vs. Wade decision that became responsible for the deaths of over 55 million innocent unborn babies in the US alone), by Our most Holy Mother to Sister Agnes Katsuko Sasagawa in Akita, Japan (declared worthy of belief by Cardinal Ratzinger, now Pope Benedict, as well as the Local Bishop Ito due to several supporting Miracles) we are told: “If men do not repent and better themselves, the Father will inflict a terrible punishment on all humanity. It will be a punishment greater than the deluge, such as one will never have seen before. Fire will fall from the sky and will wipe out a great part of humanity, the good as well as the bad, sparing neither priests nor faithful. The survivors will find themselves so desolate that they will envy the dead. The only arms which will remain for you will be the Rosary and the Sign left by My Son. Each day recite the prayers of the Rosary. With the Rosary, pray for the Pope, the Bishops and the Priests. The work of the devil will infiltrate even into the Church in such a way that one will see Cardinals opposing Cardinals, Bishops against other Bishops. The priests who venerate Me will be scorned and opposed by their confreres (other priests). Churches and altars will be sacked. The Church will be full of those who accept compromises, and the demon will press many priests and consecrated souls to leave the service of the Lord. The demon will be especially implacable against the souls consecrated to God. The thought of the loss of so many souls is the cause of My sadness. If sins increase in number and gravity, there will no longer be pardon for them. Pray very much the prayers of the Rosary. I alone am able to still save you from the calamities which approach. Those who place their confidence in Me will be saved.”

Maybe Our Holy Mother is referring to communists?

God Bless
 
There are two ways of looking at this.

The first way is to theorize and look for a global organized conspiracy of communists with somebody back in the shadows pulling all the strings. Aside from Satan, no such globally centralized leadership exists, IMO.

But the second way is much more plausible. Communism isn’t just an organization, it’s an idea. Ideas take hold not just through formal structures, but through informal networks. Organized or not, it is a matter of simple history to look back at the last 60 years and see that a significant communist influence has pervaded many members of the Church at all levels. Step aside from the label (i.e. boogeyman) and the essence of communism is the idea that we humans can build a structured society that externally imposes justice and equality on all mankind. Sound familiar? A large portion of the catholics in the world have fallen for this idea of substituting external struggles for justice for the christian mission of internal conversion that leads to the practice of justice and the subsequent evangelization of others so the same can occur in them. And it didn’t help that too many of us catholics that have resisted that essentially communist revision of our faith commited the equal and opposite crime of piously praying our rosaries while the homeless shivered and the hungry begged.

It seems to me that the real saints gained the Grace to care for the weak by cultivating their relationship with He who is strong.
 
Our Lord said the gates of the Netherworld will not prevail against his church. I have faith and believe in him.

Matthew 16
 
Zehnia is partially correct…but of course, there have always been fomenters, disidents, heretics, schismatics in the Church (and on the way out). Marxist socialism WAS a problem in the last 20 years with some of the lower clergy in Central and South America. The Church has issued corrections to the errors of Liberation Theology. So I would not be surprised to find that Communists had tried to infiltrate the Church…in fact, I’d be surprised if they didn’t try. They would either be stupid or lazy if they didn’t try, wouldn’t they? I mean, even more stupid than we imagined?

Of course, Zehnia is also completely wrong, if by “modernist church,” he or she means the Church founded by Jesus Christ and lead by His Vicar. There’s no such animal as the “Modernist Church.” There may be modernists who still self-identify as Catholics, but they’ve essentially removed themselves from the Body already. Also, “modernism” is a heresy carefully defined by the Church in Her condemnation of it. It doesn’t necessarily mean what a great many “traditionalists” want us to believe that it means. They do like to bandy it about, however.
 
JKirkLVNV said:
Zehnia is partially correct…but of course, there have always been fomenters, disidents, heretics, schismatics in the Church (and on the way out). Marxist socialism WAS a problem in the last 20 years with some of the lower clergy in Central and South America. The Church has issued corrections to the errors of Liberation Theology. So I would not be surprised to find that Communists had tried to infiltrate the Church…in fact, I’d be surprised if they didn’t try. They would either be stupid or lazy if they didn’t try, wouldn’t they? I mean, even more stupid than we imagined?

Of course, Zehnia is also completely wrong, if by “modernist church,” he or she means the Church founded by Jesus Christ and lead by His Vicar. There’s no such animal as the “Modernist Church.” There may be modernists who still self-identify as Catholics, but they’ve essentially removed themselves from the Body already. Also, “modernism” is a heresy carefully defined by the Church in Her condemnation of it. It doesn’t necessarily mean what a great many “traditionalists” want us to believe that it means. They do like to bandy it about, however.
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Well, perhaps the words “modernist church” was a poor choice of words, however I couldn’t think of a better term. I remember the Roman Catholic Church before Vatican II (slightly), and I see what represents it now, and quite frankly, for the most part I have trouble seeing a similarity. It was on that basis that I said what I did.

I do not believe the gates of hell have prevailed; I believe the Roman Catholic Church still exists. Its just very hard to distinguish these days for me. Traditional Catholics these days must feel very much like St Athanasius did when he was exiled by the Arian bishops who had taken over the Church in his day.

The one hope I have for the true Church after Jesus Christ is Pope Benedict XVI.
 
The Communists tried, of course, to infiltrate and control the Catholic Church in its satellite nations in eastern Europe, such as Poland and Hungary and Czechoslovakia. They met with some success, not much. They seem to be more successful in China at the present time, a scenario still in process.
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Prior to World War II the Communist leader of France, Maurice Thorez, proclaimed a policy of "oustretched hand" to Roman Catholics. Interestingly, several of the European countries that were heavily Catholic had very strong Communist parties after World War II. As one example, in Italy, where the Catholic Almanac indicates that as many as 98% of the people are Catholics, one-third of the voters were supporting Communist Party candidates. There had been strong support of Communism in Spain before the civil war there, and in France as many as 25% of the electorate voted for Communist candidates in the early postwar period. 

In the United States, there was no serious attempt to infiltrate Catholicism. A small handful of Protestant ministers, a dozen or so, faithfully followed the Communist Party line, and there was a bit of influence among a few Orthodox - Russians, Romanians, Armenians, etc. None of these efforts produced much results. The wild charges of successful Communist influence in American churches were completely bogus. 

 There is some irony in that a few labor unions that had majority Catholic membership as well as Catholic officers were, for a time, Communist infested and even controlled. These included the TWU in New York, UE, National Maritime Union, etc. 

 One curious event. Fr. Stanislaus Orlemanski, a Polish-American priest, flew to Moscow in 1943 to confer with Stalin and Molotov. He issued a statement describing them as 'great men' and referring to Stalin as 'a great friend of the Polish people'. There's more to this story if anyone is interested. He eventually was pressured to apologize and promised to avoid any futher political activities at odds with the Catholic Church.

  All in all, of course, the Catholic Church was fiercely opposed to Soviet expansion into countries like Poland and Hungary. Some have argued that Pius XII fretted more about Stalin than Hitler, leading to charges that he did not speak out as he should have against Nazism and its evil policies, This helps explain why many Jews today are passionately against efforts to canonize Pius XII. Many of them even believe that he was an anti-Semite. A new book, Absolute Monarchs, a history of the papacy, deals with this issue rather fairly.
 
Insight said:
" The work of the devil will infiltrate even into the Church in such a way that one will see Cardinals opposing Cardinals, Bishops against other Bishops. The priests who venerate Me will be scorned and opposed by their confreres (other priests). Churches and altars will be sacked. The Church will be full of those who accept compromises, and the demon will press many priests and consecrated souls to leave the service of the Lord. The demon will be especially implacable against the souls consecrated to God. Maybe Our Holy Mother is referring to communists?

God Bless
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The message from Fatima was very similar. Sister Lucia spoke of a “diabolical disorientation” and the “blind leading the blind” within the church. She and the other seers slao said we must all “pray much for the Holy Father”.
 
Slightly related to this topic: I read yesterday that Russia is now a far ***more ***religious country than any in secular Europe. Ironic, no?
 
In grade school during the 50’s the sisters told us that they tried to infiltrate the Church but that they were converted:shrug:
 
adrift said:
In grade school during the 50’s the sisters told us that they tried to infiltrate the Church but that they were converted:shrug:
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She may have spoken rather too soon. Where’s her order today? 😦
 
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