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X UNITED CHRISTIAN ACTION X • ' • ' • ^ 0- 737 ,0102 Menlo Park \5^ ^X • ■ '• '' ; '•'■ . ■ ! ' South. Africa . ■ Tel (012) 982680,^ X Telex 4-21851 sa,! UNITED CHRISTIAN ACTION press releases ' ucaNews 10/86 vr -,•% I, i ' * '

Pretoria, 14.05.1986 (uca) ri • : 1 J Foreign funds steer SACBC out of the control of Catholic laity - ; The following report highlights some aspects of the activities of .. j the South African Catholic Bishop's Conference (SACBC) under the ^ , leadership of Archbishop Denis Hurley.

SACBC "Report on " - Arguing that the official Marxist-Lenin ist programme of SWAPO was only drawn up to "keep the Warsaw Pact , , coimtries haony to supply the arms ..." (Report on Namibia, 01.06. 82, at p.27) Catholic Bishops are active in v.'hitewashing the South , West African People's Organisation (SV/APO). On 30.01.83 Archbishop Denis Hurley held a lecture in Johannesburg entitled "The Truth on , Namibia". Members of the later accused him of throw--" ing a smokescreen around SWAPO (Citizen, 04.02,83). Propa.gating support for the Marxist ANC overseas - Archbishop Denis ' Hurley was instriimental in the huge 1983 propaganda campaign against in V/est Germany. The German charity organisation MISEREOR, which distributes hundreds'of millions of Rand every year to Third World countries, was used as the vehicle to promote the African Nation al Congress (ANC - a Soviet backed terrorist organisation) to the West German population. "The ANC is the natural expression of the African wish for liberation" claimed Archbishop Hurley during an interview with MISEREOR and, he continued, "The black population supports my ideas fully!" (Laenderheft MISEREOR 1983, p.21). African Study Course - In the same year the SACBC's Department of Schools initiated a stiidy course in which homeland leaders are depicted as stooges of the South African government who are /. appointed to continue the oppression of the people. Black police- ^ men, soldiers, community councillors and Coloured and Indian members' * of the President's Council are all labelled "collaborators" and as betraying their people for the sake of wealth, status and education. The study course is liberally illustrated vrith pictures of 8,ngry black crowds with raised fists underlined by such captions as: "We won't work for the whites! Europeans, go home! We refuse to pay tax! ■•Schools are useless! The chiefs oppressed us! Give us land! We will ^never let the Christians rule us!" (SIGNPOSTS 1/83).

launching of the pro-Marxist newspaper "The New Nation" - In 1985 the SACBC launched a, fund-raising campaign in West Germany to raise money for what they called a "pastoral project" in South Africa. The 250 000 Rand raised was then use to finance a new Catholic newspaper "The New Nation", Far from promoting Christian principles "The New .Nation" supports tHe aims ofthe banned Marxist ANC and its front organisation United Democratic Front, as is evidenced by the paper's complimentary coverage of Oliver Tambo, guerilla handbook from Communist Angola and Nelson and V/innie Mandela. '-2-j XTNITBD CHivISTIAN ACTION press releases 14.05.1986 page 2 |

continued from page 1 : . ^

End Conscription Campaign - In 1985 the SACBC encouraged Catholics to help promote peace by working for an end to conscription. Already in 1974 they argued that the armed forces in South Africa were ; , % fighting an unjust war. "V/e believe that the financial cost of the war increases the poverty in our country, and that money should -k. h"' rather be used in the interests of peace ... Young men are con- '>? scripted to maintain the illegal occupation of Namibia, and to wage - r.^.X unjust war against foreign coimtries". On 28,06.85 Archbishop Hurley was the keynote speaker at a "Stop the Call-Up" peace festival held X at the University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg. On 15.04.86 "'1 the Archbishop and his five man delegation held three-day talks with the aHC at their headquar'ters in Lusaka, "Zambial Issuing a joint ' 1 commvinique they stated that "it is vital that the White population should recognise the fact that the Black majority, from experience, 'i' knows the South. Africar Defence Force and police as instruments of '' ' repression ... The meeting accordingly recognises the ioportance of ' the campaign to end military conscription" (citizen, 17.04.86).

Other activities - The SACBC has come out in qualified support of ' the Marxist EA.1R0S Document; it has repeatedly called for the withdrawal of police and defence forces from the townships, there by ignoring the extraordinary threat which radicals pose to moderate blacks in their efforts to make the townships vingovernable; although quick to condemn the presence of the armed forces in the townships, the SACBC consistently fails to call for the withdrawal of those comm-unist inspired "comrades" responsible for the death of more than 500 blacks by the so-called necklace treatment; and Archbishop Denis Hurley mocks the dignity of Catholic Masses held in the townships by turning the Offertory into a- platform for propaganda - offering up such items as petrol bombs, fire arms and rubber bullets.

Ignoring the aspirations of the Catholic laity in South Africa - More than 10 000 signatures against the Bishop's recent call for sanctions were collected by the TFP (Tradition, Family and Property); "Concerned Catholics" has recently handed to the Vatican a powerful protest signed by hundreds of leading Catholics in South Africa; and during a three day conference attended by 80 eminent black Church leaders in on 20.11.85 a motion of no confidence in the leadership of white radicals such as Archbishop Hurley was accepted. A leading black theologian told the S\inday Times reporter that "the basic mood at the consultation was that we are sick and tired of white messiahs seeking martyrdom overseas by interpreting black suffering to the world" (Sun day Times, 01.12.85). Subsequently black participation was'withdrawn from Hurley's Christians for Justice and Peace (CJP).

The Archbishop hovrever seems confident that the SACBC need no longer rely upon the support of ordinary parishoners or the Church laity. The extent of his donations from overseas is such that the drying up of local funds is more than compensated for by the additional inflow of millions of Rands, mainly from West Germany. In 1984 R750 000 was received, one year later that figure jumped to R2,3 million.

As the Vicar-General of , Father Reginald Cawcutt "The Bishops are leaders of the Catholic Church and they necessarily have to ask where the congregation wishes to (Citizen, 30.04,86).

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