The author of the book was not unaware that the publication of a work of that nature would be equivalent to an act of kamikaze: It would certainly inflict a hard blow on rising Progressivism, but it would also inevitably expose the Legionário group to criticism and retaliation, compromising its influence in Catholic spheres. This was exactly what happened from then on.
“It was a kamikaze act. Either progressivism or we would blow up. We did. In the catholic milieu, the book drew applause from some, furious irritation from others, and a profound bewilderment from the immense majority. The dark night of an unbearable, complete and endless ostracism descended upon those of my friends who continued faithful to the book. Forgetfulness and oblivion enveloped us when we were still in the flower of our youth: this had been the sacrifice foreseen and accepted. Dawn, as we will see, only returned in 1947. However, nascent progressivism received a blow from the book from which until today it has not yet recovered.”81
In private the archbishop of São Paulo, José Gaspar de Afonseca e Silva, did not hide his anxiety for the movement guided by Plinio Corrêa de Oliveira, with the obvious support of the Apostolic Nuncio.82 However, he died suddenly in an aircraft accident, while on his way to Rio de Janeiro, on 27 August 1943. His successor Archbishop Carlos Carmelo de Vasconcellos Motta,83 even before occupying the Episcopal see was warned in detail about the boiling situation in the Paulista capital.84
Archbishop Carlos Carmelo, whose vision was the opposite to that of the Legionário, was also of a different temperament to that of his predecessor: he was not a man to mince matters and he faced up to the situation. He imposed an “armistice” on the Legionário team85 which acted as a disavowal of its directors. Plinio Corrêa de Oliveira lost his role of president of Catholic Action; Father Antonio de Castro Mayer, Vicar-General of the archdiocese, was demoted to curate of the parish of São José de Belém; Father Geraldo de Proença Sigaud was sent to Spain.86 A stormy campaign of defamation followed against which Dr Plinio and his companions could not defend themselves publicly because of the “armistice” imposed on them by the archbishop. Finally, in December 1947, Plinio Corrêa de Oliveira was ousted from the direction of the Legionário. The issue of 29 February 1948, contained an editorial entitled “Legionário em terceira fase” (Legionário in its third phase) in which the beginning of a “new phase” of existence of the weekly was announced. The final motto of the unsigned article said everything: “Incipit vita nova”.87 Not a word about Plinio Corrêa de Oliveira, who, with immense generosity, had dedicated fifteen years of his life to the Legionário. In that same year, the future Bishop Helder Câmara took over the role of ecclesiastical assistant of Brazilian Catholic Action.88 The atmosphere was deeply altered.
Progressivism was already demonstrating the main lines of what would be its constant strategy in the subsequent years. Plinio Corrêa de Oliveira himself summarized it in these points:
“a) Flight from debate or doctrinal dialogue. The criticisms of my book, made explicit in one or another of the religious press, were vague, poor in arguments and rich in passion. Sometimes they also appeared implicit or veiled in pronouncements of this or that ecclesiastical personality;
“b) Defamation and then a campaign of silence and ostracism. Fuelled by a defamatory campaign, totally verbal, the principal clergy and laity who had applauded my book were gradually reduced to silence, removed from their positions, and relegated to ostracism. Some were only able to free themselves from this ostracism by remaining definitively silent about the subject;
“c) Advance, as if nothing had happened. Having thus stifled the opposition, the only thing left to the innovative current of opinion was to continue their advance, discreetly but resolutely.”89
The small group of the Legionário remained however compact and loyal during the storm: the oldest of its nine members was 39 years old, the youngest 22.90 Starting from February 1945 this group used to meet, every evening without fail, in the office at 665 Martim Francisco Street, in a part of the city called Santa Cecília, anxiously analysing the deterioration of the religious and political situation in Brazil and in the world.
Plinio Corrêa de Oliveira, intellectual guide of the group, made every effort to instil it with a profound and true interior life, convinced as he was that action and study should be nourished at the springs of prayer and sacrifice. He thus explained “interior life”:
“A man must endeavour to be constantly analysing himself. At every moment, he needs to know how his soul is: why is he acting in this or that way; if it is licit for him to proceed in this or that way; if to feel in this or that way in face of a certain event is according to Catholic morality. This effort is called ‘life’, because it is so intense and should be so continuous that, for man, it constitutes an existence that unfolds of its own accord on a higher and more profound plain than his external existence. This is what is called ‘interior life’, precisely because it demands that man be in the uninterrupted habit of analyzing himself and controlling himself, unceasingly acting and living ‘within himself’.”91
In study and prayer, in fraternal and daily life together, the group grew in unity and solidarity. This catacombal period, the eve of new struggles, lasted three years.92 During this period, the old Legionário team never ceased its controversial battle against the errors taking root in the Catholic world. One of the main targets continued to be Jacques Maritain, object of critical essays written, not only by Plinio Corrêa de Oliveira,93 but also by valiant polemicists such as Father Arlindo Vieira94 and José Azeredo Santos.95
During this period of isolation and misunderstandings, among the great friends of the group, we find Father Walter Mariaux,96 a prominent German Jesuit whom Dr Plinio described in this way:
“Blond, very tall, Herculean, exuberant health, ample gestures, the hands of a field marshal, he always gives a first impression of one who is robust and determined which little by little fills in with new psychological elements. I have never known a richer personality in contrasting elements that were, nonetheless, harmonic.”97
In 1949 Father Mariaux, organiser of the Marian Congregation of the São Luiz school, was recalled to Europe by his superiors. Some of the members of the congregation that he directed turned therefore to the group that met at Martim Francisco Street under the guidance of Dr Plinio. Thus the “Grupo da Martim” was born. Prominent among them were the four Vidigal Xavier da Silveira brothers, Dr Luiz Nazareno de Assumpção Filho, Dr Eduardo de Barros Brotero, Prof Paulo Corrêa de Brito Filho and José Luiz Marinho Villac, future rector of the seminary of Campos.98
Notes:
81. P. Corrêa de Oliveira, “Kamikaze”, Folha de S. Paulo, 15 February 1969.
82. C. Isnard O.S.B., Reminescências, p. 221.
83. Carlos Carmelo de Vasconcellos Motta was born on 16 July 1890 in the city of Bom Jesus do Amparo (Minas Gerais). Ordained to the priesthood on 29 June 1918, he was consecrated Bishop of Diamantina on 30 October 1932. On 19 December 1935 he was raised to the archdiocese of São Luiz do Maranhão, which he held until 18 August 1944, when he was called to replace Archbishop José Gaspar de Afonseca e Silva, as archbishop of São Paulo. He governed the archdiocese until 1964 when he was transferred to Aparecida immediately after the Revolution of 31 March. In February 1946 he was raised to the Cardinal purple by Pius XII as titular of St. Pancras. He died in Aparecida do Norte on 18 September 1982.
84. The new archbishop’s informer was, it seems, the Benedictine Dom Paulo Marcondes Pedrosa whom we have already met as the founder of the Marian Congregation of Santa Cecília and of the Legionário (C. Isnard O.S.B., Reminescências, p. 223).
85. “Let there be a total and complete armistice between the contending parties! We do not intend that this instruction be definite, but only as an emergency, while momentous subjects are being judged by the Episcopal commission of Catholic Action” (Cf. “Revista Eclesiástica Brasileira”, no. 4, December 1944, p. 978). Cf. also “Armistício”, O Legionário, no. 641, 19 November 1944.
86. P. Corrêa de Oliveira, “Padre Sigaud”, O Legionário, no. 711, 24 March 1946.
87, O Legionário, no. 804, 29 February 1948.
88. Bishop Helder Câmara had participated actively in the Ação Integralista Brasileira, the Fascist inspired movement of Plinio Salgado, becoming a member in 1937 of the supreme council of the AIB, composed of 12 members. When in 1946 the archbishop of Rio Jaime de Barros Camâra wanted to make him his auxiliary bishop, he met with difficulties from the Holy See, because of his previous political activity in the “Integralists”. The Pope refused the nomination that only arrived six years later. During that period of time, Bishop Câmara completed his transition from Integralism to Progressivism.
89. P. Corrêa de Oliveira, A Igreja ante a escalada da ameaça comunista. Apelo aos Bispos Silenciosos, São Paulo, Editora Vera Cruz, 1976, pp. 48-9.
90. Dr. Plinio’s eight companions were: José de Azeredo Santos, Paulo Barros de Ulhôa Cintra, José Fernando de Camargo, José Carlos Castilho de Andrade, Fernando Furquim de Almeida, José Gonzaga de Arruda, Adolpho Lindenberg, José Benedicto Pacheco Salles.
91. P. Corrêa de Oliveira, “Pio XII”, O Legionário, no. 553, 19 March 1943.
92. “The grim harvester took three combatants from our scanty ranks. The first was the polished, intrepid, noble son of Our Lady, our unforgettable José Gustavo de Souza Queiroz. I also remember with respect and nostalgia the ardent personality, while at the same time being silent and gentle, of a militant member of JOC (Catholic Workers Youth), Mrs Angelica Ruiz. And the fighting and distinguished figure of a model head of family, of this excellent surgeon that all of Santos admired, of this outstanding university professor, of this father of the poor called Antônio Ablas F.o” (P. Corrêa de Oliveira, “Nasce a TFP”, Folha de S. Paulo, 22 February 1969). On José Gustavo de Souza Queiroz, Cf. ID., “Bemaventurados os puros, porque verão a Deus”, O Legionário, no. 710, 17 March 1946.
93. On 6 February 1944, Plinio Corrêa de Oliveira published and commented on in Legionário the full text of the letter sent by Maritain to the Brazilian newspaper O Diario, in answer to the criticisms of Father Arlindo Vieira, that had appeared on 31 October 1943 in the same Legionário (Cf. “Os ‘direitos humanos’ e O Legionário”, O Legionário nos. 600 and 601, of 6 and 13 February 1944). Cf. also ID., “Desfazendo explorações maritainistas”, Catolicismo, no. 42, June 1954, pp. 5-6; ID., “A Comunidade dos Estados Segundo as normas de Pio XII”, Catolicismo, no. 43, July 1954, pp. 5-6; ID., “Tolerar o mal em vista de um bem superior e mais vasto”, Catolicismo, no. 44, August 1954, p. 3.
94. In Rio de Janeiro “the principal figure opposing Maritain was the cultured and intrepid Jesuit Arlindo Vieira” (P. Corrêa de Oliveira, A Igreja ante a escalada da ameaça comunista, p. 45). Father Arlindo Vieira was born in Capão Bonito, in the State of São Paulo on 19 July 1897. Having entered the Society of Jesus he finished his studies, in Rome and in Paray-le- Monial, before returning to Brasil where he devoted himself to teaching and then to the missions of the people, travelling to the poorest and most abandoned areas of Brazil. He celebrated his last Mass in Diego Vasconcelos, on the feast day of the city’s patron saint, the 4 August 1963. After distributing Holy Communion, he collapsed on the altar, where he died leaving great emotion among those present and a fame of holiness that continues to surround his memory. “His eucharistic weeks will be the spiritual renewal of the parishes. The parish priests fight over having him. Not a few bishops in the interior of Minas Gerais, of São Paulo, of Rio de Janeiro make use of his good services. He knows how to captivate the heart of the people with his goodness. His eloquence excites. It is as if his words bring a veritable supernatural message” A. Maia S.J., Crônica dos Jesuitas do Brasil centro-leste, (São Paulo, Edições Loyola), p. 212. On Father Vieira Cf. Francisco Leme Lopes S.J., “A mensagem espiritual do P. Arlindo Vieira S.J. (1897-1963)”, Verbum, no. 27, 1970, pp. 3-102; ID., “O P. Arlindo Vieira S.J., constante evocação”, Verbum, no. 27, 1970, pp. 403-19.
95. In September 1950, the magazine Vozes of Petropolis published an article by José Azeredo Santos, “O rôlo compressor totalitário e a responsabilidade dos católicos”, in which Maritain’s doctrines defended by Tristão de Athayde were criticized. In its December issue the Revista Eclesiástica Brasileira carried the article, explaining in a note that these were important and opportune questions examined with perspicacity and good sense. But in the month of March it was forced to publish a note by Cardinal Vasconcellos Motta which did not hide his disapproval of the article by Azeredo Santos.
96. Father Walter Mariaux, born in Ülzen in Germany on 21 December 1894, in 1913 joined the Society of Jesus and in 1926 became a priest. He began his apostolate with the Marian Congregations in Cologne (1929) and in Münster (1933). At the beginning of 1935, he transferred to Rome, to the Central Secretariate of the Marian Congregations. His open hostility to National Socialism made his return to Germany impossible. Thus in 1940 Father Mariaux was sent to develop the Marian apostolate in Brazil, where in that same year he met and joined the group of the Legionário. He returned to Germany in 1949, first to Hanover and then to Munich, where from 1953 he directed the Paulus-Kreis, the famous Maior Latina congregation and the national secretariate of the Marian Congregations. The magazine Die Sendung was the expression of his lay apostolate. He died in Munich on 30 April 1963. Under the pseudonym of Testis Fidelis, Father Mariaux published, El Cristianismo en el Tercer Reich, Buenos Aires, La Verdad, 1941, a well-documented and implacable analysis of National Socialist anti-Christianity. On Father Mariaux Cf. Walter Fincke, “P. Dr. Walter Mariaux S.J. “, Sendung, no. 16, 1963, pp. 97-108; Max von Gumppenberg S.J., “Walter Mariaux S.J. Ein Leben im Dienste der Kongregation”, Korrispondenz”, no. 13, 1963, pp. 177-81; Héja Gyula S.J., “Father Walter Mariaux S.J. (1894-1963) “, Acies Ordinata, nos. 31-2, 1962-3, pp. 390-5.
97. P. Corrêa de Oliveira, “Em Itaicí”, O Legionário, no. 609, 9 April 1944.
98. Canon José Luiz Villac entered the seminary in 1950 (Dr. Plinio was sponsor to his ordination to the priesthood). Over a period of ten years, he was director of the seminary of Jacarezinho and then that of Having moved to São Paulo, he is chaplain to the TFP and was able to assist Plinio Corrêa de Oliveira in the days of his last illness and death.