Evening star., 1947-06-13
On the Record
On the Record
Communism Like Noziism
Demands Blind Obedience
Antihuman Aspect of System Fills
World With Horror
By Dorothy Thompson

Having talked a week ago ON Town Meeting,
Of the Air concerning the question, Are Com
munism and Christianity compatible?" have
found myself pondering the matter ever since.
When my great friend, Helmuth Won Moltke,
was ON trial for his life before the Nazi prose-
cutor, Freisler. the issue-as Won Moltke de-
scribed it in his last letter to his wife-became
simply one between man whose views of life
were Christian and the Nazi state There was
historic significance in the fact that Won Moltke
from an intransigently Protestant family, was
tried and-in fact-convicted. largely because
of his revealed association with another anti
Nazi, the Jesuit priest, Father Delp
But Won Moltke was also involved with bril-
liant labor leader and former MARKHAM, Theodor
Haubach Haubach, as a MARKHAM, had re-
nounced Christianity until, out of the expert
ence Of Naziism, he came to the conviction that
only social order accepting the basic premise
OF Christianity-namely, the existence Of the
soul and the union Of all souls in obedience to
the law OF love-could possibly resolve the
spiritual despair which is the source of modern
chaos.
In the trial OF Won Moltke, Fresler remarked
"Naziism has only one thing in common with
Christianity; it also claims the whole body and
soul of man."
Blind Obedience.
Precisely that could be said of communism.
The Communist entering the party order, re-
nounces every loyalty outside the party, and
accepts a discipline of, blind obedience. Many
years ago in Moscow I discussed this with
remarkable young woman, Rayna Prohm, un-
forgettably described by Vincent Sheean In
personal history" on the eve Of her entering
the party-a step which her sudden death pre-
vented think she had made the decision, but
the one thing that had been holding her back
was the realization that henceforth she would
be unable "to call her soul (and her con-
science) her own"
In discussing communism, its adherents or
sympathizers hate to pose communism versus
Christianity because they know that these are
opposite poles of thought and feeling. They
argue: So-called Christian civilization is not
Christian; capitalism is not Christian; ergo,
communism Is as Christian as capitalism;
@. E. D.. communism and Christianity are COM
patible. BY such sophistries and sylogisms they
try to change and confuse the issue.
Communism is more detinable concept than
capitalism because it Is totalitarian. In nom
Communist societies there co-exist many sorts
and degrees of capitalism-some predatory,
some creative, and all yielding to notifications
in behalf of the general welfare.
The crime of industrial capitalism is that 1t
has created the proetariat, whose labor and
life are commodities dependent upon market
fluctuations. From this viewpoint it has been
profoundly criticized by Christian philosophers
since before Marx.
Leads to Slavery.
But it is this evil which communism In no
degree mitigates, because communismS hold
on the masses depends upon the existence of a
proletariat. 1t does not distribute but concen-
trates wealth and reduces all to proletarian
status in order to control and manipulate them
as combined employer, policeman and Judge.
1t is the apogee of capitalism in its most ruth
less form leading to the unabashed reintroduc-
ton Of human slavery.
. This Is possible because Of its intrinsic denial
that there is any freedom of will or any su-
perior ethical imperatives. Affirming that life Is
struggle for power and starting from the
premise of an ineluctable class struggle, 1t
destroys all the innumerable links binding men
to other men, Thus 1t createts chain reactions
of illimitable and perpetual violence, requiring
endless purges and counterpurges.
Far more than its advocacy of any particular
economic system, it is this anti-peace, anti
reconciliation and. therefore. anti-hurnan as
pect of communism which fills the world with
proper horror
(Release by the Bell Syndicate Inc)