Forefront among those who glory in the rebellion, justify the rebel atrocities, or seek to blacken the Government with misrepresentations are the Catholic Church in Spain, the Pope, and the bulk of the prominent Catholics in England along with their Press. The Universe has vied with the Daily Mail in gutter journalism. The Catholic Bishops, like Bishop Amigo of Southwark, have assisted in a widespread campaign to whitewash the rebels. Bishop Amigo was able to discover that they and their Moorish mercenaries “are fighting for God and their country” to prevent its "total destruction" (Manchester Guardian, September 4th). The Catholic Tablet, wholeheartedly on the side of the rebels but above the disreputable behaviour of such papers as the Universe, was nearer the truth when it admitted (August 1st) that the rebellion was begun by the rebels for "economic and class reasons" and could be broadly described "as a class war." The Tablet, however, was more far-seeing than Bishop Amigo, and has backed the rebels with a certain amount of misgiving: fortunately, a well-founded misgiving, for the civil war is going to do the Catholic Church in Spain more harm than 30 years of propaganda. Whether the rebels win or lose there are millions of Spanish workers and peasants who will never forget that when they tried to climb out of hideous poverty the Catholic Church helped the landowners and military leaders to grind them down again, by force of arms and with the aid of Moorish troops and every device of modern warfare.
[From an article, "The Catholic Church and the Spanish Workers", published in the Socialist Standard, October 1936.]
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