Search results

Institutions of higher learning fulfill important functions and are, in a sense, symbols of universalism. The future of mankind may depend on the orientation and effectiveness of their work.The forces of universalism confront many problems today. The universal, regional and technical international organizations have many uses, but are handicapped by and reflect the shortcomings of a political system based on so-called sovereign states. This system has become unrealistic in the age of radio, television, rapid air transportation, nuclear power, missiles, communication satellites and space ships, and in an age of world-wide problems such as hunger, unemployment and enormous population growth. Other circumstances impede the development of a co-operative world society. Besides political and ideological rifts, there is the North-South chasm caused by important differences and conflicts of interest between the developed and developing nations. Instead of concentrating on farsighted policies and meaningful co-operation, the developed nations have produced dangerous weapons systems and are, in addition, polluting the air, water and soil as if driven to self-destruction by an evil spirit. They may also—often with the purest motives—run the risk of simply exporting these problems to the Third World under the guise of development aid, in the mistaken belief that industrial and technological 'growth' and educational systems as we know them in Western countries constitute a panacea for the ills of developing societies.

The key to the problem of the expulsion of the Germans from Hungary* was the Potsdam Conference, where the representatives of the three major Allies declared "that the transfer to Germany of German populations, or elements thereof remaining in Poland, Czechoslovakia and Hungary, will have to be undertaken." Thus the three major Allies assimilated the problem of the Germans in Hungary with the problems of Germans in Poland and Czechoslovakia, although in reality the situation in Hungary differed greatly from that in the other two countries. The terms of the Potsdam decision might have been suitable for the Polish and Czechoslovak situations, but were most misleading when applied to Hungary.

The arrest, trial and sentence for life of Joseph Cardnial Mindszenty, Primate of Hungary, has profoundly shaken the conscience of the Western world and provoked a wave of protests on a scale unheard of before. The incident occurred at the climax of the tension between West and East. The figure of the Cardinal became the personification of a world-wide struggle between two fundamentally different conceptions of life. His broken resistance—both physical and psychological—symbolizes the fate of the millions oppressed and silenced by a ruthless Communist minority in East Europe. The recntations and self-contradictory confessions in the course of the trial had all the characteristics of the usual travesties of justice in Communistdominated countries. Pope Pius XII rightly stated in his allocution of February 14, 1949, that the behavior of Cardinal Mindszenty "appeared an accusation not against himself but against his very accusers and condemners."