A bad Mass

On May 8 and 9, we celebrated the 75th anniversary of the end of World War II in Europe and the victory of the Allies over Adolf Hitler and Nazi Germany. More than 70 million people worldwide died as a result of the fighting and shortages; at least 3 million were put to death in Nazi Germany's extermination camps. "The memory of the war and its horrors must be kept alive forever," the German government said in a statement released May 8.

As Europe commemorates the tragedies of World War II in the midst of the coronavirus pandemic, the news has come that a Catholic bishop wishes to hold a requiem Mass in Bosnia's capital, Sarajevo, for fallen Ustashe, the Croatian nationalists who allied with Nazi Germany. From the time Yugoslavia was occupied in 1941 to the end of the war in 1945, Nazi collaborators, the Ustashe, ruled the Independent State of Croatia (NDH), a puppet state founded under Hitler's patronage. They deported and murdered the Jewish population, Muslims, Serbs, Roma and dissident Croats in Bosnia and Herzegovina, Croatia and the Croatian-occupied parts of Serbia. More than 10,000 people fell victims to the Ustashe regime in Sarajevo alone.

After the war ended, Ustashe, NDH soldiers, and Montenegrin, Serbian and Slovenian Nazi collaborators tried to give themselves up to British troops near Bleiburg, a town in Austria on the border with Croatia. But the British soldiers handed them over to the Yugoslav Partisans, who had been supported by the Allies. The Partisans had many of the prisoners summarily executed without trial and sent others on death marches. These actions were not ever subjected to any form of critical reappraisal in communist Yugoslavia (1945-91).

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Fascist pilgrimage spot

One of the biggest meeting of European fascists is held in Bleiburg every year on May 16. Disguised as a "religious event," it has become a place of pilgrimage not only for far-right Catholic clergy, former Ustashe fighters and neo-Nazis, but even for high-ranking Croatian politicians. Even the fact that the Catholic Diocese of Gurk-Klagenfurt in the Austrian state of Carinthia has officially dissociated itself has not been able to stop these goings-on.

This year, the situation is different: Because of the coronavirus pandemic, the meeting in Bleiburg cannot take place. Cardinal Vinko Puljic, the Roman Catholic Church's archbishop of Vrhbosna, who has celebrated the requiem Mass in Bleiburg in previous years, now intends to hold the Mass on May 16 in Sarajevo's Sacred Heart Cathedral.

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The right to religious freedom is a deeply rooted aspect of democracy in Bosnia-Herzegovina. But there has been much protest against the mass for those killed after the Bleiburg repatriations, the name often given to the above-mentioned historical events. Should a commemoration for Nazis really take place in a multiethnic city that suffered so terribly under nationalism in the recent war 25 years ago? Even the country's three-member presidency is of the same opinion for once: All three have advised the cardinal to rethink his decision.

Bosnians are angry — and that could be a reason to worry. They are afraid that there could be riots if the Mass is held. Politicians have urged Bosnians, including the biggest Bosnian party, SDA, to keep calm: "We call on citizens not to express their disapproval of the mass by the Catholic Church in such a way that it could lead to incidents."

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'Retrograde rhetoric'

Metropolitian Hrizostom Jevic, the head of the Regional Council of the Serbian Orthodox Church in Bosnia-Herzegovina, has announced an end to all cooperation with the Catholic Church: "With this decision, you have closed the door of the Cathedral for us forever." In a multiethnic state in which tolerance and respect are vital for harmonious coexistence, this crisis has deepened already existing rifts.

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The Israeli Embassy in Tirana, the capital of Albania, which is also responsible for relations with Bosnia-Herzegovina, and leading Jewish figures in Bosnia have also criticized the cardinal — as have many political organizations and parties and celebrities. The president of the Jewish community in Bosnia and Herzegovina, Jakob Finci, wrote in an open letter that the mass "commemorates the executors of our mothers, fathers, grandfathers, compatriots and all other innocent people who were killed by the fascists of the para-state NDH" and would reinvigorate and strengthen fascism.

Even the US Embassy in Sarajevo called on the organizers "to refrain from historical revisionism and retrograde rhetoric."

The Croatian National Assembly, an umbrella group of Croatian political parties in Bosnia-Herzegovina, supports Pulijic.

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So does the parliament of neighboring Croatia, which has sponsored the commemoration in Austria. In recent years, the ruling party in Zagreb, the Croatian Democratic Union (HDZ), has been moving further and further to the right. The same goes for its sister party in Bosnia and Herzegovina. It has to be asked why the EU is turning a blind eye. Croatia is a member of the European Union, and admonitory measures by the bloc would be appropriate in this case. But the EU and the European People's Party (EPP), of which the HDZ is a member, are just looking on without drawing any consequences.

 It is worrying when nationalist and anti-Semitic forces can spread their inhuman ideologies without hindrance. We must never forget what we were liberated from 75 years ago. We must never cease to fight indefatigably against fascism. I call on the EPP, Brussels and the highest levels of the Catholic Church to take a stand against fascism and right-wing nationalist forces and to cancel this mass before it is too late!

I can only hope that Cardinal Vinko Puljic realizes that a Mass for fascists does not bring about reconciliation. The contrary is the case.