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József Mindszenty was born on March 29, 1892 as József Pehm in Csehimindszent, Vas County, and it was not until 1941 that he translated his name to Mindszenty. He was ordained a priest in 1915. In 1919 he was commissioned to direct the Zalaegerszeg parish. In the following decades, under his direction nine new churches and twelve schools were built, among others. During the parish of Zalaegerszeg, he promoted the cultural life of the city. XII. Pope Pius appointed him Bishop of Veszprém in 1944.
He was imprisoned for his anti-war memoirs.
When Justiniano Serédi, Archbishop of Esztergom, died on March 29, 1945 from severe diabetes, XII. At the request of Pope Pius, the Jesuit monk Töhötöm Nagy prepared a proposal to fill the archbishopric of Esztergom, appointing Bishop József Mindszenty of Veszprém first.
Two days of reflection
September 8, 1945 XII. Pope Pius appointed him Archbishop of Esztergom. After two days of reflection, he submitted to the papal will and on October 7, 1945, he was installed in his new position in Esztergom. “I wouldn’t have had a reason not to accept the choice: how easy it would have been to say no. […] However, two days later I took on the heavy burden. It was decisive in this XII. The will and trust of Pope Pius, who knew my priestly and pastoral activity and found it suitable for the bishopric of Veszprém, despite the will and stubbornness of the government. He knew of my captivity and, according to the nuncio’s reports, how I governed my diocese. I knew that if he said no, Rome would have to waste another time searching and convincing other candidates. “
He was also full of hope that the people of the country, strengthened in faith and moral life in recent decades, would have shown moving signs of their adherence to the Christian religion after the catastrophe of the war.
The solemn conquest began on October 7 at 11 a.m. in the crowded Basilica of Esztergom. It was not an everyday event for a primate to occupy a chair, since in the 20th century a similar one occurred only twice before, in 1916 and 1928.
In his eloquent speech, steeped in serious and historical examples, MIndszenty did not hide his despair at the new situation:
“A blind and alarming depth swirls before us today; The bleeding Hungary is drowning in the biggest whirlwind in our history, not only in public law, but also in moral, political and economic law ”.
Christmas arrest
Mindszenty never hid his opinion: he opposed the division of land, criticized the functioning of the political police led by the national committees and the Communists, the expulsion of the Germans, but also spoke out on the restrictions on the Catholic press. He believed that Christian democracy, a society based on Christian moral laws, was the only solution to popular democracy.
The communist regime immediately threw their net at him. A week and a half before his arrest, on December 16, 1948, the last bishopric conference under his presidency was held in Esztergom, and he noted that
we held our last meeting in an environment close to the prison.
Mindszent was arrested at Christmas, December 26, 1948, in front of his elderly mother, in the archiepiscopal palace, from where he was transferred to the infamous ÁVH center, 60 Andrássy út. In his memoirs, My Memoirs, he wrote about the story of his arrest: “It is eight thirty at night. I have been kneeling at the prayer booth since dinner, praying and meditating. Suddenly the door opens and Décsi (Lieutenant Colonel ÁVH Gyula Décsi – ed.) Enters first. Stop in front of me:
We came to arrest you.
At the same time, eight to ten policemen push Décsi into the room, and when the police lieutenant’s words are spoken, they surround him on all sides. When I ask for an arrest warrant, they tell me they don’t need it. And when I refer to the cardinal’s special international status, Décsi arrogantly thinks that vigilant democratic police are capturing traitors, spies, and currency gunners, even when someone is dressed in the robes of a cardinal. “
Much of the public was shocked by the news of the cardinal’s arrest.
Former Prime Minister Péter Boross recalled this: “I found it amazing that a high priest had been arrested. I was a country boy. When the bishop came to hire us, the whole town was in the dungeons. In my eyes, a minister was a dog’s ear to the bishop, especially the archbishop. I don’t forget, in 1944, Mindszenty visited our hometown and welcomed better people, including my father, to an audience of fifteen minutes. It was an extraordinary honor. “
Imprisonment for life
Mindszenty was accused of infidelity, crime to overthrow the republic, espionage and currency trafficking. In his memoirs of his captivity to research, he wrote:
11 at night. They are again taken for questioning, after 72 hours of not sleeping and of constantly repeating the rubber hits. The subject of the all-night interrogation is conspiracy and espionage. Now he was completely alone, exhausted and exhausted. I have to argue only when protocol packages that have risen to the heights of the mountains are signed in front of me again and again. While I refuse to sign, Lieutenant Colonel Décsi passes it to my torturer 2-3 times a night, who jumps up, takes me to my cell, undresses me, spreads me and bathes my fists with lustful beauty. Another cruel way to physically break me is to not let them sleep.
After preparing the conceptual claim, on February 3, 1949, the main trial began in the Budapest People’s Court before its special council headed by Vilmos Olti, based on the accusation of the prosecutor Gyula Alapy. It says a lot about the process that Olti was also briefed on the merits of the verdict that will be handed down. Colonel István Timár, ÁVH, mediated the political decision, according to which
the party would not be despite not sentencing Mindszenty to death.
In his theatrical indictment, Alapy stated: “Let the ruling of the People’s Court be a reminder, and the sentence will deliver the traitors, spies and kufaras of the Hungarian people to the mines. I propose to József Mindszenty, Jusztin Baranyay, Pál Esterházy that they be sentenced to death and the rest of the accused to the harshest prison sentence ”.
Mindszenty defender Kálmán Kiczkó only apologized for representing the defense, rather than fulfilling his duties. “The defense also thanks the prosecution for bringing to justice only those acts that are not related to the priestly work of the prince-primate,” said the defense attorney in his role.
On February 8, the Budapest People’s Court sentenced Mindszenty to life imprisonment.
Although the verdict was followed by international outrage and the curse of those involved in the process, neither the Pope’s actions nor a series of demonstrations in major cities around the world changed Mindszenty’s case. The high priest’s high incarceration began in the detention center prison, followed by a solitary confinement of nine months. He was returned to the prison hospital in May 1954 and, as his health had not improved, his prison term was suspended in June 1955 for health reasons. He then lived under house arrest in Püspökszentlászló, since November in Felsőpetény.
He was released from here by an armored body on October 30, 1956. He soon had to flee again and found refuge in the United States embassy, where he spent fifteen years.
Happy initiation process
Starting in 1971, the Vienna Pázmáneum became his refuge. She died on May 6, 1975 in Vienna. He was buried in Mariazell, Austria, but according to his will (“when the star of disbelief in Moscow sits on the land of Mary and St. Stephen”), his ashes were brought home on March 4, 1991 and buried in the Crypt of the Esztergom Basilica.
At the time of the regime change, on March 14, 1990, it was recorded in the parliament minutes that Mindszenty and his colleagues were victims of a conceptual lawsuit in their own country, and on May 18, 1990, in the XXVI. the 1949 verdict was also overturned by law.
In 2012, the Prosecutor’s Office also declared its full legal, moral and political rehabilitation,
the procedure was initiated by Cardinal Péter Erdő, Archbishop of Esztergom-Budapest.
In 1994, his church officially launched the Joseph Mindszenty inauguration process, in which significant progress was made last year, as Pope Francis allowed the Congregation for the Inauguration to enact in a decree the “recognition of heroic virtues.” by Joseph Mindszenty. According to Péter Erdő
It is an important step toward initiation into happiness, as the review of prayer audiences and miracles now begins.
(Cover photo: Cardinal József Mindszenty in the courtyard of the elementary school on May 17, 1947. Photo: Fortepan.)
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