Quarrel of Consciences

The advance guard of some 5,000 G.I.s who will man the air and naval bases leased by the U.S. began arriving in Spain last fall. Problems marched in with them.

Last week, trying to solve one of them, the U.S. Air Force brought down on its head a jet of Protestant fire and brimstone.

Dictator Francisco Franco, who suspects (with some reason) that the liberty-loving and liberty-taking habits of the G.I.s might prove contagious, wants as little fraternizing as possible between Americans and Spaniards. Spain's Catholic bishops, fearing that the U.S. servicemen (the present contingent is roughly 65% non-Catholic) might prove "a wedge of Protestant proselytism," demanded legal "protections" for Catholic senoritas who might fall for the Americans. The bishops pointed out that Roman Catholicism is the state religion in Spain, and that canon law is the law of the land so far as marriage is concerned. Lieut. Colonel Raymond M. Stadta, a Reno priest serving as chief chaplain of all U.S. forces in Spain, worked out an "administrative covenant" with Spanish church and state authorities.

Catholic Canons. Stadta's covenant forbids U.S. servicemen or women to enter into "mixed marriages" (between Catholics and non-Catholics) with Spanish nationals, unless the Spanish church approves. No one could quarrel with the notion that the Spanish government, or its state church, has the right to control the marriages of Spanish subjects, but Father Stadta's agreement went further. With the approval of Major General August W.

Kissner, chief of the U.S. military mission, Stadta agreed that American men and women serving in Spain would also be forbidden to contract "mixed marriages" among themselves, unless the church agreed. Stadta's intention was that approval should be sought from the Roman Catholic Military Vicar of the U.S.--New York's Cardinal Spellman. But as reported from Madrid, his covenant seemed to say that the Spanish Catholic clergy could veto a marriage between a Protestant G.I. and a Catholic WAC or WAVE.

Protestant Protests. "An attempt to sell down the river our most precious heritage, our religious freedom," protested Episcopalian Dr. James A. Pike, Dean of the New York Cathedral (St. John the Divine). It is motivated, he added, by "fear of friction with Spain, which is so financially dependent upon us it is absurd." Thundered the National Association of Evangelicals: "An affront to all true Protestants." Flustered by the outcry, the Pentagon called an urgent conference of State Department and Air Force brass and tried to soothe everyone. The agreement has not yet been signed, said General Kissner, and when it is, it "would assure to all of our people here the traditional American right to worship according to the dictates of their consciences."

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