Fire in Milan

Milan, one of Italy's Communist centers, was on fire last week with a Christian blaze. Day and night, well-organized Catholic Action workers staged rallies, Sisters of the Poor passed out leaflets, loudspeaker trucks blared Schubert's Ave Maria, 200 preachers fanned out through 31 hospitals and clinics. In churches and cinemas, banks and jails, men and women gathered to pray.

At the center of the campaign--preaching, teaching, criticizing and applauding 20 hours a day--was Milan's Archbishop Giovanni Battista Montini, 60, who, though he is not yet a cardinal, is frequently mentioned as successor to the present Pope. Said Archbishop Montini to his priests in opening the mission: "Go ye forth and speak. Your lips are opened. Preach the Gospel to every living creature . . . Open the churches! Open the houses and courtyards, schools and barracks . . . Open every doorway and above all open every heart to God!"

Flying Friars. When Montini decided this fall that Milan needed a major spiritual lift, he went at it with energy and thoroughness. From Bologna he borrowed Giacomo Cardinal Lercaro's squad of 20 "Flying Friars" (TIME, Dec. 7, 1953), whose trucks carry loudspeakers, altars and confessionals. From all over Italy he hand-picked a corps of 800 preachers belonging to all religious orders. He lined up the cooperation of Milan's officials, businessmen and non-Communist Labor leaders. Aim of the mission is not converts but "to strengthen man's filial ties to God."

The three-week campaign is divided into three phases, concentrating first on children and the sick, then on women, finally on men. There are special programs for various vocations--from artists, attorneys, ballerinas, bartenders, bus drivers to policemen, professors, radio-TV workers, social workers, soldiers, students, taxi drivers. In a daily round of rallies, 22 bishops and archbishops from all over Italy moved from one group to another. Bologna's Giacomo Cardinal Lercaro scheduled six sermons for meetings of Milan intellectuals and Genoa's Giuseppe Cardinal Siri was signed up for seven to business executives.

Like Bread & Air. How important the Milan mission is in Montini's career was suggested by Vatican reaction. L'Osservatore Romano ran almost daily items on the campaign. The Vatican Radio broadcast Montini's sermons every night and the Pope himself promised a message for windup of the Milan campaign.

Montini and his helpers concentrated on Milan's 600,000 office, shop and factory workers. He whirled through the Rinascente department store, the stock exchange, three banks. To Sputnik-struck hearers, he praised Russia's technical success, then won a thunder of applause with a blow for the Lord ("Beyond scientific reality there is a divine reality"). Everywhere Montini pleaded: "Come to our mission and hear us.' What are we talking about? The usual things? Yes, but do you really know them? The same old story? Yes, but better say the eternal story. Useless matters? No, useful as bread and as air itself."

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