The priest about the concert in Široki: They salute the ZDS, and then they sing ‘I will never betray God’

– When I was a high school student, I was one of those who drew a Ustasha “U” with a cross above it. I believed then that it was a sign of love for God and country. As obvious as it may seem now, it took time and patience for me to understand that the ideology that left behind camps and innocent victims cannot be the basis of any Christian love – he announced.

– Today I saw these videos of the Ustasha saluting “ready for home”, and along with that the ecstatic singing “I will never betray God”. I could understand “seduced” children who, like I once did, need to explain for a long time and introduce them to history so that they understand why it is wrong and incompatible with God. But I am more concerned when we elders, especially those with pastoral responsibility, are silent and do not react to it. That’s why I’m writing this – he added, then recalled the bishop’s previous statements that Ustaše crimes are the greatest stain of our nation and the greatest misfortune.

– Every evildoer is shameful and terrible, but first of all, we are ashamed of our own evildoers and evildoers in the name of our people! Every crime committed by the Ustasha regime is shameful, it is, as our bishops once wrote, “the greatest stain of our nation and the greatest misfortune”. Christian patriotism cannot rely on symbols that are associated with persecution and camps in this way. Love for the people means having the courage to admit their wounds and repent, not to relativize and brag about it. That’s not betrayal, that’s responsibility. Love for the people is not in relativizing and justifying, but in having the courage to admit mistakes and crimes, repent for them and do everything so that such evil never happens again. This is not a betrayal of the people, but a responsibility both to God and to our neighbor – he concluded.

He called on the faithful to read the text of father Vladan Perišicao to patriotism and nationalism.

– Patriotism could mean love for the homeland, we are aware of its inevitable flaws, and what motivates us is to always try to make it better. But not at the expense of others. And nationalism could mean love for one’s own nation and we try to remove the inevitable flaws so that without them it would be even more worthy of our affection. I say that patriotism and nationalism “could” be that. Because unfortunately they are not – he wrote.