56 ÁRPÁD VON KLIMÓ
and films. For him, opening up to modern society was not an op-
tion, given the difficult situation of the Church in his country.
Bishop Shvoy contrived to send his response to Rome by having
the letter smuggled out to West Germany and mailed from there.
All other letters sent to Tardini had been intercepted by in-
formants of the Hungarian State Security agency and the State
Office of Church Affairs.14 This latter institution had been found-
ed in 1951 and placed under the Council of Ministers. The State
Office was responsible for the observation, infiltration, and ma-
nipulation of religious institutions. József Prantner, the presi-
dent of the office, noted on one of the intercepted and translated
letters from Cardinal Tardini, “It is not allowed to send any kind
of meaningful answer to this call (neither against nor in favor).”15
With only one proposal, the Hungarian bishops still ranked
above the Czechoslovak and Ukrainian hierarchies, which did not
even send one reply.16 Meanwhile, the overwhelming majority,
or 79.9 percent, of European bishops who had received the letter
sent proposals to the committee in Rome. The American (88 per-
- For the history of the State Security apparatus in Hungary, see Laszlo Bo-
rhi, “Stalinist Terror in Hungary,” in Stalinist Terror in Eastern Europe: Elite Purges
and Mass Repression, ed. Matthew Stibbe and Kevin McDermott (Manchester: Man-
chester University Press, 2010), 119–40. On the State Office of Church Affairs in
Hungary in comparative perspective, see Sabrina P. Ramet, Catholicism and Politics in
Communist Societies (Durham, N.C.: Duke University Press, 1990), 2:159. - Quoted in Fejérdy, “Magyar javaslatok.” József Prantner came from a Swabian
mid-range peasant family in Szekszárd. After middle school, he worked as a rail split-
ter and a stone cutter. In 1930, he joined the illegal Communist Party; three years later,
he was imprisoned for political activities. Thereafter, he worked as a day laborer and
remained under police surveillance until he was drafted for the military labor service
in 1944, from which he escaped, only to be imprisoned again. Liberated in 1945, he
launched a successful career in the Communist Party in the county of Tolna. Starting
in 1951, he was a department chief at the State Office of Church Affairs; among others,
he was responsible for the state-sponsored “Priest Movement for Peace.” After two
years as a high party leader in his hometown, he became the president of the State
Church Office in November 1961, elevated in 1968 to the rank of minister of state. - Numbers according to Alberigo and Komonchak, eds., History of Vatican II,
1:100.