Römische Historische Mitteilungen 65/2023, pp. 561-576, 2024/05/01
The 34th International Eucharistic Congress in Budapest from May 25 to 30, 1938, was the culmination of a series of splendid self-presentations of the Catholic Church under Pope Pius XI (1922–1939) in the interwar period. Both ecclesiastical and state authorities of Austria - transformed from a republic into a Christian-German state under authoritarian leadership in 1933/34 - planned a grand entrance for it and a wide accompanying program for pilgrims passing through the country. With the invasion of Austria by German troops on March 12, 1938, all these plans became obsolete. The German authorities, through bureaucratic hurdles, thwarted participation from the now ‘Great German Reich’ and forbade any reporting on the event. Even the church leaders of Austria voluntarily refrained from joining in the celebrations out of panic over the new circumstances. For their part, the Hungarian and Vatican organizers of the Congress avoided clear statements on the delicate political situation and thus disappointed relevant expectations of the free Catholic world.
