Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
Hungarian” monument stands side-by-side with a “pro-Hungarian” one. (You can imagine
a Croat viewing this and thinking, “Those wonderful Hungarians, to whom we owe this
church—thank God we defeated them.”)
Walk upthe steps tothe area behind the main altar.Here you'll findaglass case contain-
ing a waxy, eerily lifelike sculpture of Alojzije Stepinac. (His actual remains are below.)
Stepinac was the Archbishop of Zagreb during World War II, when he shortsightedly sup-
portedtheUstaše(NazipuppetgovernmentinCroatia)—thinking,likemanyCroatians,that
this was the ticket to greater independence from Serbia. When Tito came to power, he put
Stepinacontrialandsenthimtojailforfiveyears,beforehewasbanishedtoliveouthislife
in the remote, poor village where he had been born. But Stepinac never lost his faith, and
many Croatian Catholics consider him something of a martyr—and arguably the most in-
spirational figure of their faith. He's also respected in the US, where some Catholic schools
bear his name. But many Serbs today consider Stepinac a villain who cooperated with the
brutal Ustaše.
Before leaving, pull up a pew and ponder the role of faith in contemporary Croatian life.
Bydefinition,CroatsareCatholics. And,althoughreligionwasnotencouragedincommun-
ist Yugoslavia, it was also not prohibited (as it was in most Warsaw Pact countries). Politi-
cians, military officers, and civil servants (such as teachers) couldn't publicly profess their
faith, but many were privately devout. And with the breakup of Yugoslavia and the ensuing
wars, Catholicism has seen a huge boost. In this part of the world where ethnicity is tied to
faith,nationalism(whichisalsoontherise)hewscloselytoreligion—tooclosely,manyim-
partial observers fear. The increasing influence of the Catholic Church on Croatian politics
will be a hot potato here for years to come.
As you leave the cathedral, look high on the wall to the left of the door. This strange
script is the Glagolitic alphabet (glagoljca), invented by Byzantine missionaries Cyril and
Methodius in the ninth century to translate the Bible into Slavic languages. Though these
missionaries worked mostly in Moravia (today's eastern Czech Republic), their alphabet
caught on only here, in Croatia. (Glagolitic was later adapted in Bulgaria to become the
Cyrillic alphabet—still used in Serbia, Russia, and other parts east.) In 1991, when Croatia
becameitsowncountryandnationalismsurged,someCroatsflirtedwiththeideaofmaking
this the official alphabet.
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