To the Director of Crociata Italica, Don Tullio Calcagno and His Collaborators
By Benito Mussolini
I want to tell you, first of all, that I am a regular reader of your newspaper and I find that you are doing a wonderful job.
I consider it not only appropriate, but necessary to meet the needs of the moment. It was necessary for me to raise a voice, especially among you, a voice of clarification and admonition for all the tentative and fragile people, to demonstrate that waiting and watching at the window while enemy aliens are at the door, trying to strangle the life of our Nation, does not solve any problem. I am glad to see that your work has spread far and wide among many Italians. I can see from their many subscriptions that they are not writing to you for the sake of seeing their names printed in a newspaper, but are writing in because they are sincere disciples.
Those of you who have care over souls can help people to better understand that the ideals of religion and Fatherland are not irreconcilable, but are perfectly joined together. Indeed, we can say that the outcome of this war will effect not only the Nation, but will also determine the future of Catholicism.
The flag of the hammer and sickle has now entered the Mediterranean. Do not forget that Russian Bolshevism, which is based on the principles of Marxist doctrine, has a strong hatred towards religion in general and Christianity in particular.
Some claim that we Fascists only pretend to be Catholics for political expediency, in order to lure Catholic sympathies to our cause. But this is not true. We are Catholics by conviction. I am Catholic by conviction, because I believe that Catholicism has adequate and sufficient doctrine to solve all the problems of individual, social, national and international life, and because, in the struggle between spirit and matter, Catholicism supports and desires the superiority and victory of the spirit.
I am closely following the work that you men have undertaken with nobility, sincerity, faith, enthusiasm and a controversial vivacity that does not exclude objectivity and serenity.
