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Islam, Anti-Communism, and Christian Civilization: The Ottoman Menace in Interwar Hungary

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  16 April 2009

Paul Hanebrink
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Extract

On 4 October 1948, József Cardinal Mindszenty preached a sermon for the rosary feast in front of 35,000 Catholic faithful. He began by reminding his congregation of the origins of the feast day that they were celebrating: the victory of Europe's Christian states over the Ottoman Turkish fleet at the naval battle of Lepanto in 1571. This great victory in the struggle of universal Christendom against the infidel enemy recalled to Mindszenty a second, more particularly Hungarian parallel: the victory of Habsburg forces over the Ottoman Turkish enemy at the battle of Temesvár in 1716. “Hungarian history recalls too such a rosary victory—the Hungarian Christians won it over the Turks in 1716 at Temesvár.” Both military victories represented moments when Europeans had repelled a force seen at the time, and ever after, as hostile to Christian civilization.

Type
Forum: The Ottoman Menace
Information
Austrian History Yearbook , Volume 40 , April 2009 , pp. 114 - 124
Copyright
Copyright © Center for Austrian Studies, University of Minnesota 2009

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References

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28 Mindszenty, Four Years Struggle, 124.