At the age of 46, husky, crop-haired Augustus Hlond, son of a Silesian laborer, became the youngest cardinal in the world. He was also the first Prince of the Church to celebrate a Mass that was broadcast (in 1928), and the first to fly in a plane (in 1929). When the Nazis and the Russians occupied Poland, Cardinal Hlond became an international figure. In 1940, his report to the Pope on the "dark, apocalyptic disaster" of German atrocities shocked the whole world.
From Rome, and later from Lourdes, Hlond acted as spiritual leader of Poland's 20 million Roman Catholics. In 1944 the...
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