ARGENTINA: Priest for Per

The day after Argentine ex-Dictator Juan Peron faced his first major uprising in 1955 he was excommunicated from the Roman Catholic Church for expelling a pair of prelates from 90% Catholic Argentina. During the uprising Peronistas burned nine Catholic churches. Most churchmen still denounce Peron, but last week Monsignor Antonio Jose Plaza, 49-year-old archbishop of the industrial city of La Plata, was trying to lure the 2,000,000 Peronistas still left into a proclerical political party.

In September, Plaza gathered 1,000 Catholics, most of them Peronistas, to open a "Christian Social Week." They rattled the walls with hymns, cries of "Viva Peron!"...

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