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RUSSIA-PRIEST Sep-8-2004 (690 words) With photos posted Sept. 7. xxxi
Priest who ministered at school massacre warns of mounting tensions
By Jonathan Luxmoore
Catholic News Service
WARSAW, Poland (CNS) -- A Polish priest who ministered to survivors of the school massacre in southern Russia has warned of mounting tensions and urged religious leaders to calm demands for revenge.
"Having been a priest for 22 years, I should perhaps have been better prepared, but having watched car after car bringing little children's bodies for burial, I'm deeply shocked," said Father Janusz Blaut, pastor of the Catholic parish in Vladykavkaz, capital of the North Ossetia province.
"The church's task will be to calm emotions and discourage people from answering evil with evil. But it won't be easy to convince a father who's lost his wife and four children -- not by some natural catastrophe, but through a human act of terror," he said.
The priest spoke by telephone Sept. 7 after attending a third day of funerals at nearby Beslan, where more than 320 children and adults died Sept. 3, during the end of a school hostage situation caused by suspected guerrillas sympathetic to the breakaway republic of Chechnya.
Father Blaut said tensions were running high, with locals blaming the government of President Vladimir Putin as well as Chechen separatist leaders.
"In their pain and anger, people have turned on both sides, accusing the authorities of corruption and asking how this event could possibly have happened," said Father Blaut, a priest from Poland's Katowice Archdiocese who has worked in Russia's Caucasus region for a decade.
"They say the government lied about how many hostages were involved. The lack of truthful information is the worst thing for them," he said.
More than 1,200 people were taken hostage in the school; in addition to the dead, more than 700 were wounded.
Speaking Sept. 8, Putin offered a $10 million reward for information leading to the "neutralization" of former Chechen President Aslan Maskhadov and rebel leader Shamil Basayev and warned of pre-emptive strikes against terrorist targets worldwide.
He added that he had prayed with bereaved family members in the school's devastated gym, which was strewn with discarded shoes and clothes, as well as with flowers, candles, sweets and toys left by mourners.
"It's a truly shocking sight of bloodstains and bullet holes, one of total silence interrupted only by the sound of crying," the priest said.
"I introduced myself as a Catholic priest and did what I could to keep their spirits up, telling them life would continue even after such a tragedy. But the TV images can't convey the desolation of this place," he said.
The Catholic parish of Vladykavkaz includes only a single family in Beslan whose children attend a different school.
Father Blaut said the Catholic aid agency Caritas had sent medicine and syringes to local hospitals in cooperation with the Red Cross and was ready to respond to other specific needs.
He said Beslan's 30,000 inhabitants were mostly "very poor," surviving on home produce, and were desperately short of food, clothing and counselors.
"This tragedy has touched everyone, creating an atmosphere of solidarity, but in two to three months they'll be left alone with their problems," the Polish priest said.
"The need for psychological support extends not just to those who were in the school, but also to parents, friends and neighbors who were forced to watch helplessly from outside," he said.
The priest said the "greatest fear" among local people was that the funerals of victims could be followed by a wider conflict similar to the 1992 war between North Ossetia and the neighboring republic of Ingushetia.
He added that local Christians and Muslims had been united in attempts to ensure local reactions did not "pour oil on a fire that can't be put out."
"People remember what war leads to, but those who've suffered such bereavement may well be prepared to do anything in revenge," the priest said.
"At the moment, we're all together -- Catholics, Orthodox and Muslims," he said. "But people will relive this terrible event as life goes back to its normal pattern. Children are sacred, and when someone raises his hand against them, the resulting spiral of death will be hard to stop."
END
Copyright (c) 2004 Catholic News Service/USCCB. All rights reserved.
This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or otherwise distributed.
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