Your children are likely to read the highly-sanitized (and quite inaccurate) "history" of the Spanish Civil War, which looks like this:
"The Spanish Civil War was the "trial run" for WW2. It was a clash of the political right on one side (Fascists with Hitler and Mussolini as the senior international figures and General Franco as the leader of Spain) and the political left supported by Communists, Socialists, liberal democrats and people who were worried by the rise of the far right with Hitler's Nazis as the main concern. The Germans used the War as a test bed for their new equipment and tactics. Franco "won" the war merely because he did not lose. Spain did not take an active role in WW2 although many feel that Spain supported the Nazis."
It gets a couple of things right--the war WAS in Spain, and preceded WWII.
A better picture, however, is found here.
The Generalissimo was not without fault (especially his letting down of the Carlists), but was by and large a great figure in Western history. El Caudillo saved Spain and the Church in Spain from utter ruin. The Spanish Civil war would have happened with or without his involvement. The difference is, that without his leadership Spain would have most likely emerged as a thoroughly Bolshevik puppet regime, thereby finishing off the Spanish Church, which had already suffered the martyrdom of 12 bishops, 283 nuns 2,365 monks and 4,184 priests, and would have placed Europe in a far more precarious post-WWII situation.
HT: College Catholic
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The one reservation I have about this post is that Spain has now gone far into the secularism that afflicts the rest of Europe.
Which is not to say things would have been better had the left won, just that established churches (Catholic or Protestant) in Europe appear to have been a very bad idea indeed.
Agreed.
While the State Churches were typically a bad idea (Church of England, Church of Sweeden, etc) and as bad as things are in Spain right now, they would have been a lot worse if Franco lost.
Had the communists won its safe to assume that ALL the bishops, monks, priests, and nuns, and a good chunck of the faithful lay people in Spain would have been either killed or tossed into jail. All those fine Spanish Churches would have been destoryed, their altars and chalaices and such melted down, their art sold, their relics mocked and discarded (as happend in Russia.)
So even today if the secularists have cut down the tree atleast in the past Franco stoped them from killing the roots.
Dad29, thanks for taking notice of my post!
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