Because the KGB intensified its campaign against the free underground press in Lithuania, the second half of 1979 was especially unsettling. Many searches were made at the homes of: Antanas Terleckas (arrested after the search); Julius Sasnauskas (arrested after the search); [Miss] Liucija Kulvietytė, [Miss) Vitalija Žvikaitė, Instructor Vytautas Skuodis, Povilas Pečeliūnas, [Miss] Dana Keršiūtė, and others. These actions of the KGB show how destructive to Soviet propaganda the free press is. Therefore, all efforts are being made to destroy it.
Official government agencies, especially the Soviet press, constantly threaten that"the Soviet government will never tolerate deliberate violations of its laws" (F. Laurinaitis, Pokalbiai 3 [Conversations 3], 1979, p. 23). The arrests of Antanas Terleckas and Julius Sasnauskas confirm that these are not idle threats.
In addition to the searches, interrogations, and arrests, the so-called ideological struggle was also intensified in 1979. The following facts attest to its nature. The atheistic book Pokalbiai 3 was published at the end of 1979. Its author, a former secret policeman and former Religious Affairs Council official, F. Laurinaitis, defended the Soviet government's violence by arguing that "Soviet government agencies react with compassion to the just wishes of believers." (p. 19).
Even priests aid the escalation of the lies of Soviet propaganda in the West. For example, Father Gediminas Blynas attempted to prove to emigre Lithuanians that the Chronicle of the Catholic Church in Lithuania prints lies.
Coarse lies both at home and abroad show not only that the Soviet government is extremely concerned with saving its prestige but also that it is uncompromising in its wish to implement a policy of lies and violence in the future.
Therefore 1980 does not seem to promise any relief for Lithuanian Catholics. The Soviet tanks in Afghanistan confirm this. It is quite possible that the atheistic government, seeing visible proof of the present religious and national rebirth in Lithuania, will not be deterred by the outcry raised in the West, and will implement the Stalinist KGB machinery even more intensively. The Soviet government is encoura'ged in such escapades by the West's inability to act firmly. (Oh, that the Kremlin, in repressing the dissidents, would at least be affected by the threatened boycott of the Olympics!)
Lithuania's priests and laymen, thanking good people all over the world for their help, have special confidence in God's Providence and are prepared for a long and persistent struggle for truth, freedom, and Christ's triumph in our homeland.
