Christopher Dawson on Spanish Civil War

“If Spain could find herself once more, after the dreary century of disunion and weakness – if she could once more take the place to which her history and her genius entitles her – then it will be a victory not only for Spain but for Europe. It will bring back to the European society an essential element without which European civilization has become one-sided and incomplete. And we must hope that the spirit which saved Europe from Islam and turned the tide of the Reformation is not dead: that out of the agony and destruction of the present crisis Spain will be reborn.”

“It is not merely a conflict of brute force, as in the days of the Turkish invasions, it is a battle of wills and beliefs, and it is in Spain, which has always been the bulwark of Christian Europe and bore the brunt of the battle with Islam in the past, that the battle with the new enemy of Christendom is being fought out to-day. It may well be that the issue of the struggle in Spain will decide the fate of Europe. The victory of Communism in Spain would be a victory for Communism in its most dangerous aspect, for it would not be a victory over capitalism, which is relatively unimportant in Spain, but over Catholicism, which is the very root of the Spanish tradition. And Spain is not a country for half measures; if she abandons Christianity, she will do it passionately and thoroughly. On the other hand the recovery of Christian Spain might well mark the turning point in her own history and that of Europe.”