READ the fascinating story of Bella Dodd, who was a member of the Communist Party of America in the 1930s and 1940s and later became an outspoken anti-Communist and Catholic here. An excerpt from the article by Eleonore Villarrubia follows:

In 1950, Bella was called before the Tydings Committee of the United States Senate to testify as to whether or not she knew Owen Lattimore, who had been accused by Senator Joseph McCarthy of being a Soviet agent within the American government. She had not known Lattimore and as far as she knew, he was not a member of the American Communist Party. She stated those facts; however, as she thought about the duplicity of the Party and how it had deceived her and thousands of others, she found herself revealing those facts as well. It was the first time that she had spoken out publicly against the Party. She began to see how the Russians had used the Spanish Civil War as a preview of the Red Revolution to come in western countries; she thought of the Koreans killing each other in the name of Communism and the Americans dying in the cause; she saw how the godless Communists used well-meaning Americans against their own country.

Seeing the Truth Again

There are no co-incidences with God. On a cool crisp day in the fall of 1950, an immigration appeal case took Bella to Washington, D.C. As she walked along Pennsylvania Avenue toward the House Office Building at the Capitol, she ran into an old friend from the East Bronx neighborhood of her childhood. Christopher McGrath was now a congressional representative of the Twenty-seventh District. He invited her to his office to talk of old times. He could see that she was clearly distressed and frightened and asked her if she wanted FBI protection. When she refused, he said he would pray for her safety. Then he asked, “Bella, would you like to see a priest?” He had caught her off guard, but she fervently answered, “Yes, I would.” On the spot, the Congressman’s secretary made calls and secured an appointment with Monsignor Fulton Sheen of Catholic University.

Bella saw Monsignor Sheen for the first time at his home that evening in suburban Washington. As Christopher drove her there, she thought of the many lies and canards she had let go by – even told herself – against her Church when she worked for the Communists. She was genuinely fearful of meeting the monsignor. She need not have worried, for the good priest listened as she sobbed to him, “They say that I am against the Negro,” the accusation that hurt her most. He took her into his private chapel and they knelt before a statue of Our Lady. Bella felt the battle within cease and peace took its place. He then gave her a Rosary and told her to see him on his visit to New York in the winter. Now she realized that the Communist promise of the “brotherhood of man” was impossible without the Fatherhood of God.

Return to the Church

As Christmas approached, she again felt a horrible loneliness. Poor friends, whom Bella had provided lodging in her own home years before, invited her to their coldwater walkup in Harlem for a Christmas Eve dinner. They had a simple meal and afterward read from the Psalms. When Bella boarded the bus to return to her apartment, she was so immersed in her thoughts that she passed her stop and rode many blocks farther. She got off at Thirty-Fourth Street, although she had no recollection of it. She walked and walked to the West Side until she found herself in a church, the Church of Saint Francis of Assisi. Midnight Christmas High Mass was in progress. Here she found the true brotherhood of man. So moved was she by the beautiful Mass and the devotion of the people, that she again walked the streets of New Manhattan for hours, thinking and praying, before she returned to her apartment. She felt that she had been guided by the Star of Christmas that night. [cont.]

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