FACT CHECK: Did This Former Communist Say That 1,100 Communists Became Catholic Priests?

A post shared on X claims that former Communist Party member and Catholic convert Bella Dodd said that 1,100 communists became Catholic priests.

Infiltration is real pic.twitter.com/v8duK9gZAW

— Dr Taylor Marshall™️ (@TaylorRMarshall) January 15, 2025

Verdict: Unsubstantiated

Dodd said that she never met a communist priest in a 1961 video. The claim rests on the words of others.

Fact Check:

Social media users are claiming that Dodd, a former communist, said, “In the 1930s, we put eleven hundred men into the priesthood in order to destroy the Church from within.”

This claim, though, appears to be contradicted by Dodd saying in 1961 that she had never met a communist who became a priest, according to Homiletic and Pastoral Review. The 1961 lecture was uncovered by Dr. Mary Nicolas, and the audio was uploaded to YouTube, although the video is not available. The audio was also uploaded to X by a priest.

“I never met a Communist who was a member of the Catholic clergy… My feeling is that the long years of preparation required for the Catholic clergy may deter the Communist Party line as to putting people in.” -Bella Dodd (Detroit, September 1, 1961) https://t.co/KCldLa1LSn pic.twitter.com/eCCmrQPuo2

— Fr. Paul (@BackwardsFeet) January 15, 2025

She said, per Homiletic and Pastoral Review:

“I never met a Ca-, uh, Communist, uh, who was, uh, a member of the Catholic clergy. Now I say that, not because I’m a Catholic. Because I was familiar with a number of the young ministers in the Protestant, uh, among the Protestant clergy. God bless some of them. They wanted so much to do good. The Communist Party used to raise money to send them to seminaries, which would last maybe for one year, two years. And, uh, then they’d come back and preach the social doctrine.] Now, I never had met anyone in the Ca-, uh, among the Catholic clergy. That doesn’t mean that they may not be [Communist]! My feeling is that, uh, the long years of [slight pause] preparation required for the Catholic clergy may deter, uh, the Communist Party line as to putting people in.”

The claim appears to be from a friend of Dodd, Alice von Hildebrand, who said to Nicolas and author Paul Kengor that Dodd told her, “When I was organizing for the Communist Party back in the 1930s, I helped place over a thousand communist men in Catholic seminaries,” according to Crisis Magazine.

Kevin Symonds, summarizing in Homiletic and Pastoral Review, says that “Bella Dodd’s newly restored remarks from her 1961 Detroit lecture present a challenge for Catholics who believe that she helped to infiltrate Catholic seminaries.”

“The challenge forces them to look at underlying presumptions, as well as take a highly critical view towards the sources. Those sources have largely rested upon the good reputation of Alice von Hildebrand, herself a titan in Catholic life and thought. Truth, however, is above a person’s reputation,” reads Symonds. He adds, that the “facts, as they presently stand, indicate that the claims of Dr. Alice von Hildebrand and her friends Johnine and Paul Leininger are not necessarily contradicted by Dodd’s 1961 Detroit lecture. We must, however, reconsider how we think about the matter.”