calls for reprisal, but it must enrich him, so that his own nation respects and loves other nations. In 1938, the Kingdom of Yugoslavia held its last election before the outbreak of war. Stepinac voted for Maček's opposition list, while Radio Belgrade spread the false information that he had voted for Milan Stojadinović's Yugoslav Radical Union. In the latter half of 1938, Stepinac had an operation for acute appendicitis. In 1940, Stepinac received the regent Prince Paul at St. Mark's Church as he arrived in Zagreb to garner support for the 1939 Cvetković–Maček Agreement, which had created the autonomous Banovina of Croatia within Yugoslavia. The Agreement was intended to address the "Croatian question", but did not satisfy those demanding full independence. Pope Pius XII declared the period from 29 June 1940 to 29 June 1941 as a jubilee year to celebrate 1300 years of Christianity among the Croats. In 1940, the Franciscan Order celebrated 700 years in Croatia and the order's Minister General Leonardo Bello came to Zagreb for the event. During his visit, Stepinac joined the Third Order of Saint Francis, on 29 September 1940. After the death of Bauer, Stepinac attempted to remain aloof from politics, and tried to unify Croatian Catholic organisations and subordinate them directly to his authority. He was unable to achieve this, probably because he was young and relatively inexperienced, and did not command the level of respect and authority usually accorded an Archbishop of Zagreb. The historian Mark Biondich observes that the Catholic Church had historically been on the fringes of Croatian mass politics and public life, and that the influence of the Church had been further eroded during the interwar period due to the royal dictatorship and the popularity of the anti-clerical HSS. Political and religious views prior to World War II During his period as coadjutor archbishop and as Archbishop of Zagreb up to the German-led Axis invasion of Yugoslavia in April 1941, Stepinac made his views clear on a number of political and religious issues. Foremost among these statements were those regarding Protestantism, Eastern orthodoxy, communism and Freemasonry. Stepinac criticized Protestantism, stating in a speech in 1938 that "the Catholic Church was the greatest civilising force in human history", and railed against those that wanted to deprive the Catholic Church of any influence in public life. He referred to the Reformation as the "Deformation", and denounced Luther as a false