| Show from the london news 1 V remarkable MEMORIAL si i of vire fire hundred and seven priests lu austria f tile tila follo following wink ve vcr ry important document has been beell fo forwarded carded to us ud simultaneously by two of ourt foreign corre correspondents 4 A very brief statement of its purport has appeared in some of the jo journals in in this country but its true importance batice seems scarcely to have haie been understood we need no apolo apology gy for presenting r it betoi beffie e our readers in full fill correspondents Our state that though the heads of the church in austria try to make 11 light of it there thele is in re allty a great stir among the priesthood in bohemia and elsewhere re and that a general synod and provincial synods have been summoned ched to take into consideration the means of counteracting the spirit which it indicates it will be seen that some of the reforms proposed such ae as the restoration of the clergy to tf family amily life are of thi th i boldest kid kind and that these are urged almost with desperation the memorial has lids been signed by five hundred and seven of the bohemian boheme an bishops clergy we hope that it may be but the beginning of an important movement and that those 0 old oid ld churches in bohemia which assisted go much to prepare the way for the reformation may be themselves again purified the me following memorial from five kundred hundred hundred andt ands seven sevens roman catholic clergy has been sent up to the archbishop vow Rati scheril at wenna vienna and to some som eother iOther bishops stating the conditi condition oh of the priesthood and th the e people the need of re reform foring and concluding with an earnest appeal at the time of the late revolution much interest was manifested on the part of the sec ilar government in the amelioration of the material and social position of p the lower clergy and proposals with respect to 0 o this subject were prepared by the diet now although the judgment of the clergy ply ily was that in reforms of sucha nature the de vision belonged rat herto the Apostolic head heady yet the prospect of delff rell f was as welcomed with loud rejoicings rejo icings from whatever part it might come but m when hea hen along a ong with the abolition of the diet those hopes of the clergy had vanished the servants of jesus christ though L they might still expect from the rulers of the church and state an improvement of ther thir material and social condition because we afi e religion of christ is injure dby the neglect of those need deed ful al reforms and is becoming more and more tbt sst ranged from tild tun hearts of the people whilst at the same time new enemies are daily dally rising up against the government since then the expectation so universally that measures woultz be taken to the per onal eriv abid atia raise the ta wa of morals among the fhe inferior clergy seems doomed to prolonged disappointment since according cording ab to all appearance ap ea rance the introduction ot of the concordat which whick while bestowing great increase of privilege and power on the ep episcopate le leaves a ve s the interior clergy to bear the tie full burden of that moral opposition and undisguised guised hatred which hat that most moat unpopular measure heas re has called forth is to be regarded as the apex of modern ecclesiastical inform in these realms and since moreo moreover veri there is good reason to apprehend that the true state i of the church never will lii ill as it hitherto never has reach the ears of her highest rulers through the legitimate 0 official a I 1 chan chani nels reis els eis the und undersigned undersigner under signed feel impelled by conscience tol to b g case as it really stands before the vicars and representatives of christ upon earth earthan in order that they having the interests of religion and the well weil being of their clerical subordinates near their heart may ere yet it i be too loo late take steps toward the introduction of such energetic measures as shall ward off the great and closely impending danger or at all tall events free themselves from the hea heavy v y charge barge of i having been unjust and barele careless as stewards of or the household ot of christ the holiest hollest interests of humanity are at present laid low religion is become a mere form torm achurch discipline the shadow of a shade heart religion has ceased to exist among us and worst of all this melancholy want is not as in forme former rages ages discoverable only among the so called literati et illuminati but alas the unhallowed leaven of unbelief and indifference has reachel the masses and spread among them with fearful rapidity so that reli reil religion r ion lon is become an object ot of derision and cont contempt empt the lod iod long iong suppressed hostility to ecclesiastical rule iule an hostility aich which the concordat view viewed ed as a return to mediaeval medieval media eval darkness and op oppression pre ll 11 an has nas excited to tenfold force even in moderate 0 d kite bite men begins to be openly expressed and is revenged on the ful fui fulfillers ulf fillers illera of its ardis decrees the inferior clergy on whom des cenda a lowering storm of hatred which s to be the more dangerous as its ltd chief beat seat is is ih in the aggregate population of the ein empire pire it wab was as most moat unwise as well as unjust to regard these feelis feelings gs as the liggeri lingering ng throes es of the revolution in in for whereas etwas it was at that time rare to find a country parish parah in in wiil will winch ch the unhallowed weed of disaffection to the priesthood had sprung up it would now require minute bearch search to discover one in which it doth not luxuriate doubtless the party well knowing that its ends endi are best promoted by uprooting religious feeling in the hearts of the peo people f not wholly idle but it could effect little comparatively comparative ivere vere its efforts not aided by t the e grae grave error which the church has committed in reestablishing establishing re the ecclesiastical yoke oke from which the men of 1848 trie tried d to free the people eople p arld and as assuredly there is 13 no more inore certai certain method of uprooting religion than by making its ministers hated bated and despised so sa this is the very I 1 means no now w resorted to by the enemies of order to paralyze the energies and destroy the in fluence influence of the ibe priesthood over the mass of the people nor is the task a difficult one them the thet infer inferior loi iol cler clet clergy clety y whose fixed salaries are generally below t that bat of a hackney coachman viz from twenty to fifty borins bonns per annum must needs eke out their miserable incomes by bv levying generally dom bom the very poorest portion ot of the parishioners their allowed modicum of parish dues stola ren and the raising of this tax gives rise frequently not only to very disgusting scenes in which atch the priest necessarily figures as an oppressor of the poor but religion itself a appears P iu i th elight of a hateful burden which it were wise w to 6 shake off this state of feeling feel ing being moreover moreover industriously fostered by the enemies of the church who lake take ake pains to call attention not to the necessities of the inferior inferior fer eor for but to the fhe 8 superfluities of the higher bagher clergy but cerep on the contrary dry the inferior clergy who iii in fact are the really wor working icing part ot of the ecclesiastical polity suitably paid out vid of available church funds more especially out of the revenues of convents whose inmates being wholly idle idie might justly be secularized lari zed not only would their undeniable hard bard lot be softened but the enemies of good government menty religion and social order would h bew deprived of obe one chief means of popular seduction byet yet we must not conceal that the deadliest blow of all has been given to clerical influence by doubt now almost universally entertained of the morality of the priests to such an extent hab has this weapon beep brought to beai bear a against it alnet thein them th h t it would woula be hard to find an individual I 1 11 who believes in their moral purity hard to find a bingle priest who is not assailed on this t object by the mocking taunts not inot of aid aki adulis tills only but even ci en of boyhood nor is a justification ot of the taunts sought in pro pio proven en transgression priestl priestly chastity is impugned simply on the ground grotrud that the denial of lawful marriage has rend gend rendered pred it an impossibility but this la is not all not only does the priest haq had himself p personally ereo nally exposed to derision on this score buthe but he has the pain of beholding how widely the assumed delinquencies rt rf r f his class have contributed to open the flood floodgates gates of vice among the once vitt autu 11 ous pa peasantry santry inasmuch as th the e now gigantically increased immorality of all 0 orders aders of society y is frequently justified by reference to the notorious lives of their spiritual guides and the application of the proverb prove ib like peo t pie die like priest forms the running commentary in in every ethical discussion hence it is s rare in our days to find a head of a christian family ar or even a thoughtful political economist who does not deem the most imperatively called for measures forthe for the prevention okuhi of universal immorality to be the effectual removal of all suspicions of priestly the word of god is now fettered by the vices whether rea iea real or supposed of those who proclaim it and it if a reform be not speedily introduced trod by which on the other nand band the priesthood shall be secured a suitable bup sup support rt without t b behrig eing a burden on the poor and andron on the oher other be rf reed freed from the suspicion of the most infamous and destructive vices by which in short we clergy shail shall be restored to our proper position in the social circle and enabled to occupy reoccupy re with honor our place in the family the church and the world unless such reform be brought about our hopes of usefulness are arp null and void religion itself is given over to contempt the hierarchy hangs on th everge of an fall and arid the state of its overthrow our humble and earnest petition therefore i hat bat you rip rig right reverend father may be pleased in conjunction with the high episcopate and the imperial government to origin ate measures by which the evils which are now undermining clerical influence and which threaten the ruin of both church and nd stater state may be removed lest the people at large should be tempted to look to the revolution revolutionary ar y party baity as their sole hope and be led to bless even the enemies of god and good order if their heir political wisdom release them from so intolerable a stat state of things |
