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Show Batteij-ing at Confession. These whojj have been watching the course of th( great battle now proceeding proceed-ing between! the forces of Antichrist and the CiVthollc church have noted that the grelatest energy of the attack J? directed against the confessional. This is regarcjjed as the center of the Catholic position. It is the outwork protecting thtl sacramental ark. The confessional i:fc the second gate of the church. After baptism has been passed, there is no cither portal. These gates agitate the fcates of hell, and all the fury of its foces now concentrate about the center off resistance. In France the Masonic preas is doing much the same class of w ;rk as the anti-Catholic press here i doing in such works as "The Devil n the Church." Its efforts are being si ipported by the still more effective agr ney of the moving-picture machine, t aousands of these devices are now in o aeration in the most populous popu-lous Frencl i cities, poisoning the streams of ti uth and inflaming the fuel of passion. jere, too, the thin end of the wedge hits been tried. In BufCalo recently the l.onfessional pictures were advertised bV means of a placard outside out-side a Phonoglraph entertainment booth, with the atteactlvc notification "How Mons. le Cur Hears the Ladies' Confessions. Con-fessions. Verlv, very funny!" A priest from Canada was among those who went to see the show. The confessor, a bloated, leerirjgr personage that might have served f.or a drunken satyr, was shown entering the box, and then a female coming In at the side-a figure that looked HI ;e a street drab awakening awaken-ing from a di bauch. The priest was horrified to bi hold these figures make thf sifn rf tr, ,1 i u.. uiuss o a. iJit:njniiia.ry to their blasphemous mimicry. Their hugger-mugger) grew scandalous, until at last it culminated in the confessor putting his arra around the "penitent" Just as the light was being turned off. Appalled and Vmazed at the frightful profanity, the priest called for the proprietor pro-prietor of the show and demanded the withdrawal of , this abomination. He demurred at first pleading that similar pictures wero being exhibited all over the world. But on finding that the law-might law-might he set in motion against such a show, he backed down and got the attraction at-traction removed from his list. Nor Is the propaganda of vileness confined to the biograph. In a hundred other ways the office of the priest and the profession of the monk are being held up to odium. The artistic wall plaque and the handsome oil painting bring the slander against the church Into millions of homes. Monks carousing carous-ing in company or stealthily caressing a bottle or holding a sparkling glass of rich vintage up to a shaft of light in a cellar: or monks slyly embracing buxom bux-om wenches, as though every monk were a true follower of the recreant Luther, decorate the walls of many of these millions, the walls of offices and the walls of hotels, cafes and saloons. The brown-robed Franciscan might be taken for the especial saint of places of conviviality, so frequently is he seen therein, on the painter's canvass. The cigar box. the cigarette wrapper, the Sunday pictorial supplement abomina tion, an contribute a formidable quota to the army of defamation. What can be done to stem the torrent of deviltry? Well, something can be done. The individual Catholic can do much if he would only shake off his indifference, the organized forces of Catholic action can do a great deal. Catholic societies can raise an agitation. They can make showmen and publishers and storekeepers store-keepers feel that while the Jew and the Freemason have rights, the right to outrage Catholic feeling is not amongst them. The protest of a priest subscriber sub-scriber has been effective in the case of the "North American" and Gertrude Atherton's offensive story, in which the Franciscan friars in California were held up to scorn in a way that ought to make the blood boil in the veins of any man. Catholic Standard and Times. |