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Show France and Its Faith. CATHOLICS in this country are drifting away from the one-sided view presented to them in the beginning of the French campaign against the religious orders a view which admitted censure only of those conspicuous in the enforcement of the Law of Associations and helped to fix in the mind an erroneous idea of religious re-ligious persecution. " In their condemnation condem-nation of the Waldeck-Rousseau ministry min-istry American Catholics forgot that they were indicting the republic itself along with the electoral system of representation.. rep-resentation.. In swallowing the charge that the Free Masons, drunk with infidelity, in-fidelity, were alone responsible for banishing the religious orders from France, they were crediting a society numbering not more than 22,000, of which not over 5.000 are active members, mem-bers, with debauching the religious sentiment of 35,000,000 of French Catholics. Cath-olics. Sober reflection at once discovers discov-ers the absurdity of such a proposition, proposi-tion, and even the most pious of Catholics, Cath-olics, those whose thoughts are drawn to the cloister as often as they dwell upon the world, are forced to this question: ques-tion: "If 60,000 male members of religious re-ligious orders are driven out of their native country by 5,000 Free .Masons, what is the matter, and with whom?" The Holy Father has discovered the cause of this religious commotion in France and he has spoken to the bishops bish-ops of that country in tones that they can neither mistake nor disregard. He has told them that they must get out of politics. For years they have been preaching a crusade against the republic re-public and have encouraged the good people of France to hope that they could and would be redeemed by raising rais-ing the standard of the Cross and all who believed in God to rally around it. The Church was, triade the recruiting ground of the new army of liberation. The priest was to be France's political redeemer. For years this has been the refrain of all the missions, all the pilgrimages, pil-grimages, all the great popular devotions devo-tions of France. The Western Watchman, edited by a priest (Rev. D. S. Phelan), explains the existing conditions along with their contributory causes. Father Phelan says: "When the late law against the orders was passed it was confidently expected that the people would rise up and overthrow the government. The two armies were face to face and a i collision seemed inevitable. But the expected uprising did not occur; the people supported the government very generally; the orders took their departure de-parture without any very great manifestations man-ifestations of grief on the part of the people; the crisis passed over as if the affair were a spinsters' quarrel. Religion Re-ligion as a war cry failed to arouse the enthusiasm even of the Catholic masses, and the campaign of religious frenzy ended ingloriously. "The union of all the Catholic elements ele-ments in the party known as the Nationalists Na-tionalists brought about the union of all the factions opposed to the Church. The Socialists were held together by the fear of the clericals. All shades of Republicans blended Into one determined deter-mined opposition to the revival of the political power of the priests. If the present Socialistic Republic were ever overthrown it would not be by the men who received their cue from the sacristy. sac-risty. Far-seeing Catholics had their eyes opened to that fact at the last election and have sought a new alignment align-ment of the religious forces. The Holy Father saw it, and his late instructions to the French clergy are the result. Frenchmen may fight the Republic, but they must do it no longer behind the ramparts of the Church. "The French people are not opposed to religion. They love the Church. They have no thought of renouncing their faith as individuals or as a nation. But they fear and hate the monarchist in cassock; the Royalist in mitre and the Bourbon under the cowl. They fear them more than they do the Socialist; they hate them more than they do the Jew or the Protestant. As long as the Church remains in politics in France, so long will the cross be dragged in the dust of defeat. There is absolutely no hope of reform until the clergy give up once and forever all idea of political supremacy in France." That is strong language coming from a priest, but it is the right way to put disagreeable problems to the Catholic public. Catholic sentiment in this country coun-try is strongly resentful of priestly ambition am-bition in politics. It will not tolerate anything beyond the priest's right to I exercise his privlege as a voter and express ex-press himself as an American citizen. With scarcely an exception the rule of non-interference in politics by the American Am-erican Catholic clergy remains unbroken un-broken to this day. All the same, the Catholic laity may learn a lesson from France. It is needless to disagree with some of our contemporaries who paint the malignity of the Waldeck-Rousseau administrtition in carmine. We are ready to believe, when proof is furnished, fur-nished, that the Free Masons of America Amer-ica are different from their brethren in Fiance and that an estrangement exists ex-ists between the order here and the order in France because of the infidelity infidel-ity of French Masons. We are willing to admit the charge of infidelity against them, but does history prove that infidels are the most malignant persecutors of the Church? What does it tfll us of Cromwell and other stanch Bible pirates of the Reformation? Reforma-tion? We believe all that has been said against the French ministry upon substantial sub-stantial evidence. We have no love for ,1 such men as compose the Waideck-. Waideck-. Rousseau ministry. Yet we cannot help admiring their audacity in the face of 35.000,000 Catholics, who alone l keep them in power. Father Phelan j presents the correct estimate of the present ministry when he says it is the longest-lived in the history of the republic re-public and the one that deserved to be the shortest. "The premier is a trickster; the secretary of war is a man devoid of the qualities either of a gentleman or a soldier; the head of the army is a puppet: the secretary of commerce a forceur in society as in the political clubs. Yet with this menagerie me-nagerie behind him this man. Waldeck-Rousseau, Waldeck-Rousseau, has succeeded in keeping himself in power longer than the giants that preceded him; simply because he always managed in a crisis to arouse the clergy to some overt act 'of hostility, hos-tility, and then to unite all opposition in the common defense of the country against clericalism. All he had to do was to .wave the black soutaine and all the bulls of the opposition began to paw. "We. feared a year ago that the Catholics of France would finally come together and overthrow the republic. It looked as if further endurance of the hated regime of insolent infidelity were impossible. We deprecated it; as we knew' that no government brought about by the clergy would endure in France, and the work of the revolution revolu-tion would some day have to be done over again. The clergy never yet made good politicians; and the religious orders or-ders were always freaks as law-givers i for the world. Happily, our forebodings forebod-ings turned out false. The elections that have been held during the past year have convinced us that the republic re-public has nothing to fear from the sacristy. That being the case, wisdom should dictate that the priest, should disappear entirely from the political field in France and leave the moral and social regeneration of the country to the people who are most interested in its government. There can be no lasting political reform that does not begin with the people and is not bound up with the aspirations of the people. We are glad the Pope has taken this decided stand and feel sure that now his orders will be heeded. The archbishop arch-bishop of Taris. one of the most pronounced pro-nounced of reactionaries, has sounded the retreat of the clerical forces in Paris, and the other bishops will reecho re-echo the command. The Church of France will retire from politics at the beginning of the twentieth century to enter it no more forever." |