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Show LAYMAN'S SERMON. : ; ' 1 J Catholic Devotion to the Blessed Virgin. : j Not Adoration. Mary Exalted Woman- ' f hood. Angelus Bell Recalls Fimdamen- j tal Principles of Christianity. Liberty and Education. Sixty Universities in f I Europe Before Reformation. Meaning t of True Liberty. ! i , We herewith publish the conclusion of the Lay- i V ' i man's address, begun last week. Hon. J nines M. :j Graham, a member of the HotK-e of Representative ! : J of the United States from Illinois, delivered that . ! able address before a meeting of the Catholic (.'on- ; vert League of Washington. Though deprived of , the opportunities, in early life, of Catholic educa ! tion, it shows what can he aeeompli-hed by a sin- J " cere man in search of truth. To answer objee- , tions. be prepared himself by reading Catholic lit- : '" ' erature. The effect- of this self-training he telU f , " ; in a simple and lucid way. His lecture is an oh- ' ject lesson for Catholics, who should follow hi . ' example. He said: f;' There is nothing sweeter than the relation ex- ' isting between the Catholic and the Blessed Vir- gin. And yet Protestant ministers are in friction S. with their followers with regard to our teaching. r j Many non-Catholics do appreciate our relation ; : ' toward the Blessed Virgin Mary. It would be a ' violation of the first commandment to worship any- f ; ' thing but God. and yet many Protestants insist; ; ; ' that we adore her. Mary has done more for woman- j ! hood than all civilization ever could do for her. Ii ;-: that powerful litany you know it starts out: ; ; ''Lord, have mercy on us.'' Then, "Holy Mary, . Mother of God. pray for us." Intercede for us!- M Isn't it a beautiful thought i When the Aiigelu ; J rings, one of the sweetest customs, we hear th !' ,' words that the angel declared unto Mary. I wa '! walking along the street one day with a Protestant ; acquaintance, and when the Angelus rang he said: : ; "Why in does that bell ring so often, disturb- '. I ing people all the time?" I told him that it wa " i. I the Angelus. He inquired, "What is the Angelus" ! I I said, "It is a reminder of the fundamental basin ; J of the Christian religion, the incarnation of our . ' i Divine Lord. In the Protestant Bible you have it, ; ' 'Hail, Thou that art highly favored.' In the Cath- ; olic Bible it is, 'Hail! Full of grace. The Lorrt ' is with thee.' The Church has ydded the beautiful ! petition, 'Holy Mary, Mother of God. pray for ti", sinners, now and at the hour of our death. Amen.' j Then we recite the second part of the Annuneia-' I t , tioh, 'Behold the handmaid of the Lord. Be it! i done unto me according to Thy word.' Then fol- ; . ,! 1 .l. iTin ir 1 .Tr l 1 r l it r I iow me Jiau Jiary: ami iioiy jiary. auq trio-) s I I third part of the Annunciation then comes, 'And1 ! ' j the word was made flesh and dwelt amongst us,' fol- i .' lowed again by the beautiful 'Hail Mary etc. Ha i ' said. 'I think that is perfectly beautiful, and I ! shall never hear that bell again without remera- ; bering why it is rung" k' The Protestants would put Mary in the back- ': ground. She was good enough to bear the Son of . God in her precious womb (and they try to defila .' her by charging that she was the mother of other children). 'And the word was made flesh and dwelt j :.' among us" the whole basis of Christianity. Morn- ing. noon and night the sweet tones of the bella I ' ring out declaring the miracle of Christ's birth. I There are a great many other objections to tha ' ' Church, among them the claim that we are the enemies ene-mies of liberty and education. I went to the trou- ble of making a partial list of Catholic universities ' and colleges before the Reformation, so called i. i. e., before the beginning of the sixteenth century and that was a few years before Luther arranged his famous theses. There were more than sixty f great universities in Europe. Since that time five or ten followed, yet the universities have not increased in-creased fifty per cent. Some of these great uni- !' versities had thirty or forty thousand students. Be- . fore Luther left the Church there were twenty dif- ! I ferent editions of the Bible printed in Greek. The '. I chained Bible was supposed to be an enemy of tho .' I Church. It was meant to be just the opposite 5 -, I from what you have been told it was. It was then '. . I in manuscript, and a single book was the work of . a lifetime. So that the people might learn it. it 4 was placed where all might read it. and it was f chained for fear that there were some who wouM i' f forget whose Bible it was. It was a labor of self- , sacrificing men, who gave their lives to humanity. f Then, in 1440. printing was invented that would j I be only seventy-seven years before Luther's dentin- . ciation of the Church and for several years after ; the invention it was very imperfect indeed, more j like a child's set of blocks. Between the invention j of printing and Luther's day there were twenty editions of the Bible. j The Church is the real friend of freedom. Free- , I dom does not mean the right to do as you please. j ' ' i There can be no freedom or liberty without re- ; straint and authority. Liberty and authority ara dependent one upon the other. Protestantism gives one the liberty to pick up a book and read i , into it or out of it what he will. Liberty loads the !. : f Methodists to read out of the Bible that infant : ' j 'baptism is not only good, but necessary. Liberty ; f leads the Baptist to believe that infant baptism is sacrilegious. What kind of liberty Is that? That ; I means the liberty to be wrong. Baptism must be ' the result of the will or desire, says the Baptist, ( and without baptism there can be no salvation. ;. The Methodists and others tell you that is not so. What kind of liberty is that? If this is a law established es-tablished by the Omniscient God, how is it that He ' allows one to say, "This is white' and another to say, "It is black V Of course, one must be wrong. Continued on Page 5. LAYMAN'S SERMON." (Continued from page 1.) Private interpretation of the Scriptures is the foundation of Protestantism. Liberty to them is the right to do anything that they have the power to do. True liberty means action guided and controlled con-trolled by authority. Spiritual liberty means liberty lib-erty under the law: If a citizen were permitted to pick up and read the statutes his way, what would this country be ? How many on the street today I dare say there are ten thousand who have worked out a creed of their own from the Bible! The result of the Reformation has been a splitting up of pieces. It must be so. In the spiritual order, just as in the civil order, there can be no true liberty lib-erty without authority. What would your liberty be without lawyers and officers of the law, and if the courts were abolished, and if the burglar had liberty without the restraint of authority? The command that Christ gave to His apostles was this : "Teach all men for all time." That is the authority, and under that authority we are bound to have liberty. lib-erty. Just as in this country we have all the liberty lib-erty that it is possible for a man. to have, there-froe there-froe in the spiritual order we have all the liberty that can possibly be allowed under spiritual authority. author-ity. The preservation of liberty for the American people and the perpetuity of the law will in the end have to rest upon those immutable doctrines and teachings of the Catholic Church that liberty under the law, liberty guided and controlled by proper authority. The Catholic Church has been referred to by some of our greatest men as being the salt of the earth the preserver, the real, true preserver, of liberty. The Church has always stood for the rights of the common men. You know that no Catholic, owes temporal allegiance to the Pope. We have political allegiance on the one hand, our- allegiance al-legiance to our country, and spiritual allegiance on the other hand, our allegiance to the Pope. Who are more loyal than Catholic citizens to America? The line is made clear between temporal and spiritual spir-itual obligations. When Christ said, "Render therefore to Caesar the things that are Caesar's, and to God the things that are God's," He emphasized empha-sized the necessity of allegiance to the government under which we live, but our spiritual allegiance must be rendered to Him who gave us our immortal souls. There is a great duty resting on us now. With my knowledge of Protestant affairs, I say that the American people offer the greatest field on the face of the globe for Catholic conversion. There are hundreds and hundreds of those now outside of the Church who, if the real truth of the Catholic teaching were brought to them, would follow in your footsteps. There 13 not a Catholic doctrine or Catholic practice that cannot be absolutely proved and demonstrated. An educated Catholic laity is necessary to carry on this great work of conversion and teaching. The non-Catholic is a little bit timid about approaching a priest. . Give them light, and when they get used to it, see that we are able to give them a straightforward and truthful explanation of what the Church really teaches. Challenge them and ask them to read. Most Protestants have never read a Catholic book on Catholic doctrine. Catholics should patronize Catholic literature. We have splendid books, papers pa-pers and magazines, but they are too rarely found in Catholic homes. |