OCR Text |
Show Persecution in Catholic France Thousands of Children Without Facilities for Getting an j Education Some Insight into Law of Associations. j I Republican France persecuting her Catholic people finds this week her President addressed through his wife by a committee of courageous women who demand that justice be done to the teaching nuns. At Landerneau peasant peas-ant women sit on benches opposite the school gate, knitting as they await the gendarmes, whom they declare they will resist. Minute men in Roscoff j sleep on their arms in the fields, while sentries listen for the approach of the officers whom they intend to fight before be-fore the schools shall be closed. Thousands of children all over the country are without facilities for getting get-ting an education. Priests are being deprived of their state stipend. Thou sands of religious are obliged to leave the country. Prominent Catholic lay- men and priests who dare open their mouths in protest are put in jail. A committee of lawyers of Lyons has issued a statement as to the legal aspect as-pect of the matter. Among the signers sign-ers are men prominent internationally, such as Berloty, de Chabannes, Blan, Jacqpier, H. and J. Lucien-Brun. The statement says: "By a letter of July 9 M Combes, president of the council of. government, invites all the prefects to notify the directors (superiors) of schools in charge of religious that they are given eight days to go to the mother home of their congregation and close the establishment es-tablishment that they occupy at present pres-ent under pain of the law (ejectment). "Directors of such schools thus meant by the circular are not bound to obey this order, which is not legal and is based upon a false interpretation of the law of July 1, 1901. These schools mentioned in M. Combes' letter do not constitute the 'new establishments,' which, according to the. law of; 1901, could be 'founded' only by a special law. M. "Waldeck-Rousseau has stated expressly that point in the discussion of the law. Moreover, supposing the law . of 1901 could be applied to such schools, the government could not order their closing without a special law. Therefore the directors have neither to leave, to repair to the mother homes of their congregations, nor to close their schools. "When legal force is used the course to follow will vary according to circumstances cir-cumstances and places. If a special law has been promulgated there might he a case for an appeal to the council of state. If an official presents himself to act by force, to close the school and place the seal upon it, the owner of the establishment ought to resist such action. ac-tion. He could even at his own risk break such a seal as representing an abuse of authority." .Le Temps, which does not pose as a defender of Catholicism, has declared editorially that M. Combes has exced-ed exced-ed his powers in applying the law retroactively upon institutions founded before its passage. The religious are standing upon their rights under the law and refuse to ask for the authorization author-ization which is required of new establishments. estab-lishments. The issue is expected to get into the courU. Meantime. Catholicism itself in France is in no condition to cope with any such attack. A writer in the August Au-gust number of the Catholic World cites page after page of incidents illustrating illus-trating the sham piety of what he says has become almost the typical French Catholic. Fast days ignored, church service neglected, mass, or at any rate the meaning of it, forgotten, children permitted to make their first communion, commu-nion, if they happen to take it into their heads; the ordinary necessities of a Catholic's life, as we know it. he asserts, as-serts, are in France rapidly becoming matters of choice or of chance. . But the malady is even more morU.l than this. Free . Masonry, w nich w e sometimes see defended in American Catholic periodicals as "permitto! un- ; der certain conditions," is in Frame so powerful in its influence rimong nominal Catholics that, where .Masonry .Ma-sonry is on one side of some great question and Catholicism on the orh- i ti, or, as is more often the ease, where Free Masons are looking for offices. ' the Catholic cleaves to Free Masonry j as the more vital ioyalty. i The clergy themselves are in an ex- ' ceedingly grave situation, and were so before the law of 1901 was enacted. How is a bishop appointed? Three names selected by the French govern- . j ment are sent to Rome for the Vatican , to choose from. The premier is very i careful to see that the three are favor- i able to the coalition at that moment ' in power. Occasionally the pope re- j jects all three names, but the new set i furnished ham, while it may be su- ! perior on canonical grounds to the set j rejected, will all the same be admin- I istration men. M. Combes orders the ' stipend cut from under every priest J not known positively to be "in favor j of Republican institutions." Everybody ! knows what he means. j To such a condition as this has ; Catholic France been reduced. Compare Com-pare her clergy with .the state-sup- j ported clergy c England. Who can ! conceive of an English bishop not be- j ing allowed to speak his mind on pol- j itics? The French hierarchy is a body of congested administration fealty; ' men chosen as least likely to oppose measures aimed against their own religion. re-ligion. Religious schools are closed and no other scnools provided to accommodate ac-commodate the ejected pupils; civil appointment ap-pointment is made impossible to graduates grad-uates of congregation schools; yet there is no organized opposition from the clergy, and the chief persecutors include apostates and make-believe Catholics. It is thus seen that the mere matter . of whether or not M. Combes is ex-ceedings ex-ceedings his powers under the associations associa-tions law is incidental and temporary. The question is. could M. Combes ob- tain a new law that would carry hia i point? Has the clement which is de- f termined to annihilate Catholicism in France really acquired control of the country, as would be shown in a dod- ! ular election? The soberest 'opinion among French-American French-American priests is that the case is not as bad as that. A young and vigorous vig-orous party organized to fight persecution perse-cution went before the country at the last elections and made some small gains. They will be better organized and know who their friends are another an-other time. There is a popular revival re-vival of faith in that mos-t active ami influential quarter, the world of let- ! ters. That the last few years should have seen the return 'to active and intimate in-timate church life of such men as Bourget, Huysmans. Brunetiere. and-latest and-latest and most important. Francois Coppee, the pot. who wns jailed th? other day and wrote a very effective protest which procured his release, means the spread of Catholic literature litera-ture in the most attractive and popular popu-lar form. M. Waldeck-Rousseau's dissent from M. Combe's interpretation of the law. also, may be taken as more than mere academic debate. Evidntly the persecution per-secution itself seems to him, as to L Temps and a doubtless large following of non- but not anti-Catholics, to have now gone too far. The next eier-tion.i may be expected to exhibit the results of this reaction, which, if it were important im-portant enough, might produce an amendment to the law providing for the protection of vested interests even though it provided against further unrestricted un-restricted extensions of the religious school system. Boston Republic. |