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Show j Federation of Catholic Societies U Logical Appeal, Showing the Benefits and Necessity of if Unity, by Hon. T. B. Minnehan of Columbus, 0. I! l 1. rossibly I cannot at once name the ' lit.t method to secure to Catholics nual recognition; perhaps I can do this most effectively if i borrow the beautiful thought of another: 'What is the real good?" , jf I asked in musing mood, " Order, said the law court; Knowledge, said the school; Truth. s;yd the wise man; Pleasure, said the fool; Love, said the maiden; Heauty, said the rage; Freedom, said the dreamer; SHome, said the sage; Fame, -aid the soldier; . Knnlty. the seer; Spake my heart full sadly; , "The answer is not here." I Then an angel softly whispered: I "'Each heart holds the secret, I Kindness is the word." ! Kindness! Charity! This is the crown jewel best adorning all human life, national as well as individual. Let me repeat it again: Kindness is the word! Honesty, friendly investigation into the farness of what Catholics ask from their fellow citizens this must brin gus nearer together. i Higotry bah! It is a toadstool from j the fens of ignorance; a toadstool fit only to enthrone the mocking, sneer-s sneer-s ing find of our common Christianity Infidelity. How- utterly he mistakes who Interprets Inter-prets your presence and object here this evening as suggestve of stirring up religious strife. The very opposite J must be the result of the beneficent union of Catholic societies. Religious bigotry! I dislike even to think upon that subject. What a foul, senseless thing the bitterness of creed is. Have you ever thought upon the inconsistency in-consistency of it? .'v'en hating each other because ther rm, ,t see alike the light of God's trurb: be i.use they cannot can-not worship him in the same way. K.jbert Burns caugt.t tho correct idea when he sarcastically -wrote: "Sending "Send-ing one to heaven and ten to hell all for his glory." How is it that in the broad, intellectual intellec-tual sunlight of today the microbe of intolerance still thrives? For a like reason, probably, that, in the economy of nature, the maggot must live as well as the rose must die. Lt me repeat what I said at the opening session of the Cincinnati convention: con-vention: "With -malice towards none, 1ut with charity for all," the Federation Federa-tion of American Catholic Societies hopes to ommend Its aims and meth-1 meth-1 ods to the respect and esteem of all our fellow citizens. We trust the day will not be long delayed until the white hand of a broader, better, fair-play, loving, true Americanim will reach out with us to pluck from beneath the fair rose of our constitutional freedom the last withered wither-ed thorn of religious bigotry- No more of the bitterness of race; no more of ihe bigotry of creed! This is the broadest broad-est meaning of the grandest mission of the stars and stripes to begin the civilization civil-ization of the Twentieth century. Peculiarly American are all the aims snd methods of the Federation of Catholic Cath-olic Societies. Among other things but in the main, we aim to secure the practical, everyday religious equality enjoyed by our fellow citizens of all other denominations. Asking no fa-1 fa-1 vors, we do insist upon our rights as Catholic citizens. To this end we are striving to fuse the broken fragments of Catholic fraternal and social life; trying to fashion into a shield of strength the united influence, the pow-I pow-I er of millions of Americans working JL together for the better protection of I those constitutional rights too long un- I fairly and too often shamelessly dis- I criminated against. We would wipe from the broad, noble brow of our country the last lingering stain of narrow-mindedness. We believe be-lieve with Senator Hale: "If every Catholic in the country were dead, the Protestants would still cling to Ameri- ; can instutions. If every Protestant in I America were dead, this government would be safe in the hands of its Catholic Cath-olic citizens." Than Catholics there do not live stancher believers in the doctrine doc-trine of separation of church and state. We would resent the slightest political Interference or rule of a pope as sternly stern-ly as that of a king. The efforts of Federation to accom-7'lieh accom-7'lieh its purposes are open, above board and in the broad light of day. . Its instrumentalities, and all of them ' -n ill be by methods commanding the respect and, as we hope, enlisting the generous co-operation of that large and continually increasing class of Americans who love Justice and instinctively in-stinctively approve of every great work ' having for its main object equality. freedom; what Is fair, reasonable and just. We would have our fellow citizens measure up to a practical acknowledgment acknowl-edgment and recognition of the religious religi-ous freedom intended by the "Fathers" when they builded ho much wiser than many of "their narrow degenerate de-' srendants seem to appreciate. We are not unmindful of, but we thank God for the encouraging fact : that education has, at least to some extent, ex-tent, dispelled many illusions about atholic belief and practice. In some respects, a long stride forward for-ward has been made in the. past quarter quar-ter or more of a century. With frank intelligence, cultured Protestantism Pro-testantism now laughs to scorn many of the nonsensical misrepresentations it once honestly mistook for facts. An instance. Behind the simple adornments adorn-ments of the parish church; back of the splendid decorations of the majestic majes-tic cathedral: behind the sculptured W forms of breathing marble; the glowing ' colors of speaking canvas; back of the blazing lights: the perfume of incense; the fragrance of flowers and the harmony har-mony of music; instead of seeing m all ' N this, as used to be the case, oniy the trapppings of superstition and downright down-right idolatry. Protestantism now reads in it all a poem of beauty, an epic of grandeur appealing rationally to the intelligence, touching the soul through all its sensibilities and lifting the spirit from the mere semblance to the divine reality beyond the stars. By educated Protestants, the confessional confes-sional is now quite generally understood under-stood in its true light. Being understood, under-stood, it is no longer held hideous as the countenance of some "veiled prophet pro-phet of Khorassan." It is admitted to be, even from a human standpoint, an institution of incalculable good. Educated Protestants begin to measure meas-ure by a different standard the religious intelligence of their Catholic friends. They no longer regard them as either the fools or dupes which downright ignorance or misconception once mistook mis-took them to be. Candid Protestantism is now quite ashamed of some of its own past scarecrows. The more it comes to really know "Popery," the farther it gets from the ignorant narrow nar-row doctrine of "No popery." The truth is also gradually dawning upon the American Protestant mind that while Catholics take their faith from the Chair of Peter, they recognize recog-nize no political creed under heaven better, wiser or higher than that of Hamilton or Jefferson. Recognized and respected, too, is the fact that of all others, the Catholic clergy, by choice, stand farthest aloof from the clashing arena of politics. Equally, however, is becoming appreciated appre-ciated the fact that when the honor of the flag., the law-abiding peace of a community, the integrity of the nation has been assailed ,the humblest priest, as well as the mitred prelate, have ever been among the very foremost to shake out of the folds of the great flag and preach the doctrine that love and duty to country go hand in hand with love and duty to God. I say, we thank God for the change of conviction upon the part of our fellow fel-low citizens of other creeds which has brought them, at least in some slight measure, to recognize the only true common sense Christianity; that kind of Christianity which believes in the right or uncompromising individual belief be-lief as in every way compatible, not only with the highest duties of civic, but also with the truest and dearest friendships of social life." . We cannot, however, suffer ourselves to be .betrayed with a delusion. Having Hav-ing ears we cannot but hear, and having hav-ing eyes we cannot but see the seemingly seem-ingly invincible jealousy and even hatred so ofen in evidence around and about us against the Catholic church in America. . Falsification broadly stares from the page of history and literature; open defamation still disgraces too many Christian pulpits; an innsidious fling, a covert stab too often disgraces the elquence of the platform: slander too frequently assails us in the columns of the press. The why and wherefore? That is . the enigma. Was voice ever more powerfully or eloquently raised for the uplifting of all mankind than that which the nations, even yesterday, yes-terday, heard again ringing from the Vatican as the "Morning Bell" of the new century? Americans cause to doubt, to mistrust mis-trust or to fear the Catholic church. Why? Think a moment. What tongue has been more scathing in its denunciation denun-ciation of anarchy? Do the great problems prob-lems of labor and capital cast shadows upon the national hearthstone? What voice more gently chides or so firmly commands? What hand has held truer to the rudder of justice to the currents of domestic safety? Does the legally recognized dissolution of the marriage vow arouse universal concern. Does it hold the deeply concerned attention of every Christian pulpit in the land? Who so much as the Catholic clergy are striving to arrest this damnable blight eating- at the very heart of the nation's social and. consequently, its civil existence? Does the curse of intemperance in-temperance continue to sap the strength, to degrade tTie manhood of i the country? What grander workers ! in the cause of sobriety, of purity than American prelates and priests? By their fruits shall ye know them. Is no Catholic effort for purity and sobriety in the line of nobler and better bet-ter citizenship? The Catholic church a source of mistrust for the highest and best wel- j fare of America? Listen to her voice on every hand leading against the removal re-moval of God from the educational system of the country. Is she not in this but repeating over and over again the warning of Washington's farewell address to his countrymen? No morality mor-ality without God, and withputmor-ality withputmor-ality no enduring citizenship. The overwhelming contradiction bt the unfair, un-Christian accusatjpns against the Church in America speaks loudest in the gentle, the lofty lives, the imperishable works for better citizenship citi-zenship of such intensely patriotic Americans Am-ericans as Cardinal Gibbons, as Archbishop Arch-bishop Ireland, Bishop Syaulding aftd without exception, of thif jitire hierarchy hierar-chy and clergy of Catholic America. . 1 have spoken of the unfounded, un-reasnoing un-reasnoing mistrust for the . Church itself it-self as represented in the person of it ecclesiastical authority. The same unfounded un-founded prejudice, the same sensess suspicion attaches to the American Catholic laity. Replying for them I can. perhaps, best condense your thought by illustration. A little w hile ago I stood in the deepening deep-ening twilight of a winter's evening, midway between the . great Brooklyn bridge. The scene was one of enchantment. en-chantment. The throb of traffic at the heart of the great city was hushed, millions of lamps began to kindle their twinkling fires in the vast panoramic picture of bay and city. In the near distance loomed from the waters Bar-tholdl's Bar-tholdl's "Liberty." A magnificent figure. Fit companion piece for the Colossus of Rhodes, it stands the noble gift of a sister republic. As I turned from its symbolic torch and contemplated contem-plated the great Catholic, metropolis of Nw York there came to my fancy another an-other figure, grand beyond the conceptions concep-tions of imagination. Its pedestal, the Continued on rage 2.) Pederation of Catholic Societies. (Continued from page i.) continent. Its background, the nation's na-tion's history. This figure looking out upon the revelation of America's" energy, ener-gy, upon structures of material enterprise enter-prise rivaling in magnitude those of1 Egypt. "The Land of Alighty Ruins." I though I could hear a voice representing repre-senting this figure saying: "These are largely the work of my hands. Standing upon fields of battle far more renowned than those of Rome. "The Land of the Conquering Sword." ' This figure, I thought, spoke again: "Americans, the laurels o your freer dom are all bathed in the richest blood of my heart." Looking again where school houses, academies and universities universi-ties where scientific research, the printing press, the rostrum and ffie chair of philosophy are spreading a culture unsurpassed by even Greece. "The Land of the Beautiful Mind." This figure spoke again: "America these are the stars of light my hand i has largely helped to place upon the j nation's brow." This figure tonight, I Catholic America, may it not truthfully say: "Americans am I not identified as is no other religion with the discovery dis-covery of your country, with its heroic early missions, with the battle-rocked radio of its birth as a nation? What religion is more closely identified with all the best achievements of your energy, ener-gy, your valor and your virrue? In the heat of the striving, in the up-ullding up-ullding of the moral as well as the , ' material elements of the nation's 5'?5 g?'?2????r ?t CathoUc. A-rfc;. A-rfc;. been bone of its bone and blood of St? bkNOd of th gfat republic? In the name of the Federation let me repeat it, we bring no gospel of hatred ' strife to our fellow citizens. We come, rather, with the historic language lan-guage of Abraham Lincoln upon our lips: "We are not enemies,, but friend"." We must not be enemies. Though prejudice and narrow-mindedness may at times have strained, they must not break, the natural bonds of j ; affection that should bind all Ameri cans together. "The mystic cords of memory, stretching from every battlefield and patriot grave to every living heart and hearthstone all over this broad land, will surely touch the better angels of our nature." No one more than we do realize that "the edifice of moral and social improvement we aim to build can never be erected upon the ruins of charity." We believe that intelligence, that education, that patriotism, that true Christianity, are all sufficient to ; adjust in the best and wisest possible i way all our really unnecessary .misun- : derstandings. Liveried in the sentiment, in the spirit of the Sermon on the Mount, we have no reason to fear the result of ' plain, outspoken, firm, but kindly, re monstrance against the discrimination that would make millions of Americans aliens in the land of "their birth. It is characteristic of our country that the sentiment always nearest the American heart, when properly appealed to, is one of fair play, right-mindedness and f justice. It may at times be clouded, but America's sense of equality can always al-ways be trusted if reached by tactful methods. The real loaders of American ' thought, the men who shape thz trend ' of national affairs, are sagacious enough and broad enough to put the seal of approval upon manly protest against the jealous, evil-hearted, narrow-minded machinations of the ignorant, ignor-ant, designing and un-American mischief mis-chief makers. Those who would still live in the savagery of fanatical ages are no longer the leaders of thought. All that is needed is to properly focus the light of truth and fair play upon thp dark places. This movement to federate Catholic societies is by no means a new idea. It is not either without distinguished precedent of long standing in the American Protestant world. With in-linitely in-linitely less of necessity the EpWorth League and the Young Men's Christian association long ago recoghized the wisdom and opened the way to unity ; ' of purpose and action among Protest- ; , : nt sects. We congratulate them upon their quicker perception, and we trust there will be found work of so broad a character along, the lines of good citizenship citi-zenship that we Can, at some points at least, touch with them in the harmony of patriotic emulatlop. If our fathers i forgot religious prejudice, if they for- got all silly fears of the "Bug-a-Boo" of Rome while touching elbows upon the fields of death, Why should we desecrate dese-crate their memory by denying to each v , other the full freedom of the flag In whose defense they died in heroic, no- ble brotherhood to defend? (Td be Continued.) |