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Rights and Wishes

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Review and Herald Publishing Association · Takoma Park Station, Washington, D.C. · May 14, 1908

FromReview and Herald, Vol. 85, No. 20.

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Rights and Wishes

THE Roman Catholics, of New Bedford, Mass., made an unsuccessful effort to have the public schools closed on Good Friday. The local priest then commanded the families of his congregation not to send their children to school on that day, and not to send an excuse for their non-attendance. In justification of this course he said:—
The Constitution of this country gives us the right to worship as we wish; and we should certainly not be bound to send an excuse for keeping our children away from school, to go to church, and recognize one of the most important days of the year in our church.
Referring to this denouncement by the priest, a local Methodist pastor wrote a letter for publication, in which he said:—
The real trouble with the reverend priest is not that any right of Catholics is interfered with, but rather that the wishes of the Roman Catholic authorities are not made the supreme factor in deciding what to do. The state has no right to make any law that shall recognize any church by giving to it any rights or privileges that do not belong to all, or that shall give state influence to aid any church or creed. . . . Let every citizen who believes in the separation of church and state, with equal rights and privileges to all, sustain them [the members of the school committee] in their work as representatives of all the citizens of New Bedford.
If the sound principles stated by this Methodist pastor should be applied in all cases involving the relation between the church and the state, there would be no religious legislation enacted, and one class of professed Christians would not be found enforcing upon any other class of professed Christians, or upon non-believers, religious observances of any kind. Inasmuch as the same authority has set apart both Sunday and Good Friday as days to be religiously observed, there is no more reason for requiring non-Catholics to regard Sunday than Good Friday. The only right way, so far as the state is concerned, is to leave every person free to observe any day or no day as he may choose, so long as he does not interfere with the equal rights of others in so doing.