p. 94 | Untitled article

The Seventh-day Adventist Publishing Association · Battle Creek, Mich. · July 23, 1867

The Roman Pageant.

The Eternal City has recently been the scene of one of those gorgeous and imposing ceremonial displays with which the Church of Rome delights to captivate the senses of the multitude. The martyrdom of St. Peter, just eighteen centuries ago, and the canonization of twenty-five servants of the Church who laid down their lives in Japan for the sake of their religion, furnished the occasion for the glittering pageant. Previous to the grand exhibition of religious pomp beneath the dome of St. Peter’s, a public consistory was held by the Holy Father, at which were gathered, in their pontifical robes, more than four hundred Roman Catholic bishops, coming from every part of the world. The Pope addressed the assembled clergy in a formal allocution. Their presence was interpreted as a testimony to their zeal and devotedness in the cause of the Church. It was held up to the faithful as an illustration of their fidelity to the Holy See, and as an example to the enemies of Rome of the universal power which is still exercised by the chair of St. Peter.

The Roman Catholic clergy of this country were largely represented on the occasion. They came, like the wise men of the East to Bethlehem, with costly gifts in their hands. A quarter of a million of dollars in gold coin, and a silver model of one of the famous American yachts, which was the contribution of the faithful in the United States, placed His Holiness in excellent good humor, and drew from his lips a specimen of the pleasantries with which reverend ecclesiastics are wont to edify their docile listeners. This diversion of the hard earnings of American labor from the cause of the Fenians to the objects of the Church, was doubtless regarded as an omen of happy import. The Pope spoke of the devotion and generosity of his American children in terms of gracious approval, and was profuse in compliments to all who represented the interests of this country.

But the grand object of attraction was on a subsequent day, when all the resources of St. Peter’s were combined to give dramatic effect to the canonization of the martyrs. The first scene was the illumination of the whole city on the previous evening, bathing the towers and steeples of Rome as in a sea of liquid fire. With the earliest rays of the morning sun, a procession of prelates, priests, monks, and soldiers passed in shining apparel and solemn array from the Vatican to St. Peter’s, while the dazzled multitude that swarmed in the streets and on the house-tops rent the air with their acclamations. The Pope was borne in triumph on his jeweled throne by the shoulders of men. The interior of St. Peter’s presented a spectacle of bewildering grandeur. Every foot of space in that vast area was occupied by a promiscuous crowd of all nations and languages. The church was decorated in a manner surpassing the temple of Solomon in all its glory. Its massive columns and graceful arches were hung with cloth of gold, silver tapestries, crimson silks in endless profusion, and works of religious art by the greatest masters. The dim religious light of the ancient sanctuary yielded to the intolerable blaze of many millions of wax candles. The Gregorian mass in Latin and Greek was celebrated by the Pope. The magnetism of the immense audience, which included the loftiest dignitaries of church and state, the solemn music, the display of military arms and banners, the religious associations of the scene, kindled a fervid enthusiasm, and held the strongest heads as by a spell of enchantment. One bewildered worshiper was so excited by the occasion that he even lost his senses, and committed suicide on the spot.

The immediate motive of such a gorgeous exhibition at this time has not been expressly declared; but it is in perfect accordance with the usual policy of the Church of Rome to appeal to the imagination through the medium of the senses. It presented the influence and power of the Church in a visible, spectacular form. More than any arguments addressed to the understanding, more than all the cold deductions of logic, more than the most impressive suggestions of passionless and serene wisdom, was that holiday pageant adapted to gain possession of the hearts of the multitude. The impressible Italian nature is roused to its highest possibilities in such an atmosphere; while less ardent temperaments are fired by example and sympathy. The Roman Church has always understood the secret of bringing this element of human nature to bear on the promotion of its interests. It looks upon men and women not as beings of pure contemplation, not as endowed by their Creator with exclusively spiritual attributes, not indeed as capable of high intellectual advancement; but rather as children of a larger growth, who are to be tempted, as if by sweetmeats, and cakes, and fine clothes, to the pursuit of virtue and the attainment of salvation.

The Church makes great account of the power of association. If it makes provision for the indulgence of ascetic tendencies, and the gratification of a taste for solitary life, it presents innumerable points of contact for persons of a contrary disposition. It finds an effective agency in the aggregate of numbers. A crowd assembled in the midst of architectural splendors, in an atmosphere perfumed with the odors of incense, and soothed with the strains of the grand ecclesiastical music of the middle ages, presents all the conditions for a profound religious influence. It is not necessary to believe that this is a mere illusion of the imagination and the senses. The spiritual truth, of which every form of religious worship is to a greater or less degree the symbol, is brought out of the sphere of abstraction, held in solution, so to speak, and presented in a state to be assimilated by the individual.

Still we do not look upon the late scenic exhibitions at Rome as any proof of the increasing power of the Church over the most advanced life of the community. The best minds at the present day which bow at the Catholic altar utter an inward protest against the pretensions of the Pope and the dogmas of the creed. Many who are more faithful than Mazzini in the visible allegiance to its authority agree with him in the opinion that death has seized upon its vitals, and that a worthier manifestation of truth is in reserve for humanity.—Independent.