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Pacific Press Publishing Co. · New York · December 1, 1898

FromAmerican Sentinel, Vol. 13, No. 47

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“God Not for the Catholics.”

By JOHN MCCARTHY

BY JOHN MCCARTHY.
An article with the above heading appeared in a very important Spanish journal, El Diluvio, published in the great Iberian educational center, Barcelona. It reads:—
“It is a great truth, manifested hundreds of times over, that God is not for the Catholics. If anyone should doubt this, the reverses which Spain is suffering in war with the great Protestant American Republic, prove in the most eloquent manner that God has abandoned us to our own fortune; which is the fortune of a dog.
“It happens then, that in the war with the United States, we have come off defeated, because God has so ordained; and in good orthodoxy there is no need to point to this one or that as being responsible for the catastrophe. God has so wished it; and he has his reasons for subjecting us to this new trial.
“Nevertheless we are forced to recognize that the Catholic nations are very unfortunate, and carry upon their shoulders the worst shadow of the world. During the past 100 years all has been lamentations and heartbreaks, sorrow and bitterness for the Roman Catholic nations; while on the contrary prosperity, good fortune, and well-being has followed the Protestants and heretics.
“Spain fights against Protestant England, and Spain comes out of the conflict defeated. She fights against Catholic France with an allied army, composed of nearly all Protestants, and Napoleon is conquered upon the fields of Waterloo. A war is declared between Catholic Mexico and the Protestant United States, and but little lacked for preventing the entire disappearance from the map of the world of that new and growing Mexican nation.
“War is again decreed, this time between Catholic France and Protestant Prussia, and the Protestant army besieges Paris. Again the war hounds are let loose, this time between heretical Turkey and the Catholic schismatic Greece, and the Turks come triumphant even unto the historic pass of Thermopylæ. And ultimately the very Catholic Spain essays to fight the Protestant American Republic, and already the reader knows what she has done to us.
“It is in vain that our archbishops and bishops have blessed the Spanish flags and armies; it is in vain that they have offered public devotion to the virgin. God has not heard us; all, all has been for the enemy; fatal doom! doleful gate!
“It is, I repeat, the evil shadow that follows the Catholic nations. For the Protestants everything is felicity and prosperity; and notice that even the rebellion against ancient ideals is a cause of success.
“To the religious Reformation of the 16th century England owes the growth of its power and its progress in the days of modern civilization. The same causes produced analogous effects in Germany, Switzerland, Holland, and other northern countries.
“Italy realized its national unity, thanks to the anti-Catholic spirit of its cities; delivered as they had been for so long to the foreign yoke, because of the selfish interests of the “popes;” and if Catholic Austria has saved itself up till the present, she owes it to the great effort by which she broke the concordat which bound her to Rome, and gave in time religious liberty to the Austrians, recovering at the same time for the state attributes, until then hidden away beneath the cloak of the papish ecclesiastical court. And France is the second nation of the world since it has turned heretic.
“In exchange, the very Catholic Spain is almost at the point of passing the pantheon of extinguished nations: The Catholic Stuarts lost their crowns in England and Scotland. Ireland and Poland lost their independence; while the Bourbons have lost nearly all their thrones:—viz., that of France, and of Naples, of Parma, and of Módena. Only that of Spain remains to them.
“I have said, the evil shadow is girthed about the Catholic nations. It is like the shadow of the manchin-ille; which permits not to enjoy the sun’s ray, but kills instead.
“We have to die, that pleases me; still, nevertheless, it is not good to precipitate events. It is better to die of apoplexy than to die of Anæmia.
“So as not to die of anæmia, one has to give much iron to the body; and thus debilitate the enemy, inasmuch as the weaker the enemy is, the less influence is heable to exercise upon us, the evil shadow which follows us.
“Then since God is not with us, let us remain with God!”
The above is a sad yet true picture expressed by a heart full of bitterness, almost on the verge of desperation, a soul tired of being imprisoned in the trammels of Rome. His keen eye has penetrated the superficiality of the papish system; he sees the mercenary motives which impel the many blasphemous ceremonies of Catholicism; and he sees also the judgment of God being poured out upon Spain because of her having left the true and living God, by turning her face to the altars of Baal.
It is a fact that almost every expedition in times past that has received the papal benediction, has met with defeat and disaster. Thus the people are beginning to open their eyes to the emptiness of both Romish blessings and cursings.
Oh, that poor Spain would open her doors to receive the message of salvation; open her heart to admit of the rays of the Sun of righteousness. This is the only balm for the afflicted soul of Spain. This is the only way by which Spain or any other land can be elevated from the low and immoral plain of this degenerate world.
How long, oh, Spain, will you close your eyes to the glorious truth hidden in God’s Word? How long will you remain in your priest-ridden servitude, when God wants you to step into the light and liberty of the gospel?
Turn your eyes Zionward, leave all superstition, and human tradition; then shall you receive the blessing—not from the Vatican—but from the divine Creator,—a blessing that will bring victory here in the present life, and a crown of life hereafter.
Republica Argentina.