The Papacy and the United States in Cuba
A CERTAIN Monsignor Sbaretti came from Rome to the United States in 1894 as auditor of the apostolic delegation of the papacy here. About a month ago he was appointed bishop of Havana, Cuba. And it is announced that he was selected for that bishopric “on account of his knowledge of canon law, the Constitution of the United States, and the method of procedure in our courts,” and with all this because of “the prominence in Havana of questions concerning the property of the Roman Catholic Church.” If that is not the forming of a union between the papacy and the United States government in Cuba, then what more is needed to make such a union? And the constitution of the United States, which this Romanist is said to know so well, is not the Constitution ordained and intended by the Fathers of this nation; but, the constitution as it was made Catholic by the argument, declaration, and decision of the United States Supreme Court, Feb. 29, 1892,—the constitution which, because of that decision, Pope Leo XIII commanded all Catholics to take in one hand, with the Catholic Bible in the other, and go forward to bring this country into unity with the Catholic Church.