p. 7 | Priestly Intimidation of Voters

Review and Herald Publishing Association · Takoma Park Station, Washington, D. C. · Aug 2, 1906

Priestly Intimidation of Voters

A LITTLE insight into the hold which the Catholic Church has upon its members politically is given in a case at law in Leipzig, Germany, decided on July 9, in which a Catholic priest was fined twenty dollars for threatening a voter, during an electoral campaign there, with denial of the sacrament if he did not vote for the Center Party candidate for the Reichstag. An appeal had been taken by the priest from a lower court; but the Imperial Supreme Court sustained the action of the lower court in fining the ecclesiastic. How much of this kind of electioneering is being done it is impossible to determine; for it is very evident that there are few Catholics who would dare to hale their confessor before the court even in a matter of this kind. This unchristian tampering with politics and intimidation of voters is but a natural outgrowth of the church-and-state idea, whether openly expressed or covertly maintained under a different name. To teach, to preach, to minister to the sick and sorrowing—these are the legitimate fields of the followers of Christ. To strive for worldly or political preferment, to threaten, to coerce—these are the occupations of the kingdom of darkness.