ROME AS THE LEADER IN KNOWLEDGE.
By H. F. Phelps
The 5th of September, 1895, was a great day in the annals of the northwest, especially that of St. Paul, Minn. The occasion was that of the consecration of the Catholic seminary just completed, made possible by the gift of $500,000 from the great railroad magnate, J. J. Hill, president of the Great Northern Railroad. Mr. Hill is not a Catholic, but his wife is. Pontifical high mass was celebrated in the open air by Mgr. Satolli. The dedicatory sermon was by Dr. O’Gorman. Speeches were also made by Satolli, Archbishop Ireland, Bishop Kean, and J. J. Hill. Dignitaries of the church were present from all parts of the country. Upwards of two hundred priests were also present. Over one hundred voices from the various Catholic choirs of the city of St. Paul rendered the music. It was estimated that fully twelve thousand witnessed the ceremonies. After the addresses the buildings received the blessing of the ablegate. A congratulatory telegram was received from the pope through Cardinal Gibbons. While there were many good things said in the various addresses in regard to education, the main drift was the education of the priesthood. There were also some things said that a Protestant would criticise. With no desire, however, simply for criticism, the writer would desire to call especial attention to some things said by Dr. O’Gorman. In speaking upon the social conditions, and the desire upon the part of some for a more equal distribution of wealth, he said:— This is the aspiration of the world to be realized in the thoughts of many by impracticable dreams and impossible Utopias. The church has the real solution. The ethics she teaches—the duty of labor and capital—favor the production of wealth, and she alone has the moral lessons and influence that render the use of wealth just and humane. As to the distribution of riches, what power is more needed than the one that proclaims the principles of justice and charity, the fatherhood of God and the brotherhood of man? Now this is an exaltation of the Catholic Church above all others, and even above Jesus Christ. For, notice, the ethics, the solution, the influence, and the moral lessons are all to be found in the church—the Roman Catholic Church—not in any other church, nor even in the Gospel of Christ. Let man rather say that the ethics, the solution, the influence, and the moral lessons for these times, are all to be found in the Gospel of Jesus Christ, which is the power of God. Another statement is the following:— Fear not for the church. She is the mother of liberty, science, and order; in her are the principles, the strength, all the resources to guide the new movements of humanity, as Leo XIII. is showing and doing. No fear of the church; this is not the question nor the present concern. The mother of liberty! Forsooth! And when did she become such? O! I see; it is the liberty of and for the Catholic Church. For has not Pope Pius IX. said in his encyclical of August 15, 1854, “Cursed be those who assert the liberty of conscience and worship, and all such as maintain that the church may not employ force”? And that ultramontane editor, Veuillot, said, “When Protestants are in the ascendency we demand religious liberty, because that is their doctrine; but when Catholicism is in the ascendency we deny religious liberty, because that is our doctrine.” She the mother of liberty? It is only one of those sops that just now are being thrown out to deceive sleepy Protestants. But again Dr. O’Gorman says:— Give us then a clergy holy, master of knowledge and expression, and America, destined by providence, according to all appearances, to be the theater upon which modern improvements are to have their greatest and quickest developments, America shall be Christian and Catholic. Such is the purpose of the St. Paul Seminary, and such, in a higher and wider sense, is the purpose of the Catholic University of America, to which your seminary is affiliated. Such is the program outlined by Leo XIII. In science Catholics ought not to be followers but leaders, is the watchword that has come down to us from the Vatican. The Roman Catholic Church to be the leader in science! And for wonder! Look at her history in countries where she has the rule to-day, and in days gone by. Why was she not the leader in knowledge in and during the Dark Ages? And why does she not lead in Mexico and in South America to-day? Let her go to those countries and there establish her claims. As she admits the doctrine of religious liberty in countries where that is the doctrine, so she favors education where she can best obtain her ends by that means. And even here it is the education of the priesthood, according to these addresses, and the parochial school under the dominating influence of the priests, because in this country her people are made to see the need of education. But where she rules, as in Mexico and in South America, she has no aspiration to become a leader in science, or to assert or give proof that she is the mother of liberty. And in this country, where religious liberty is the doctrine, could she gain the ascendency, our liberty would soon become the same as in those countries where now she rules. But ever since this nation, by the affirmation of the Supreme Court, became a “Christian nation,” these claims of the Papacy have been made with a boldness that is an astonishment to those who are inclined to look at the logical results of admitting those claims. They are but sops that are continually being put forward to lull the nation to sleep. And the nation is being deceived by these claims—to its ruin and to the ruin of the world. And this ruin is incidentally mentioned by the doctor as follows:— “The priest is the keeper of knowledge, and from him shall the law be sought.” “And what,” continued the prophet, “if he depart out of the way and cause many to stumble at the law?” “Ah, then,” saith the Lord, “I have made you contemptible and base before all people. I will send poverty upon you, and I will curse your blessings; I will scatter upon your face the dung of your solemnities.” More than sacrifice, sacraments, worship, and rites has been committed to the priests—knowledge of the law and order. Of all the churches in all the world, it is to the Roman Catholic Church, according to history, that the words of the prophet are applicable: “Her priests have violated my law, and have profaned mine holy things; they have put no difference between the holy and profane, neither have they showed difference between the unclean and the clean, and have hid their eyes from my Sabbaths, and I am profaned among them,” in that they have expunged the second commandment from the law, and set the Sunday—“the wild solar holiday of all pagan times”—in the place of the Sabbath of the Lord, thus putting no difference between the holy and the profane. Thus it is true that they have “caused many to stumble at the law.” But the time is not far distant when the doom that is written by the prophets will fall upon mystical Babylon and all that will be found connected with her. Therefore the words are now going, “Come out of her, my people, that ye be not partakers of her sins, and that ye receive not of her plagues.”