THE CHRISTIAN STATE

International Tract and Missionary Society · Oakland, California · Dec 9, 1886

FromSigns of the Times, Vol. 12, No. 47.

THE CHRISTIAN STATE

The Papacy; Its Position, Policy, and Prospects.—No. 2.

AND what now is the work in hand for which this vast and careful preparation has been made? That work consists of two parts: the first is to combat the revolution; the second is to restore the Christian state.

As regards the revolution, which the church of Rome declares it is one grand branch of her work to combat, it is necessary to have a correct idea of what she means by "revolution." In the Papal vocabulary words do not mean the same things which they do in ordinary speech. The term "revolution" in the mouth of the Pope does not denote the atheistic and destructive doctrines of Communism and Socialism, as one might suppose; revolution in Papal phraseology is but another name for constitutional government. This the Pope denounces as Naturalism; because it is government on the natural principles of reason and equity, and because it brings two execrable impieties, as the Pope holds them, in its train: toleration of opinion and liberty of conscience. The German Empire is a revolution; the French Republic is a revolution; and the kingdom of Italy, with Rome for its capital, is the greatest revolution of all. This is the revolution that Rome is to combat, holding it to be a wicked and blasphemous rebellion against God, and his Vicegerent on earth.

"THE CHRISTIAN STATE."

The second part of the work now on hand is the restoration of the "Christian state." And what do the Popes mean by the Christian state? For Papal language and ordinary language, as I have just reminded you, are two different things. By the Christian state is meant simply a world governed by the Pope and the canon law. In order to see this it is necessary to attend a moment to the doctrine of the church of Rome on the head of society. Society, say the theologians of that church, may exist in two states: (1) in a state of nature; (2) in a state of grace. By society in a state of nature they mean society as God constituted it at the beginning, guiding itself by the light of nature and reason.

It is the mission of the church, they tell us, to lift society out of that low and corrupt condition, and to elevate it to a higher and holier sphere—to bring it into a state of grace. How do they do this? They begin by confiscating all merely civil rights and privileges, and by subordinating, if not wholly abolishing, all civil magistracy. And with what do they replace it? Why, with the magistracy of the church. All the obligations which the subject owes to the law and the monarch of the country in which he lives, are subordinated or transferred to the spiritual authority; that is, to the Pope and the canon law. The state governed by the Pope and canon law is the Christian state, and this it is the grand object of the Vatican to restore. Constitutional government, says the syllabus, is a revolt against the world's divine king, whose seat is on the Seven Hills. The modern theories of liberty and authority are emanations from the pit; they are the promptings of Lucifer. It is the mission of the church to dethrone that tyrant, and rescue society from the abyss in which he has plunged it, and place it upon the rock of the church, where alone it can enjoy repose. Then will be seen the "Christian state." A faint image of this happy time was exhibited in the thirteenth century during the reign of Innocent III. That image will revive and be seen in the greater splendor and completeness of that kingdom over which the Popes of the future will sway their scepter.

But how is this grand project to be realized? What are the instrumentalities which are to be put in operation for quelling this great revolt, and casting out that legion of demons which have taken possession of modern society, and which are known by the various names of constitutionalism, toleration, liberty of conscience, etc.

In the syllabus we see the programme of what the future is to behold, realized; we see there the foundations traced out of that great Babel which the builders of the Vatican are about to erect. But how, you ask, are the ideas and principles of the syllabus to be rendered into facts? In order to this a great and various mechanism has been constructed, and is being put at this hour into busy operation all over Europe.

THE SCHOOL.

There is, first, the school. Wise for her own interests, the church of Rome has taken into her own hands the education of youth, in some countries partially, in others entirely; she is training young Europe in the principles of the syllabus. In France she has a staff of not less than 70,000 persons, male and female, engaged in the work of teaching youth. What are these 70,000 doing but binding down France in the chains of the syllabus? In Italy and Spain the schools are worked mostly by priests and monks. In Belgium "Christian brothers" teach the boys, and nuns the girls. In Southern Germany the teachers in the schools are mostly clerical; it is the same in Austria. Here are millions and millions being reared in the syllabus—being taught as the truth of God that all merely civil laws and civil rulers, so far as they are not in consonance with canon law, are moral nullities, and that the Pope is the one God-appointed and divine governor of the earth.

The generation now being so trained will soon have the affairs of Europe in their hands. They will be the cabinet ministers of monarchs, the legislators of kingdoms, the editors of newspapers, teachers in colleges and schools, generals in the army, and, especially, they will form the rank and file of the soldiery which will fight our future campaigns. It was the schools opened in Germany by the Jesuits that furnished the soldiers for the Thirty Years' War. The same tactics are being repeated, and a new generation, trained in the schools, will soon be seen legislating, writing, preaching, and fighting for the suppression of "naturalism," that is, civil liberty, and the subjection of the world to the divine vicegerency of the Pope; and when it has come to pass that no human being is suffered to form an opinion in morals and religion, unless in accordance with the syllabus, then the Jesuits will sing their pæan over their completed work of restoring the "Christian state."