IS ROMANISM TO RULE AMERICA?
THE astute and tireless agents of the Pope answer, Yes, and put forth all their energies to accomplish their designs. The American Protestants say, No, but make little or no effort to oppose the threatened domination. Monsignor Straniero, the Papal Ablegate who brought the beretta to Cardinal Gibbons last summer, has just returned to Italy to report to the Pope the state of his church in this country. In a communication that appeared in the New York Times, November 12 (the day before he sailed), he said:— “I have spent the last four months in traveling through this country. I had been in all the principal countries of Europe, and believed that nothing could astonish me. I acknowledge now that there is only one really great country—the United States. And great as your country is at present, I see that there is a future before it such as never existed in the world. Your career is only just begun, and I was rejoiced to see everywhere I went that the Holy Catholic Church has influence, not only among her own members, but among Protestants. . . . “Everywhere I went the hospitalities given to me were boundless, and it seemed as if people could not do enough to make my journey pleasant and profitable—I mean, of course, profitable mentally and spiritually. Boston impressed me greatly as an intellectual capital. History had informed me that Boston was the center where Protestant teachings flourished. It seems to me that Catholicity now has the lead there, and that in the future it will be even more powerful than now. . . . “Of the wonderful prosperity and what I believe to be the destiny of America I have already spoken. Amid all, it seems to me that the ‘signs of the times’ point with an unerring hand to the prevalence of Catholicity. I had expected to meet with prejudice wherever I went because I was a Catholic priest. I met none. On the contrary, intelligent people of all sects acknowledged that, if Christianity and the institutions, the social relations which Christianity has created, are to be maintained, it must be by the influence of the Catholic Church. Many of the Protestant sects are rapidly reapproaching Catholicity—more rapidly, probably, than their leaders would be willing to own. . . . “The church in Italy is laboring under many evils and great persecution. In America I see nothing but prosperity. The youngest child of the church is also her lustiest.” These are not the idle utterances of an irresponsible priest, nor the vaporings of a wild Irishman like Bishop Ireland, but the deliberate conclusions of a trained diplomatist who surveyed the field and observed the “army of occupation”—bishops, priests, monks and nuns—already at work. If Rome’s hopes are realized, American liberty will give place to spiritual bondage.—Converted Catholic.