The Restoration of Papal Temporal Power
By Editor
SOME time since the Christian at Work had a note in which it pooh-poohed the idea of the restoration of the temporal power of the Pope, and in replying to it the Catholic Review says:— “The Christian at Work need not trouble itself about the temporal power of the Pope. The Catholic world is now agitating the subject, and never did the signs appear more favorable for it. The odious legislation of Minister Crispi has made more apparent than ever the terrible wrongs that Pope, priest, and Catholic people may suffer at the hands of the invading Government at Rome. The voices of more than two hundred million Catholics are now heard in favor of the temporal sovereignty which the Pope did possess for centuries, which is his by right to-day, and which the just spiritual rule of Catholics of every land and race on the globe demands.” Of course no Protestant can or will admit for a moment that the Pope has any just claim to temporal sovereignty. The very fact of his being Pope should exclude him from exercising civil power, because at all times and everywhere civil and ecclesiastical powers should be kept separate; but we cannot close our eyes to the fact that powerful influences are at work for the restoration of the Papacy to all its ancient privileges. And when any man assumes to say that “the Pope’s temporal or territorial sovereignty is as dim as a vision of angels, and as distant as the furthest removed star in the nebulæ of Orion,” he simply closes his eyes alike to the most potent facts and to the plainest prophecies.