A ROMAN CATHOLIC MANIFESTO.
By M. C. W.
THE delegates of the recent Catholic Congress at Baltimore, which closed the 12th instant, adopted a manifesto "with enthusiastic unanimity" setting forth their views. In this declaration there are some things worthy of notice. They begin by saying (as reported in the San Francisco Examiner of November 13):— "We claim to be acquainted with the laws, institutions, and spirit of the Catholic Church, and with the laws, institutions, and spirit of our country, and we emphatically declare there is no antagonism between them. We repudiate with equal earnestness the assertion that we need lay aside any of our devotedness to the church to be true Americans, and the insinuation that we need abate any of our love for our country's principles and institutions to be faithful Catholics." Just fancy a congress of Congregationalists, or Baptists, or Presbyterians, or any other Protestant sect, asserting in such forcible terms that their sect was loyal. A loyal sect does not need to do so. Rome knows her past, and the world knows it. They know that whenever she possessed power in any government, that wherever necessary that power was always subverted for the advancement of the church, at whatever expense to the public weal. That church over and over declares her unchangeableness and infallibility, and over and over again indorses the whole history of her infamous past; and now she would seemingly wish to cry her patriotism so loud that the wail of the martyred millions of the past cannot be heard by the multitude of to-day. Put the above declaration of loyalty by the side of the last expression of the manifesto:— "We cannot conclude without recording our solemn conviction that absolute freedom of the holy see is equally indispensable to the peace of the church and the welfare of mankind. We demand in the name of humanity and justice that this freedom be scrupulously respected by all secular governments. "We protest against assumption by any such government of the right to affect interests or control the action of our holy father by any form of legislation or other public act to which his full approbation has not been previously given. "We pledge to the worthy pontiff to whose hands Almighty God has committed the helm of Peter's bark amid the tempest of this stormy age, the loyal sympathy and untainted aid of all his spiritual children in vindicating and perfecting the liberty which he justly claims as his sacred and inalienable right." The Roman Catholic's first duty is to his church and to the pontiff at Rome as the head of that church. This would not be so bad if it related to things purely spiritual, but it does not. The temporal power of the Papacy is the one leading question among Romanists to-day. Let the United States become involved by treaty with Italy the same as Germany and Austria are at present, let this government support Italy in its quarrel with Pope Leo XIII, concerning his temporal power, and every Catholic who adopted the above declaration would be bound to rebel against his own government and render "untainted aid" "in vindicating and perfecting the liberty which he justly claims." So the Englishman, the Frenchman, the German, who had sworn allegiance to this government, would have the same right to join the forces of their native lands in war against this country. They demand that the United States shall "respect" the temporal power of the pope, that no legislation shall be taken which will control his action as the actions of other men are controlled without his full approbation, and Catholics are pledged to carry this out. No true Roman Catholic can be a loyal citizen of this, or any government, unless that government is in harmony with the church, and then the public weal must always be subservient to the wishes of the church. A blow is well struck against the combined power of wealth and evils in our social system, one of the greatest of which is intemperance, which no organization outside of the whisky rings fosters more than the Church of Rome. The chronic growl at the public school is indulged in with the recognition of the three great agencies in the education of the child, namely, the church, the school, and the Christian home. No one objects to Rome's using all these agencies, but she has no right to demand the public money therefor. If she had more of the last agency she would not clamor so much for the second. Mormonism, a thousand times lesser evil than Roman Catholicism, because of lesser and local influence, is denounced; Catholic clergy to minister to Catholic prisoners is demanded; Catholics are exhorted to mingle more in works of national virtue such as non-Catholic citizens are engaged in; Catholic circulating libraries and reading circles are recommended, in which the history of the past will be glossed, perverted, or obscured; emphatic determination is expressed to close saloons Sundays by the passage and enforcement of the necessary laws; the establishment of Catholic daily papers is looked for; and the faithful are exhorted to unite with non-Catholics in securing better Sunday observance. These are the principal points set forth. We have noticed the last elsewhere. We do not know why a daily press is needed, when so many of the secular dailies can be used by the church. On the whole, the platform is one well calculated to please National Reformers and the American Sabbath Union and Sunday temperance workers. To the intelligent friend of civil and religious liberty, to the true Bible student, Rome appears as she ever has, the inveterate foe to truth and freedom. The only difference is between Rome triumphant in power and Rome bidding for power. Her words are softer than oil, yet are they drawn swords.