LEO'S LATEST LETTER

International Tract and Missionary Society · Oakland, California · May 12, 1890

FromSigns of the Times, Vol. 16, No. 18.

LEO'S LATEST LETTER.

THE recent encyclical letter which His Infallibility Leo XIII. has addressed to the ordinaries in peace and communion with the holy see is a remarkable document. Every Protestant preacher who wishes to understand the relation in which Romanists stand to the pope, and the claims which are put forth by the head of the Roman Church, ought to read this document very carefully. It is described by its author as a letter on the principal duties of Christian citizens.

After referring to the state of society, and to the abundance of evils which prevail, and which lead to the result that no wise man can bear the present without keen anxiety, or look forward to the future without fear, the writer says that the time warns us to look for remedies where they are to be found; that is to say, to restore the principles and practices of Christianity in private life and in all parts of the social organism. The true remedy seems to the pope to be easily found. His simple recipe contains one direction,—"Obey me." He tells his readers that the man who has embraced as he ought to embrace the Christian church, becomes by that very fact subject to the church, his mother, and a member of the highest and most holy society which it is the special office of the Roman pontiff to govern with full power under Jesus Christ. In cases where the Roman pontiff gives directions which are opposed to the laws of earthly sovereigns, the Catholic need not doubt which is to be obeyed.

"It is an impious deed . . . to transgress the laws of the church under the pretext of obeying the civil law." "If the laws of the State . . . command anything prejudicial to the church, . . . or violate in the person of the supreme pontiff the authority of Jesus Christ, then, indeed, it is a duty to resist them—a crime to obey them."

Those who imagine that the pope claims to be obeyed only in matters of vital import to the life of the believers or the church, will be surprised to find that Leo has made the limits of required obedience co-extensive with the limits of possible activity. What man ought to believe and what he ought to do are alike to be decided by the supreme pontiff. It is incumbent on him to point out what is moral and what is immoral.

"The union of minds requires with perfect obedience in the same faith perfect submission and obedience of will to the church and the sovereign pontiff as to God himself."

In exercising the privileges which they enjoy as citizens, Catholics are required "always, and in the first place, to serve as far as possible the interests of Catholicism." If these are endangered, all the Romanists in the particular country where the danger exists must take the same side and defend their religion. No one is to receive the vote or the support of a papist who is known to be hostile to "the church," or who openly refuses to respect its rights.

The pope does not hesitate to give exact directions with reference to men's political conduct, for, as he says, the supreme pontiff "has not only to govern the entire church, but also to order and regulate the actions of Christian citizens." It is indispensable that "the faithful should always religiously take as the rule of their conduct the political wisdom of the ecclesiastical authority."

No one can mistake the meaning of such statements as these. Henceforth no one will be excusable who asserts that a Romanist can be a good British citizen. He is bound to obey a foreign potentate. He is threatened with eternal loss if he acts the British citizen rather than the Roman subject. Only when he may be doing nothing to endanger the power, the prosperity, and the progress of popery, can he be perfectly free to vote as his British instincts and affections may impel him to do.—Christian Commonwealth, England.