ROMANISM IN AMERICA

Pacific Press Publishing Company · Oakland, California · Dec 17, 1894

FromSigns of the Times, Vol. 20, No. 58.

ROMANISM IN AMERICA.

THE Catholic Times, speaking of the diminution of the population of Ireland, which in the last fifty years has been about three and a half millions, almost wholly in the Catholic provinces, consoles itself for this loss to "the church" by the reflection that "this loss of Catholics from Ireland has made the Catholic Church the dominant religious force in the United States, and a power in every colony of the empire."

American Protestants will not read with pleasure the statement in the Catholic Times that the Catholic Church is "the dominant religious force in the United States;" but it is a fact nevertheless. Its power, however, is not by any means entirely due to Catholic immigration, as the Catholic Times intimates. A large part of it is due to the professed Protestants themselves. In their endeavor to secure the legal enforcement of Sunday observance, they have unconsciously been building up Catholicism, for that is the very soul of Catholic supremacy.

Protestants, both in England and in America, have not been unmindful of the fact that Rome has been gaining ground among them, although they have by no means realized the extent of her growth. They have seen that Rome was seeking to control politics; and so they thought to checkmate her by trying to get control of politics themselves. They have reasoned that if Protestants controlled legislation Catholics could not gain power, not realizing that by this means they were only increasing the danger they thought to prevent.

It should be well understood that the early church was just what that which to-day is called Protestantism ought to be. It held the religion of the Bible. We might say that it was Protestant, because it was a protest against Jewish and heathen errors. There was no "Catholic Church." But this "Protestant" church was not content with its position; it did not wish to wait till the next world for its inheritance, but desired it now. So it sought and gained political power, and thereby became "Catholic." The Catholic Church is nothing else but Protestantism with political power. When Protestants to-day think to beat Catholicism with its own weapons, they will find that it is master of them. Every Protestant appeal to the civil law is but an admission that Catholicism is right. Rome can be successfully opposed only by practices exactly opposite to hers, namely, by the practice of the gospel of Christ as revealed in his word.—Present Truth (London, Eng.).