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The Outlook

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Pacific Press Publishing Company · Oakland, California · Oct 21, 1897

FromSigns of the Times, Vol. 23, No. 41.

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The Outlook

By Editor

"I will stand upon my watch, and set me upon the tower, and will look forth to see what He will speak with me."

THE POPE LEO XIII. AND AMERICA.

BOURKE COCKRAN, the eloquent political orator of New York, on his recent visit to Europe, had an interview with Pope Leo XIII. The Thrice-a-Week World, of July 7, printed an authorized interview with Mr. Cockran. Among other things the pope said to him is the following, which Americans will do well to ponder:—
"I would gladly take to my bosom the whole world and embrace it in the holy Catholic faith, not for any benefit it could do me personally, but to advance the welfare of men in this world, and promote their prospects of happiness in the next. The Catholic Church is universal, and the whole world is dear to me, but your country lies especially close to my heart. The Catholic Church has shown, here in the Old World for nineteen centuries, that it is not merely a depository for spiritual truth, but that, as it was in the beginning the cradle of civilization, it now is its bulwark.
"But if the history of the Catholic Church lies in Europe, its future lies in your great nation. You can therefore understand the great interest that I take in the American people, and the anxiety with which I look for tidings of the growth of the church in the United States."
Says Mr. Cockran:—
"I ventured to say that it was a mistake to assume there was a divorce between Church and State in this country—that on the contrary there was an intimate and indissoluble connection between them, but that instead of the State supporting the church in America, the Church supported the State by promoting obedience to law through her teachings and discipline. This remark appeared to please him very much, and he inquired with great particularity into the operations of the various charitable and religious institutions maintained by the Diocese of New York with which I was myself familiar."
How long will it be ere the "church" will direct the State in the laws which shall be made, and in the enforcement of law?