The Struggle Between Church and State
By Editor
The great struggle in France between the State and the Church is decidedly on. Just what the outcome will be it is impossible to tell at this writing. Before our paper reaches its readers there may be civil war. In case it should reach any degree of regular warfare, no doubt there will be filibustering parties pouring in from Catholic countries all over the world, and the very existence of the French republic would be at stake. Some of the Socialists contend that this present struggle is with the view of overthrowing the republic and establishing a monarchy. American Catholics are endeavoring to induce the American people to believe that it is wholly a matter of injustice on the part of the French Government. We have endeavored to look quietly and dispassionately on both sides of the question. We do not see how France could have done much better. It has given the Roman Catholic Church the privilege of forming associations for the holding of church property. It has proposed to assist that church in the support of its priests until it can adjust itself and become self-supporting, as well as the other religious bodies of the republic, the same as in the United States. What the French Government proposes is an absolute separation of Church and State. Roman Catholics in America tell us that they are in favor of that; they are in favor of that because that has always been the case here, but they are opposed to it in France because it is setting aside all the history of the past; they can not bear to feel that the eldest daughter of the church repudiates the union of Church and State.