The President at Mass

Review and Herald Publishing Association · Takoma Park Station, Washington, D. C. · Jan 29, 1914

The President at Mass

THE attendance of President Wilson at the Thanksgiving mass held at St. Patrick's Church in Washington, in November, has called forth numerous comments from the religious press. The Watchman-Examiner (Baptist) of Dec. 11, 1913, says:—

For several years the President of the United States and members of his Cabinet have attended services in a Roman Catholic church on Thanksgiving Day. After inveigling the President into attending these services by making the day an occasion for rejoicing over the pleasant relations existing between the United States and the South American republics, our Catholic friends are making capital of the presence of the President, going so far as to declare that this proves ours to be a Roman Catholic country. The Protestant ministers of Washington have made a ringing protest against the trickery of the whole procedure, and we gladly publish their protest elsewhere in this issue.

The leading Methodist paper of the United States, the Christian Advocate, feels that the faintest approach of political Romanism should be resisted:—

We shall doubtless be accused of bigotry by all who are partisans of Rome, and by many who refuse to peer beneath the surface of events and are incorrigibly optimistic in the face of any alarm. It will be said that we have exaggerated a mere trifle into a thing of portentous magnitude. Nevertheless, a slight piercing of the dike may let in the whole flood. It is the part of wisdom

to resist the faintest approach of political Romanism to the strongholds of our national life. It will save trouble to begin now. The secular press for obvious reasons will not sound this warning. The religious press, in the interest of political liberty, must bear the obloquy of performing this unpleasant duty.

The Northwestern Christian Advocate of December 24 declares:—

It is a matter of deep regret that the President permitted himself to be blinded to the real principle at stake. Having yielded once, he will find it increasingly difficult to decline the invitation which will be made next year—and pressed if occasion demands; but it should be the duty of every citizen who appreciates the situation to so impress him that he will refuse to further entangle himself in the toils of Romanism.

The New York Weekly Witness of December 3 believes that in its endeavors to secure recognition by government officials the Roman Church is overreaching itself, and while it feels that there is "not the slightest danger that this country will ever submit knowingly to priestly dominion," "it may be a good thing for the country that the Roman Church is showing its hand in political intrigue." Of the attendance of President Wilson and Mr. Bryan at the Thanksgiving services, the editor declares:—

But from a religious point of view, we were very sorry to see that President Wilson and Mr. Bryan attended high mass. Mr. Taft had done the same thing, but he is a Unitarian, and could scarcely be expected to know better. Wilson and Bryan are both Presbyterians, and they disgraced their religion by taking part in an idolatrous service—the worship of a wafer as the body of Christ. Their act was very blameworthy also from a political point of view, because it was an attempt to give official recognition to a service which they had no authority to recognize officially.

Nor are the papers of the President's own church silent with reference to the evil which may grow out of his attendance at this mass. The Christian Observer (Presbyterian), in its issue of December 3, gives the protest presented by the Protestant ministers of Washington against the efforts of the Roman Church to secure for this service official recognition, and in its comments thereon says:—

This is one of the spectacular, shrewd methods that the Roman Catholic Church uses to keep its own organization prominently before the people. What right has a church of the Lord Jesus Christ to make use of the officials of the government, in their official capacity, to further its own ends? The rector of St. Patrick's Church in Washington attempts to obscure the issue by pleading that this is a celebration which has for its object peace and good will to men, and states that it is intended to bring together prominent men of the American republics for the purpose of fostering friendly sentiments among them. Here is the ever-present Jesuitical argument, "The end justifies the means," upon which the hierarchy of Rome has established itself. . . . No Protestant church would have the temerity to attempt to gain such recognition of itself from official sources. And if, perchance, one of the Protestant churches should make the attempt, Rome would be the first to "howl" against it. By this act the Church of Rome overreaches all the bounds of propriety and Christian humility. It seeks to use the strong arm of the national government for its own aggrandizement.

The Continent (Presbyterian), published in New York, is quite sanguine in its belief that since President Wilson has by this act of courtesy shown his friendliness to the Roman Church, next year will find him attending either the Thanksgiving service of his own or that of some other Protestant church. Regarding the principle involved, the editor states:—

But the President has, we trust, observed in the protests reaching him, a note deeper and more sober than this, and much more worthy of his attention. The jealousy which the Protestant ministers of Washington expressed was, as the Continent understands it, not jealousy of the Catholic rector in Catholic St. Patrick's, but jealousy for the American principle of government impartiality among churches. . . . Having already proved by his presence at this one Thanksgiving service that he realizes himself the President quite as much of Catholic as of Protestant Americans, and having shown perfect respect to Catholic worship, Mr. Wilson will no doubt next year quietly choose for himself some Thanksgiving service which represents his own personal preference in religious custom. That will end all this talk of the "official Thanksgiving," and everybody will be as happy as before.

In a later number, January 1, the Continent declares, with reference to the Protestant mass meeting held in the city of Washington:—

The Protestants of Washington City have done recently what Protestants of other cities ought to do—held a theater mass meeting under the joint auspices of all locally represented Protestant denominations, where in a forcible address the crowds attending were told just why Protestantism exists in the Christian world, and what it stands for.

The United States of late has heard a great deal too much of fierce and even slanderous denunciation of Roman Catholics, and far too little of the reasons why the majority of Christians in this country are not Roman Catholics. The roar and noise of maledictions hailing down on the head of the Pope persuade the public of nothing except that the all too familiar spirit of religious intolerance has been stirred up again. And the reaction is more likely to incline popular opinion toward Catholicism than away from it. But the calm and candid statement of why the Reformers reformed—and why Protestant churches still refuse to admit the Pope's authority—will command public attention and public sympathy, for the Protestant idea of liberty, fairly stated, is an idea inbred in the American bone, and never more potent in American sensibilities than right now.

This is the kind of speech that Dr. McKim made in Washington on the occasion alluded to, and a multitude heard him with lively appreciation. Moreover, the daily press gave prominent space to reprinting the gist of his reasons on "Why Are We Protestants?" as it never would have given to reasons why other folks should not be Catholics. This is, besides, the kind of religious argumentation that loyalty most sanctions. It is really a shame to men and women who have entered into the heritage of Calvin and Luther and Knox that they so seldom exhibit appreciation of the mighty idea for which these men lived and so many martyrs died—the faith that every man for himself, peasant layman as well as lordly prelate, may come to God direct and receive the Holy Spirit without a priest's intervention. Strangely enough, men who boast in liberty from political lordships do not seem to realize what they have been delivered from in the way of ancient religious tyranny.

The feeling of alarm over the aggressiveness of the Roman Church is by no means confined to the Protestant ministers of Washington, nor to the Seventh-day Adventist denomination. There is going on at the present time a country-wide agitation over the question, and there is hardly a religious journal of any Protestant church but that in some degree voices this uneasiness, and sounds to its readers a note of alarm.

This agitation is in God's order. This controversy involves mighty principles. God has committed to Seventh-day Adventists great light with reference to the meaning of these things. Let us be faithful in taking advantage of this widespread interest to place in the hands of the people the literature which will give them a knowledge of the prophecies of the Scriptures, and of the times we have now reached in the history of the world.