CIVIL AND RELIGIOUS LIBERTY.
A man enjoys _religious_ liberty when he possesses the free right of
worshiping God according to the dictates of a right conscience, and of
practicing a form of religion most in accordance with his duties to God.
Every act infringing on his freedom of conscience is justly styled
religious intolerance. This religious liberty is the true right of every
man because it corresponds with a most certain duty which God has put upon
him.
A man enjoys _civil_ liberty when he is exempt from the arbitrary will of
others, and when he is governed by equitable laws established for the
general welfare of society. So long as, in common with his
fellow-citizens, he observes the laws of the state, any exceptional
restraint imposed upon him, in the exercise of his rights as a citizen, is
so far an infringement on his civil liberty.
I here assert the proposition, which I hope to confirm by historical
evidence, that the Catholic Church has always been the zealous promoter of
religious and civil liberty; and that whenever any encroachments on these
sacred privileges of man were perpetrated by professing members of the
Catholic faith, these wrongs, far from being sanctioned by the Church,
were committed in palpable violation of her authority.
Her doctrine is, that as man by his _own free will_ fell from grace, so of
his _own free will_ must he return to grace. Conversion and coercion are
two terms that can never be reconciled. It has ever been a cardinal maxim,
inculcated by sovereign Pontiffs and other Prelates, that no violence or
undue influence should be exercised by Christian princes or missionaries
in their efforts to convert souls to the faith of Jesus Christ.
Pope Gregory I. in the latter part of the Sixth Century, compelled the
Bishop of Terracina to restore to the Jews, the synagogue which he had
seized, declaring that they should not be coerced into the Church, but
should be treated with meekness and charity. The great Pontiff issued the
same orders to the Prelates of Sardinia and Sicily in behalf of the
persecuted Jews.
St. Augustine and his companions, who were sent by Pope Gregory I. to
England for the conversion of that nation, had the happiness of baptizing
in the true faith King Ethelbert and many of his subjects. That monarch,
in the fervor of his zeal, was most anxious that all his subjects should
immediately follow his example; but the missionaries admonished him that
he should scrupulously abstain from violence in the conversion of his
people, for the Christian religion should be voluntarily embraced.
Pope Nicholas I. also warned Michael, king of the Bulgarians, against
employing force or constraint in the conversion of idolaters.
The fourth Council of Toledo, held in 633, a synod of great authority in
the Church, ordained that no one should be compelled against his will to
make a profession of the Christian faith. Be it remembered that this
Council was composed of all the Bishops of Spain, that it was assembled in
a country and at a time in which the Church held almost unlimited sway,
and among a people who have been represented as the most fanatical and
intolerant of all Europe.
Perhaps no man can be considered a fairer representative of the age in
which he lived than St. Bernard, the illustrious Abbot of Clairvaux. He
was the embodiment of the spirit of the Middle Ages. His life is the key
that discloses to us what degree of toleration prevailed in those days.
Having heard that a fanatical preacher was stimulating the people to deeds
of violence against the Jews as the enemies of Christianity, St. Bernard
raised his eloquent voice against him, and rescued those persecuted people
from the danger to which they were exposed.
Pope Innocent III. in the Thirteenth Century promulgated the following
Decree in behalf of the Hebrews: “Let no Jew be _constrained_ to receive
baptism, and he that will not consent to be baptized, let him not be
molested. Let no one unjustly seize their property, disturb their feasts,
or lay waste their cemeteries.”
Other succeeding Pontiffs, notably Gregory IX. and Innocent IV., issued
similar instructions.
Not to cite too many examples, let me quote for you only the beautiful
letter addressed by Fenelon, Archbishop of Cambray, to the son of King
James II. of England. This letter not only reflects the sentiments of his
own heart, but formularizes in this particular the decrees of the Church,
of which he was a distinguished ornament. “Above all,” he writes, “never
force your subjects to change their religion. No human power can reach the
impenetrable recess of the free will of the heart. Violence can never
persuade men; it serves only to make hypocrites. Grant civil liberty to
all, not in approving everything as indifferent, but in tolerating with
patience whatever Almighty God tolerates, and endeavoring to convert men
by mild persuasion.”(300)
It is true, indeed, that the Catholic Church spares no pains and stops at
no sacrifice in order to induce mankind to embrace her faith. Otherwise
she would be recreant to her sacred mission. But she scorns to exercise
any undue influence in her efforts to convert souls.
The only argument she would use, is the argument of reason and persuasion;
the only tribunal to which she would summon you, is the tribunal of
conscience; the only weapon she would wield, is “the Sword of the Spirit,
which is the Word of God.” It is well known that the superior advantages
of our female academies throughout the country lead many of our dissenting
brethren to send their daughters to these institutions. It is also well
known that so warm is the affection which these young ladies entertain for
their religious teachers, so hallowed is the atmosphere they breathe
within these seats of learning, that they often beg to embrace a religion
which fosters so much piety and which produces lilies so fragrant and so
pure. Do the sisters take advantage of this influence in the cause of
proselytism? By no means. So delicate is their regard for the religious
conscience of their pupils, that they rarely consent to have these young
ladies baptized till, after being thoroughly instructed in all the
doctrines of the Church, they have obtained the free permission of their
parents or guardians.
The Church is, indeed, intolerant in this sense, that she can never
confound truth with error; nor can she admit that any man is
conscientiously free to reject the truth when its claims are convincingly
brought home to the mind. Many Protestants seem to be very much disturbed
by some such argument as this: Catholics are very ready now to proclaim
freedom of conscience, because they are in the minority. When they once
succeed in getting the upper hand in numbers and power they will destroy
this freedom, because their faith teaches them to tolerate no doctrine
other than the Catholic. It is, then, a matter of absolute necessity for
us that they should never be allowed to get this advantage.
Now, in all this, there is a great mistake, which comes from not knowing
the Catholic doctrine in its fulness. I shall not lay it down myself, lest
it seem to have been gotten up for the occasion. I shall quote the great
theologian Becanus, who taught the doctrine of the schools of Catholic
Theology at the time when the struggle was hottest between Catholicity and
Protestantism. He says that religious liberty may be tolerated by a ruler
when it would do more harm to the state or to the community to repress it.
The ruler may even enter into a compact in order to secure to his subjects
this freedom in religious matters; and when once a compact is made it must
be observed absolutely in every point, just as every other lawful and
honest contract.(301) This is the true Catholic teaching on this point,
according to Becanus and all Catholic theologians. So that if Catholics
should gain the majority in a community where freedom of conscience is
already secured to all by law, their very religion obliges them to respect
the rights thus acquired by their fellow-citizens. What danger can there
be, then, for Protestants, if Catholics should be in the majority here?
Their apprehensions are the result of vain fears, which no honest mind
ought any longer to harbor.
The Church has not only respected the conscience of the people in
embracing the religion of their choice, but she has also defended their
_civil_ rights and liberties against the encroachments of temporal
sovereigns. One of the popular errors that have taken possession of some
minds in our times is that in former days the Church was leagued with
princes for the oppression of the people. This is a base calumny, which a
slight acquaintance with ecclesiastical history would soon dispel.
The truth is, the most unrelenting enemies of the Church have been the
princes of this world, and so-called Christians princes, too.
The conflict between Church and State has never died out, because the
Church has felt it to be her duty, in every age, to raise her voice
against the despotic and arbitrary measures of princes. Many of them
chafed under the salutary discipline of the Church. They wished to be rid
of her yoke. They desired to be governed by no law except the law of their
licentious passions and boundless ambitions. And as a Protestant American
reviewer(302) well said about forty years ago, it was a blessing of
Providence that there was a spiritual Power on earth that could stand like
a wall of brass against the tyranny of earthly sovereigns and say to them:
“Thus far you shall go, and no farther, and here you shall break your
swelling waves” of passion; a Power that could say to them what John said
to Herod: “This thing is not lawful for thee;” a Power that pointed the
finger of reproof to them, even when the sword was pointed to her own
neck, and that said to them what Nathan said to David: “Thou art the man.”
She told princes that if the people have their obligations they have their
rights, too; that if the subject must render to Cæsar the things that are
Cæsar’s, Cæsar must render to God the things that art God’s.
Yes; the Church, while pursuing her Divine mission of leading souls to
God, has ever been the defender of the people’s rights.
St. Ambrose, Archbishop of Milan, affords us a striking instance of the
strenuous efforts made by the Catholic Church in vindicating the interests
of the citizen against the oppression of rulers.
A portion of the people of Thessalonica had committed an outrage against
the just authority of the Emperor Theodosius. The offence of those
citizens was indeed most reprehensible; but the Emperor requited the
insult offered to him by a shocking and disproportioned act of
retribution, which has left an indelible stain upon his otherwise
excellent character. The inhabitants were assembled together for the
ostensible purpose of witnessing a chariot race, and at a given signal the
soldiery fell upon the people and involved men, women and children in an
indiscriminate massacre, to the number of about seven thousand. Some time
after the Emperor presented himself at the Cathedral of Milan; but the
intrepid Prelate told him that his hands were dripping with the blood of
his subjects, and forbade him entrance to the church till he had made all
the reparation in his power to the afflicted people of Thessalonica.
People affect to be shocked at the sentence of ex-communication
occasionally inflicted by the Church on evil-doers. Here is an instance of
this penalty. Who can complain of it as being too severe? It was a
salutary punishment and the only one that could bring rulers to a sense of
duty.
The greatest bulwark of civil liberty is the famous _Magna Charta_. It is
the foundation not only of British, but also of American constitutional
freedom. Among other blessings contained in this instrument it establishes
trial by jury and the right of _Habeas Corpus_, and provides that there
shall be no taxation without representation.
Who were the framers of this memorable charter? Archbishop Langton, of
Canterbury, and the Catholic Barons of England. On the plains of
Runnymede, in 1215, they compelled King John to sign that paper which was
the death-blow to his arbitrary power and the cornerstone of
constitutional government.
Turning to our own country, it is with no small degree of satisfaction
that I point to the State of Maryland as the cradle of civil and religious
liberty and the “land of the sanctuary.” Of the thirteen original American
Colonies, Maryland was the only one settled by Catholics. She was, also,
the only one that raised aloft over her fair lands the banner of liberty
of conscience, and that invited the oppressed of other colonies to seek an
asylum beneath its shadow.
Lest I should be suspected of being too partial in my praise of Maryland
toleration, I shall take most of my historical facts from Bancroft, a New
England Protestant clergyman.
NOTE—The first edition of Bancroft’s History was published in
1834. From that date till nearly half a century afterward upwards
of twenty editions were issued, all of which retain the passages I
have cited on Maryland toleration. Early in the 80s a new edition
was given out, which omits or abridges some of the passages quoted
in this chapter. I may add that all of Bancroft’s eulogies of Lord
Baltimore’s benevolent administration are borne out by the
original documents, and by McMahon, Bozman and McSherry, and other
historians of Maryland.
Leonard Calvert, the brother of Lord Baltimore and the leader of the
Catholic colony, having sailed from England in the _Ark_ and the _Dove_,
reached his destination on the Potomac in March, 1634.
“The Catholics took quiet possession of the little place, and religious
liberty obtained a home, _its only home_ in the wide world, at the humble
village which bore the name of St. Mary.”(303)
“The foundation of the colony of Maryland was peacefully and happily laid.
Within six months it had advanced more than Virginia had done in as many
years.... But far more memorable was the character of the Maryland
institutions. Every other country in the world had persecuting laws; but
through the benign administration of the government of that province, no
person professing to believe in Jesus Christ was permitted to be molested
on account of religion. Under the munificence and superintending mildness
of Lord Baltimore, a dreary wilderness was soon quickened with the
swarming life and activity of prosperous settlements; the Roman Catholics
who were oppressed by the laws of England were sure to find a peaceful
asylum in the quiet harbors of the Chesapeake; and there _too, Protestants
were sheltered against Protestant intolerance_. Such were the beautiful
auspices under which Maryland started into being.... Its history is the
history of benevolence, gratitude and toleration.”
“Maryland was the abode of happiness and liberty. Conscience was without
restraint. A mild and liberal proprietary conceded every measure which the
welfare of the colony required; domestic union, a happy concert between
all the branches of government, an increasing emigration, a productive
commerce, a fertile soil, which heaven had richly favored with rivers and
deep bays, united to perfect the scene of colonial felicity. Ever intent
on advancing the interests of his colony, Lord Baltimore invited the
Puritans of Massachusetts to emigrate to Maryland, offering them lands and
privileges and free liberty of religion; but Gibbons, to whom he had
forwarded the commission, was so wholly tutored in the New England
discipline, that he would not advance the wishes of the Irish Peer, and so
the invitation was declined.”(304)
On the 2d of April, 1649, the General Assembly of Maryland passed the
following Act, which will reflect unfading glory on that State as long as
liberty is cherished in the hearts of men.
“Whereas, the enforcing of conscience in matters of religion hath
frequently fallen out to be of dangerous consequence in those
commonwealths where it has been practiced, and for the more quiet and
peaceable government of this province, and the better to preserve mutual
love and unity amongst the inhabitants, no person whatsoever within this
province professing to believe in Jesus Christ shall from henceforth be
anyways troubled or molested for his or her religion, nor in the free
exercise thereof, nor anyway compelled to the belief or exercise of any
other religion against his or her consent.”(305)
Upon this noble statute Bancroft makes the following candid and judicious
comment: “The design of the law of Maryland was to protect freedom of
conscience; and some years after it had been confirmed the apologist of
Lord Baltimore could assert that his government had never given
disturbance to any person in Maryland for matter of religion; that the
colonists enjoyed freedom of conscience, not less than freedom of person
and estate, as amply as ever any people in any place of the world. The
disfranchised friends of Prelacy from Massachusetts and the Puritans from
Virginia were welcomed to equal liberty of conscience and political rights
in the Roman Catholic province of Maryland.”(306)
Five years later, when the Puritans gained the ascendency in Maryland,
they were guilty of the infamous ingratitude of disfranchising the very
Catholic settlers by whom they had been so hospitably entertained. They
“had neither the gratitude to respect the rights of the government by
which they had been received and fostered, nor magnanimity to continue the
toleration to which alone they were indebted for their residence in the
colony. An act concerning religion forbade liberty of conscience to be
extended to ‘Popery,’ ‘Prelacy,’ or ‘licentiousness of opinion.’ ”(307)
I shall also quote from “Maryland, the History of a Palatinate,” by
William Hand Browne.(308) Mr. Browne was a graduate of the University of
Maryland. For several years he was editor of the Maryland Archives, and of
the Maryland Historical Society. He became afterward Professor of English
Literature in the Johns Hopkins University. He devoted his long life to
the Colonial history of Maryland, and is justly recognized as a standard
authority on that subject. I may add that he cannot be suspected of undue
partiality, as he was not a member of the Catholic Church.
Speaking of Calvert, the Proprietary of the Maryland Colony, the author
remarks that “while as yet there was no spot in Christendom where
religious belief was free, and when even the Commons of England had openly
declared against toleration, Calvert founded a community wherein no man
was to be molested for his faith. At a time when absolutism had struck
down representative government in England and it was doubtful if a
Parliament of freemen would ever meet again, he founded a community in
which no laws were to be made without the consent of the freemen.
The _Ark_ and the _Dove_ were names of happy omen. The one saved from the
general wreck the germs of political liberty; and the other bore the olive
branch of religious peace.”(309)
When the rule of the Catholic Proprietary was overthrown and the Puritans
had gained the ascendency in the Province, the new Commissioners issued
writs of election to a general assembly—writs of a tenor hitherto unknown
in Maryland. No man of the Roman Catholic faith could be elected as a
burgess, or even cast a vote. The Assembly obtained by this process of
selection, justified its choice. It at once repealed the Toleration Act of
1649 and created a new one, more to its mind, which also bore the title:
“An Act concerning Religion,” but it was toleration with a difference. It
provided that none who professed the Popish religion should be protected
in the Province, but were to be restrained from the exercise thereof.
For Protestants it provided that no one professing faith in Christ was to
be restrained from the exercise of his religion, “provided that this
liberty be not extended to Popery, or Prelacy, nor to such as under the
profession of Christ, hold forth and practice licentiousness. That is,
with the exception of the Roman Catholics and churchmen, together with the
Brownists, Quakers, Anabaptists, and other miscellaneous Protestant sects,
all others might profess their faith without molestation.”(310)
After the overthrow of the Puritan authority, and the advent to power of
the members of the Church of England, the second act of the Assembly was
to make the Protestant Episcopal Church the established church of the
Province.
The Act imposed an annual tax of forty pounds of tobacco per poll on all
taxables for the purpose of building churches, and maintaining the clergy.
In 1702 it was re-enacted with a toleration clause: “Protestant Dissenters
and Quakers were exempted from the penalties and disabilities, and might
have separate meeting-houses, provided that they paid their forty pounds
per poll to support the Established Church. As for the ‘Papists,’ it is
needless to say that there was no exemption nor license for them.”(311)
The author then sets before us the three kinds of toleration, like three
portraits, so that their distinctive features appear in bold relief.
“We may now,” he says, “place side by side the three tolerations of
Maryland.”
The toleration of the (Catholic) Proprietaries lasted fifty years, and
under it all believers in Christ were equal before the law, and all
support to churches or ministers was voluntary.
The Puritan toleration lasted six years, and included all but Papists,
Prelatists and those who held objectional doctrines.
The Anglican toleration lasted eighty years, and had glebes and churches
for the Establishment, connivance for Dissenters, the penal laws for
Catholics, and for all, the forty per poll.
In fact, an additional turn was given to the screw in this year; the oath
of “abhorrency,” a more offensive form of the oath of supremacy, being
required, beside the oath of allegiance, and for one thing, no Catholic
attorney was allowed to practise in the Province.(312)
When the members of the Constitutional Convention declared in 1787, that
“Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or
prohibiting the free exercise thereof,” it is worthy of note that they
were echoing the sentiments, and even repeating the language of the
Maryland Assembly of 1649, which declared that “No person whatsoever
within this Province, professing to believe in Jesus Christ, shall from
henceforth be any ways molested for his or her religion, nor in the free
exercise thereof.”
We may therefore affirm that Lord Baltimore’s Toleration Act of 1649 was
the bright dawn that ushered in the noon-day sun of freedom in 1787. And
we have every reason to believe that the Proprietary’s charter of liberty
with its attendant blessings, served as an example, an incentive, and an
inspiration to some at least of the framers of the Constitution, to extend
over the new Republic, the precious boon of civil and religious liberty.
It is proper to also observe that the Act of 1649 was not a new
declaration of religious freedom on the part of Lord Baltimore’s
administration, but was a solemn affirmation of the toleration granted by
the Catholic Proprietary from the beginning of the Settlement in 1634.
I will close this subject in the words of a distinguished member of the
Maryland Historical Society: “Higher than all titles and badges of honor,
and more exalted than royal nobility is the imperishable distinction which
the passage of this broad and liberal Act won for Maryland, and for the
members of that never-to-be-forgotten session, and sacred forever be the
hallowed spot which gave it birth.”(313)
What shall I say of the prominent part that was taken by distinguished
representatives of the Catholic Church in the cause of our American
Independence? What shall I say of Charles Carroll of Carrollton, who, at
the risk of sacrificing his rich estates, signed the Declaration of
Independence; of Rev. John Carroll, afterward the first Archbishop of
Baltimore, who, with his cousin Charles Carroll and Benjamin Franklin, was
sent by Congress to Canada to secure the co-operation of the people of
that province in the struggle for liberty; of Kosciusko, Lafayette,
Pulaski, Barry and a host of other Catholic heroes who labored so
effectually in the same glorious cause? American patriots without number
the Church has nursed in her bosom; a traitor, never.
The Father of his Country was not unmindful of these services. Shortly
after his election to the Presidency, replying(314) to an address of his
Catholic fellow-citizens, he uses the following language: “I presume that
your fellow-citizens will not forget the patriotic part which you took in
the accomplishment of their revolution, and the establishment of their
government; or the important assistance they received from a nation in
which the Roman Catholic faith is professed.”
And the Catholics of our generation have nobly emulated the patriotism and
the spirit of toleration exhibited by their ancestors. They can neither be
accused of disloyalty nor of intolerance to their dissenting brethren. In
more than one instance of our nation’s history our churches have been
desecrated and burned to the ground; our convents have been invaded and
destroyed; our clergy have been exposed to insult and violence. These
injuries have been inflicted on us by incendiary mobs animated by hatred
of Catholicism. Yet, in spite of these provocations, our Catholic
citizens, though wielding an immense numerical influence in the localities
where they suffered, have never retaliated. It is in a spirit of just
pride that we can affirm that hitherto in the United States no Protestant
house of worship or educational institution has been destroyed, nor
violence offered to a Protestant minister by those who profess the
Catholic faith. God grant that such may always be our record!
It is just because the Church has ever resisted the tyranny of kings, in
their encroachments on the sacred rights of conscience, that she has
always been the victim of royal persecution. In every age, in the language
of the Psalmist, “the kings of the earth rose up, and the princes
assembled together against the Lord and against His Christ.”(315) The
brightest and most thrilling pages of ecclesiastical history are those
which record the sufferings of Popes and Prelates at the hands of temporal
sovereigns for conscience’ and for justice’ sake.
Take, for instance, St. John Chrysostom, the great Archbishop of
Constantinople in the fifth century, and the idol of the people. He had
the courage, like John the Baptist, to raise his eloquent voice against
the lasciviousness of the court, and particularly against the Empress
Eudoxia, who ruled like another Jezabel. He was banished from his See,
treated with the utmost indignity by the soldiers, and died in exile from
sheer exhaustion and ill-treatment.
Witness Pope Gregory VII., the fearless Hildebrand, in his life-long
struggle with the German Emperor, Henry IV. Gregory directed all the
energies of his great mind towards reforming the abuses which had crept
into the church of France and Germany in the eleventh century. In those
days the Emperor of Germany assumed the right of naming or appointing
Bishops throughout his Empire. This sacred office was commonly bestowed on
very unworthy candidates, and very often put up at auction, to be sold to
the highest bidder, as is now the case with the schismatic Greek church in
Turkey.
These Bishops too often repaid their imperial benefactor by pandering to
his passions and by the most servile flattery. The intrepid Pope partially
succeeded in uprooting the evil, though the effort cost him his life. The
Emperor invaded Rome and drove Gregory from his See, who died uttering
these words with his last breath: “I have loved justice and hated
iniquity, and therefore I die in exile.”
For the same cause Thomas à Becket, Archbishop of Canterbury, was slain at
the altar by the hired assassins of Henry II., of England.
Observe how Pius VII. was treated by the first Napoleon in the beginning
of the present century. The day-dream of Napoleon was to be master of
Europe, and to place his brothers and friends on the thrones of the
continent, that they might revolve, like so many satellites, around his
throne in France. Napoleon makes two demands on the venerable Pontiff:
First—That he dissolve the marriage which had been contracted between the
Emperor’s brother, Jerome, and Miss Patterson, of Baltimore. His
ostensible reason for having the marriage dissolved was because Miss
Patterson was a Protestant, but his real motive was to secure a royal
bride for his brother instead of an American lady. Second—That he close
his ports against the commerce of England, with which nation Napoleon was
then at war, and make common cause with the Emperor against his enemies.
The Pope rejected both demands. He told the Emperor that the Church held
all marriages performed by her as indissoluble, even when one of the
parties was not a Catholic; and that, as the common father of Christendom,
he could close his port against no Christian power. For refusing to comply
with this second demand the Pope was arrested and sent into exile, where
he lingered for years.
At this very moment the old conflict between the Church and despotic
governments is raging fiercely throughout Europe. The scene enacted by
John and Herod is today reproduced in almost every kingdom of the old
world. It is the old fight between brute force and the God-given rights of
conscience.
In Russia we see the Bishop of Plock exiled for life from his See to
Siberia. His only offence is his refusal to acknowledge that the Emperor
Alexander is the head of the Christian Church.
If we pass over into Italy we see religious men and women driven from
their homes; their houses and libraries confiscated—libraries which pious
and learned men had been collecting and consulting for ages. The only
crime of those religious is that they have not the power to resist brute
force.
Cross the Alps into France and there you will see that many-headed
monster, the Commune, assassinating the Archbishop of Paris and his
clergy, solely because he and they were the representatives of law and
order.
In the Republic of Switzerland Bishop Mermillod is expelled from Geneva
without the slightest charge adduced against his character as a citizen
and a Christian Prelate. Faithful clergymen are deprived by the government
of their parochial rights and renegade Priests are intruded in their
place. The shepherd is driven away and wolves lay waste the fold.
Go to Prussia; what do you behold there? A Prime Minister flushed with his
recent victories over France. He is not content with seeing his master
wear the imperial crown of Germany; he wants him to wear also the tiara of
the Pope. Bismarck, like Aman, the minister of King Assuerus, is not
satisfied with being second in the kingdom so long as Mardochai, that is
the Church, refuses to bow down and worship him.
He fines the venerable Archbishop of Gnesen-Posen and other Prussian
Prelates again and again, sells their furniture and finally sends them to
prison for a protracted period. St. John Chrysostom beautifully remarks
that St. Paul, elevated to the third heaven, was glorious to contemplate;
but that far more glorious is Paul buried in the dungeons of Rome. I can
say in like manner, of Archbishop Ledochowski of Posen, that he was
conspicuous in the Vatican Council among his peers; but he was still more
conspicuous sitting solitary in his Prussian prison.
The loyalty of the Prussian clergy is above reproach. The Bishops are
imprisoned because they insist on the right of educating students for the
ministry, ordaining and appointing clergy, without consulting the
government. They are denied a right which in this country is possessed by
Free Masons and every other human organization in the land.
Perhaps a simple illustration will present to you in a clearer light the
odious character of the penal laws to which I have alluded. Suppose the
government of the United States were to issue a general order requiring
the clergy of the various Christian denominations to be educated in
government establishments, forcing them to take an oath before entering on
the duties of the ministry, and forbidding the ecclesiastical authorities
to appoint or remove any clergyman without permission of the civil power
at Washington. Would not the American people rise up in their might before
they would submit to have fetters so galling forged on their conscience?
And yet this is precisely the odious legislation which the Prussian
government is enacting against the Church. And the Catholic Church, in
resisting these laws, is not only fighting her own battles, but she is
contending for the principle of freedom of conscience everywhere.
But, thank God, we live in a country where liberty of conscience is
respected, and where the civil constitution holds over us the ægis of her
protection, without intermeddling with ecclesiastical affairs. From my
heart, I say: America, with all thy faults, I love thee still. Perhaps at
this moment there is no nation on the face of the earth where the Church
is less trammelled, and where she has more liberty to carry out her
sublime destiny than in these United States.
For my part, I much prefer the system which prevails in this country,
where the temporal needs of the Church are supplied by voluntary
contributions of the faithful, to the system which obtains in some
Catholic countries of Europe, where the Church is supported by the
government, thereby making feeble reparation for the gross injustice it
has done to the Church by its former wholesale confiscation of
ecclesiastical property. And the Church pays dearly for this indemnity,
for she has to bear the perpetual attempts at interference and the
vexatious enactments of the civil power, which aims at making her wholly
dependent upon itself.
Some years ago, on my return from Rome, in company with the late
Archbishop Spalding I paid a visit to the Bishop of Annecy, in Savoy. I
was struck by the splendor of his palace and saw a sentinel at the door,
placed there by the French government as a guard of honor. But the
venerable Bishop soon disabused me of my favorable impressions. He told me
that he was in a state of gilded slavery. I cannot, said he, build as much
as a sacristy without obtaining permission of the government.
I do not wish to see the day when the Church will invoke or receive any
government aid to build our churches, or to pay the salary of our clergy,
for the government may then begin to dictate to us what doctrines we ought
to preach. If it is a great wrong to muzzle the press, it is a greater
wrong to muzzle the pulpit. No amount of State subsidy would compensate
for the evils resulting from the Government censorship of the Gospel, and
the suppression of Apostolic freedom in proclaiming it. St. Paul exults in
the declaration that, though he is personally in chains, the word of God
is not enchained.(316)
And moreover, in proportion as State patronage would increase, the
sympathy and aid of the faithful would diminish.
May the happy condition of things now existing among us always continue,
in which the relations between the clergy and the people will be direct
and immediate, in which Bishops and Priests will bestow upon their
spiritual children their voluntary labors, their tender solicitude, their
paternal affection, and pour out like water their hearts’ blood, if
necessary; and in which they will receive in return the free-will
offerings—the devotion and gratitude of a filial people.