"THE EXPOSITION OF THE CHURCH"
WHILE in Europe God opened Father Hecker's soul to the cries of the
nations. He was profoundly interested in the state of religion there,
and the persecutions suffered by Catholics in Germany, in
Switzerland, and in Italy during his stay, while it aroused his
sympathies, increased his desire to find a remedy, and a fundamental
one, for the evils from which the Church suffered. The peoples of the
Old World, with their differing tendencies, were incessantly
disputing in his mind. They were always displaying over against each
other their diverse traits of race and tradition, at the same time
that they were actually passing before his eyes in his constant
journeyings in search of health.
What amazed and no less irritated Father Hecker was the political
apathy of Catholics. All the active spirits seemed to hate religion.
A small minority of anti-Christians was allowed entire control of
Italy and France, and exhibited in the government of those foremost
Catholic commonwealths a pagan ferocity against everything sacred;
and this was met by "timid listlessness" on the part of the Catholic
majority. These latter evaded the accusation of criminal cowardice by
an extravagant display of devotional religion. To account for this
anomaly and to offer a remedy for it, Father Hecker in the winter of
1875 published a pamphlet of some fifty pages, entitled _An
Exposition of the Church in View of Recent Difficulties and
Controversies and the Present Needs of the Age._ It is a brief
outline of his views, held more or less distinctly since his case in
Rome in 1857-8, but fully unfolded in his mind at the Vatican Council
and matured during his present sojourn in Europe; the reader has
already been given a summary of them in a letter treating of the
providential meaning of the Vatican decrees.
What is the matter with Catholics, that they allow their national
life, in education, in art, in literature, in general politics, to be
paganized by petty cliques of unbelievers? How account for this
weakness of character in Catholics? The answer is that the devotional
and ascetical type on which they are formed is one calculated to
repress individual activity, a quality essential to political success
in our day. Energy in the world of modern politics is not the product
of the devotional spirit dominant on the continent of Europe. That
spirit in its time saved the Church, for it fostered submission when
the temptation was to revolt.
"The exaggeration," says the Exposition, "of personal authority on
the part of Protestants brought about in the Church its greater
restraint, in order that her divine authority might have its
legitimate exercise and exert its salutary influence. The errors and
evils of the times [the Reformation era] sprang from an unbridled
personal independence, which could only be counteracted by habits of
increased personal dependence. _Contraria contrariis curantur._ The
defence of the Church and the salvation of the soul were [under these
circumstances] ordinarily secured at the expense, necessarily, of
those virtues which properly go to make up the strength of Christian
manhood. The gain was the maintenance and victory of divine truth,
and the salvation of the soul. The loss was a certain falling off in
energy, resulting in decreased action in the natural order. The
former was a permanent and inestimable gain. The latter was a
temporary and not irreparable loss."
The passive virtues, fostered under an overruling Providence for the
defence of threatened external authority in religion, and producing
admirable effects of uniformity, discipline, and obedience, served
well in the politics of the Reformation and post-Reformation eras,
when nearly all governments were absolute monarchies; but the present
governments are republics or constitutional monarchies, and are
supposed to be ruled by the citizens themselves. This demands
individual initiative, active personal exertion and direct
interference in public affairs. Vigilant and courageous voters rule
the nations. Therefore, without injury to entire obedience, the
active virtues in both the natural and supernatural orders must be
mainly cultivated; in the first order everything that makes for
self-reliance, and in the second the interior guidance of the Holy
Spirit in the individual soul. This, the Exposition maintains, is the
way out of present difficulties. That it is the Providential way out,
is shown by most striking evidence: the diversion of the
anti-Catholic forces from the attack against authority to one against
the most elementary principles of religion--God, conscience, and
immortality; the drift of Anglo-Saxon and Teutonic minds of a
religious cast towards the Church, calling for spiritual attractions
in accordance with the independence of character peculiar to those
races; the hopeless failure of the post-Reformation methods to meet
the needs of the hour; and especially the Vatican decrees, which have
set at rest all controversy on authority among Catholics. The needs
of the times, therefore, call for virtues among Catholics which shall
display the personal force of Catholic life no less than that which
is organic. These must all centre around the cultivation of the Holy
Spirit in the individual soul.
"The light the age requires for its renewal," says the Exposition,
"can only come from the same source. The renewal of the age depends
on the renewal of religion. The renewal of religion depends upon the
greater effusion of the creative and renewing power of the Holy
Spirit. The greater effusion of the Holy Spirit depends on the giving
of increased attention to His movements and inspirations in the soul.
The radical and adequate remedy for all the evils of our age, and the
source of all true progress, consist in increased attention and
fidelity to the action of the Holy Spirit in the soul. 'Thou shalt
send forth Thy Spirit and they shall be created: and Thou shalt renew
the face of the earth.'"
The following extract gives the synthesis of the twofold action of
the Holy Spirit, showing how external authority and obedience to it
are amply secured by the interior virtues:
"The Holy Spirit in the external authority of the Church acts as the
infallible interpreter and criterion of divine revelation. The Holy
Spirit in the soul acts as the Divine Life-giver and Sanctifier. It
is of the highest importance that these two distinct offices of the
Holy Spirit should not be confounded. The supposition that there can
be any opposition, or contradiction, between the action of the Holy
Spirit in the supreme decisions of the authority of the Church, and
the inspirations of the Holy Spirit in the soul, can never enter the
mind of an enlightened and sincere Christian. The Holy Spirit, which
through the authority of the Church teaches divine truth, is the same
Spirit which prompts the soul to receive the divine truths which He
teaches. The measure of our love for the Holy Spirit is the measure
of our obedience to the authority of the Church. . . . There is one
Spirit, which acts in two different offices concurring to the same
end, the regeneration and sanctification of the soul.
"In case of obscurity or doubt concerning what is the divinely
revealed truth, or whether what prompts the soul is or is not an
inspiration of the Holy Spirit, recourse must be had to the Divine
Teacher or criterion, the authority of the Church. For it must be
borne in mind that to the Church, as represented in the first
instance by St. Peter, and subsequently by his successors, was made
the promise of her Divine Founder, that 'the gates of hell should
never prevail against her.' No such promise was ever made by Christ
to each individual believer. 'The Church of the living God, the
pillar and ground of Truth.' The test, therefore, of a truly
enlightened and sincere Christian will be, in case of uncertainty,
the promptitude of his obedience to the voice of the Church.
"From the above plain truths the following practical rule of conduct
may be drawn: The Holy Spirit is the immediate guide of the soul in
the way of salvation and sanctification; and the criterion, or test,
that the soul is guided by the Holy Spirit, is its ready obedience to
the authority of the Church. This rule removes all danger whatever,
and with it the soul can walk, run, or fly, if it chooses, in the
greatest safety and with perfect liberty, in the ways of sanctity."
"The practical aim of all true religion is to bring each individual
soul under the immediate guidance of the Divine Spirit. The Divine
Spirit communicates Himself to the soul by means of the sacraments of
the Church. The Divine Spirit acts as the interpreter and criterion
of revealed truth by the authority of the Church. The Divine Spirit
acts as the principle of regeneration and sanctification in each
Christian soul.
"Such an exposition of Christianity, the union of the internal with
the external notes of credibility, is calculated to produce a more
enlightened and intense conviction of its divine truth in the
faithful, to stimulate them to a more energetic personal action; and,
what is more, it would open the door to many straying but not
altogether lost children, for their return to the fold of the Church.
The increased action of the Holy Spirit, with a more vigorous
co-operation on the part of the faithful, which is in process of
realization, will elevate the human personality to an intensity of
force and grandeur productive of a new era in the Church and to
society; an era difficult for the imagination to grasp, and still
more difficult to describe in words, unless we have recourse to the
prophetic language of the inspired Scriptures."
It is thus made plain that Father Hecker does not deny the harmony
between the devotional spirit and practices prevalent in different
ages of the Church; but he calls attention to the fact that the
dominant note of one age is not always the same as that in another.
And in using the words criterion and test, descriptive of the Church,
he would convey their full meaning: not merely a plumb-line for the
rising wall but divine accuracy itself made external. His outer
criterion is to the inner life what articulate speech is to the human
voice.
"The Exposition is nothing else," he writes home, "than a general
outline of a movement from without to within; as in the sixteenth
century the movement was one from within to without. This was
occasioned by the nature of the attack of Protestantism. The Church
having with increased [external] agencies protected what was
assaulted, can return to her normal course with increased action. I
give an indication of the nature of this movement:
"An increased action of the Holy Spirit in the soul in consequence of
this greater attention directed to the interior life, and a more
perfect explanation of the same. An exposition of the relation of the
external to the internal in the Church. The action of the Holy Spirit
in the soul and His gifts are the remedies for the evils of our
times. The development of the intelligible side of the mysteries of
faith, and the intrinsic reasons of the truths of divine revelation.
Such a movement will open the door for the return of the Saxon races.
The Latin-Celts in relation to the development of the hierarchy,
discipline, worship, and æsthetics of the Church are considered.
Causes of Protestantism--antagonism and jealousy of races; present
persecutions. The Saxon idea of the Catholic Church. Reason for
it--they see only the outward and human side of the Church. Return of
the Saxons in consequence of the new phase of development--the
display of the inward and the divine to their intelligence. The
transition of races; in the future the Saxon will supernaturalize the
natural, the Latin-Celts will naturalize the supernatural. The plan
and suggestions given are the way to escape the extermination of
Christianity by the Saxons, and the denial of Christianity by the
apostasy of the Latins. The union of these races in the Church, with
their civilization and force, is the means of spreading Christianity
rapidly over the whole world.
"In the Exposition I follow simply the footsteps of the Church as
indicated in her history, in the Encyclicals of Pius IX., and the
Vatican Council. The Church is God acting directly on the human race,
guiding it to its true destiny, the road of all true progress."
The Exposition, as already said, had been talked to all comers by
Father Hecker, and in various parts of Europe, but was put into shape
in the autumn of 1874, while he was in the north of Italy. He took it
to Rome and offered it to the Propaganda Press. No fault was found
with it; many high dignitaries, some of them members of the
Congregation of the Sacred Palace, which has charge of the
censorship, heartily approved of it and would have it published at
once; but at the last moment this was decided by the authorities to
be inexpedient. It was then sent to London, and Pickering brought it
out anonymously, and it was at once put into French by Mrs. Craven.
It was published as a leader in _The Catholic World_ about the same
time, and in 1887 formed the first chapter of _The Church and the
Age,_ a compilation of Father Hecker's more important later essays.
The Exposition contributes to the solution of the race problem as it
affects religion. A glance at Europe shows the radical difference
which is symbolized by the terms Transalpine and Cisalpine, Latin and
Teutonic. The one group of races most readily clings to the interior
virtues of religion, the other to external institutions. The problem
is how to reconcile them, how to bring both into unity. Father Hecker
believed that the Latin race had crowned its work in the Vatican
Council and done it gloriously, and that the time had arrived to
invite the Teutonic race to develop its force in the interior life of
the Church. There are passages in the following letter which indicate
the weight of this racial problem to him, as well as the supernatural
earnestness which he brought to the study of it. It serves to explain
a remark he once made: "I wrote the Exposition while I was having
very many lights about the Holy Ghost--I couldn't help but write it."
"PARIS, June 11, 1874.
"DEAR GEORGE AND JOSEPHINE: There is not much for me to add to my
letter of the third of this month. My preparations are made to go to
Mayence during the Catholic Assembly, which commences on the
fifteenth and lasts three days. There I shall meet several persons
whom I am interested in and wish to see. Besides, ecclesiastical
affairs in the German Empire are in a very critical state, and this
must add to the interest of the Assembly. Meeting, as I frequently
do, the leading minds of Europe, enables me to compare views,
appreciate difficulties, and hear objections.
"It is just as difficult to get the Celtic [and Latin] mind to
conceive and appreciate the internal notes of the Church, and the
character of her divine interior life, as it is to get the Teutonic
mind to conceive and appreciate the divine external constitution of
the Church, the importance, and essential importance, of her
authority, discipline, and liturgy. But the weakness of the former,
and the persecutions now permitted by Divine Providence to be visited
on the latter, are teaching them both the lessons they need to learn.
To complete the development of the truth, of the Church, each needs
the other; and Divine Providence is shaping things so that in spite
of all obstacles, natural and induced, a synthesis of them both is
forming in the bosom of the Church. The work is slow but certain,
concealed from ordinary observation because divine; but exceedingly
beautiful. Underneath all the persecutions, the oppression, the false
action, the whole outwardly critical condition of the Church and
society, there is an overpowering, counteracting, divine current,
leading to an all-embracing, most complete, and triumphant unity in
the Church. To see how all things--wicked men as well as the good,
for God reigns over _all_--contribute to this end and are made to
serve it, gives peace to the mind, repose to the soul, and excites
admiration and adoration of the Divine action in the world.
"To have a conception of this all-embracing and direct action of God
in the affairs of this world, and by the light of faith to see that
the Church is the dwelling place of His holiness, majesty, mercy, and
power, and is the medium of this action, at first stupefies,
overwhelms, and, as it were, reduces the soul to nothing. By degrees
and imperceptibly it is raised from its nothingness; timidly the soul
opens its eyes and ventures to cast a glance, and then to contemplate
the Divinity which everywhere surrounds it, as air and light do our
bodies. The contemplation of the Divine action becomes its only
occupation and it is an irresistible one. All the life, mind, and
strength of the soul is involuntarily absorbed in this direction,
leaving the body scarcely sufficient strength to continue its
ordinary functions.
"How far will the body regain its former strength? What will be the
relation of the soul with its former occupations? Will this
additional light require other conditions? Was this light given for
another and wider field of labor? These and many other questions must
arise in the soul, which in due season will be answered. Its present
duty is to practise conformity to God's will, patience, detachment,
discretion, and confidence."
There is hardly any part of this Life which does not assist one in
understanding the Exposition, especially the chapters on the idea of
a religious community and that giving his spiritual doctrine. Many
leading spirits hailed it with joy, among them Margotti, the editor
of the _Unita Cattolica_ of Turin, and Cardinal Deschamps. The former
made Father Hecker's acquaintance during a visit to Turin, and became
a warm admirer of him and his views. He compelled him to leave the
hotel and lodge at his house during his stay in that city. When the
Exposition came out he gave it two long and highly commendatory
notices in his journal, at the time the most influential Catholic one
in Italy, and published three chapters entire.
We have a copy of the Exposition annotated, at Father Hecker's
request, by the late distinguished Jesuit, Father H. Ramière. These
comments are valuable and suggestive. While modifying Father Hecker's
judgment as to the causes of the deterioration of Catholic manliness,
Father Ramière recognizes the fact. The remedies receive his emphatic
approval, as also the author's explanation of the synthesis of the
inner and outer action of the Holy Ghost in the Church.
When _The Church and the Age_ appeared the English Jesuit magazine,
_The Month,_ in its issue of July, 1888, gave the book a very full
and favorable review, endorsing all the principles of the Exposition.
After saying that the Vatican decrees mark a special epoch in the
evolution of Christianity, and close a period of attack--one of the
sharpest which the Church has ever sustained--upon her external
authority, the reviewer continues:
"It completed the Church's defence, and left her free to continue
unimpeded her normal course of internal development. . . . The author
displays remarkable breadth of thought, and the book contains many
passages which are not only eloquent as a defence of Catholicity, but
which cannot fail to impart instruction to the reflecting reader. We
think it deserving of a wide circulation among both clergy and laity,
and it is with a desire to further such a result that we propose to
explain at some length the views which we have already touched upon.
. . . We want a Catholic individualism, which necessarily requires a
clear and recognized authority as a safeguard against the errors to
which individualism exposes itself, but which, on the other hand, can
never be begotten by the mere principle of authority as such."
The _Literarischer Handweiser,_ a German Catholic critical review,
published in Münster, having a high character and wide circulation,
gave an equally favorable estimate of Father Hecker's views in a
notice of _The Church and the Age._
The following extracts from letters will close our consideration of
the Exposition, which we have thought worthy of so careful and full a
study because it is the remedial application of Father Hecker's
spiritual doctrines to the evils of European Catholicity:
"It is consoling to see men of different opinions and of opposite
parties in the Church regarding my pamphlet as the programme of a
common ground on which they can meet and agree.
"I have had several interviews with Cardinal Deschamps. He invited me
to spend the evenings with him, as we are old and very close friends.
On all points, main points, our views are one. And it is singular how
the same precise ideas and views have presented themselves at the
same time to the minds of us both. In matters which regard my
personal direction, I have consulted him several times, and fully. He
has always taken a special interest in my welfare in every sense. His
counsel has given me great relief, increased tranquillity, and will
be of great service. He remains here eight or ten days longer, and I
will see him as often during that period as I can."
A distinguished Swiss orator and prelate, since made cardinal, told
Father Hecker of a devout priest who gave a large number of retreats
to the clergy: "'When I saw him last,' said Monsignor to me, 'he said
that since we had met he had given retreats to seven hundred or eight
hundred priests, and that he had read to them the Exposition of the
Church which I gave him at my last interview with him.'"
"It will take time to understand the ideas in the Exposition. It will
take still longer time to see their bearing, application, and
results. Few at first will seize their import; by degrees they will
take in a wider circle. The difficulties of the times, the anguish of
many souls in the midst of the present persecutions, etc., will draw
attention to any project or plan or system that offers a better
future."
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