THE TWO CARDINALS AND PAGAN ENGLAND.

Auckland Star, Volume XXX, Issue 76, 1 April 1899, Page 1 (Supplement)

THE TWO CARDINALS AND PAGAN ENGLAND.

In the Sydney "Morning Herald,' the Anglican Bishop of Bathurst replies in the following terms to Cardinal* Mornn's remarks on the Expansion of Romanism and the Decay of Anglicanism, quoted in the 'Star' the other day:—

Sir,—ln your issue of Monday last a speech of Cardinal Moran's is recorded, which has a splendid heading: 'Cardinal Moran and his Critics.'—'The Decay of Anglicanism,' 'Rapid Expansion of Romanism.'—'A Pagan England.' With such a summary it is only natural to expect some reply, endeavouring to palliate numerous inaccuracies, mistakes, and fabulous statements; something at any rate about the now famous essay on 'Windmills,' paragraphs on inaccuracy in quoting Scripture; something to account for the ever-haunting ghost of HenrY VIII. Not one word do I find on any of these subjects, but only some more 'feats in arithmetic' which the Bishop of Goulbourn is (if he thinks it worth while)' more than competent to dispel and expose, and some marvellous assertions. The speech of Ro'okwood commences with a 'Creole proverb' which your reporter has done well to omit. Then, after a common place stay, the Cardinal plunges into his arithmetical performances, and forthwith goes on to quote from an American paper about 'a reverend gentleman who had quitted one of the various sects in the United States, and Had become a registered member of. the' Protestant Episcopalian Church.' The Cardinal's own quotation convicts him, for something more than to 'become a registered member' is necessary on entrance into the Protestant Episcopalian Church. The Cardinal in his hurry to obtain a set-off against Father Isaac Hecker, founder of the American Order of Paulists, has iriost unwisely inserted this.

Then wo have a long quotation from a sermon of a New York rector, the gist of which the Cardinal entirely loses sight of in order to serve his special purpose, viz., to belittle the Protestant Episcopal church In America, which is entirely independent of but in communion with the Church of England, and hence is a truly catholic body, yet Protestant in its attitude. The Cardinal gives this sermon all the authority of a papal bull, although the American Episcopal Church is no more responsible for it than the Italian mission in England is responsible for the following letter of Father O'Halloran, which is a curious specimen of the perfect peace, unity, and concord that exist in Cardinal Vaughan's communion in England. The Cardinal tried to turn him out, and sent a Benedictine mission to supplant him. He thus wrote to the 'Middlesex County Times': 'The attempt of the monks to usurp my jurisdiction and rob me—as Henry VIII. robbed them—of my maintenance from the Roman Catholics of Ealing is simply pure schism. Their existence in Castle Hill depends on a huge lie—the "Cardinal's .notification"— which is ridiculed and laughed at by all educated Catholics, and only imposes on the credulity of a few simple souls—principally women—who know nothing about Church government, and are ready to believe any fa.ble from the monks and the Cardinal. It' the Cardinal told them that Jonah swallowed the whale they are ready to believe it. They believe the Cardinal to be almost God Almighty, having the power to send all of us who worship at S.S. Joseph and Peter's into hell fire. But we, the genuine Roman Catholics, do not believe in any such superstitious nonsense. We believe Cardinals and Popej t({ b€ exactly like other rulers, tyho w,iit get a jplfy good heating themselves if they do not govern-justly and^in accordance with God's law.'

I venture to think that the utterances of the Protestant Episcopal rector of, St. ifohn. the Evangelist in New York against unprimitive teachings( in the United States are hardly as trenchant as those of the Roman Catholic, rector of St. Josoph and Peter, Eailing, against Roman tyranny in England. Then he (the Cardinal) conies -to the question of 'Pagan England.'

'On. this point I shall content myself with putting the utterances of two Cardinals side by side; and first .we take that of the Irish Cardinal. In order to emphasise what he considers to be the heatenish condition of England, he says: 'He thought there were more Pagans in London in the present day than were to be found in Pekin.' I am informed that

some among the extreme Romans have the insolence to call all who are not of the Roman communion 'Pagans.' Whether this is correct or not I cannot absolutely assert; but if it is so, and the Cardinal uses it in this sense, his assertion is founded upon a fact,' as the members of the Italian mission are small in proportion to the population of London. But we now turn to the utterances of a great English Cardinal (Manning), great notwithstanding the records of Purcell's life.

In a sermon quoted in the English 'Times' Cardinal Manning said: 'What made England? He did not ask what made made it a Christian land, but what made England great? It was not warfare, nor conquest, nor politics, nor legislation. It was that one faith and that one love of God and our neighbour which made a united England.'

I think your readers will not be long in coming to the conclusion that the Irish Cardinal is wrong and' the English Cardinal is right, although they may feel surprised that so much difference of opinion should exist in the Church of Rome, whjch J5 constantly held up as pip Example of peace and unity, in which the priests never dispute the will of their bishops, and in which all are knit together in the one bond of loyal obedience to the Vicar of Christ.—l am, etc.,

CHARLES E. BATHURST.