TUESDAY, OCTOBER 2, 1900. ARCHBISHOP REDWOOD'S SENSATION.

Auckland Star, Volume XXXI, Issue 234, 2 October 1900, Page 4

TUESDAY, OCTOBER 2, 1900. ARCHBISHOP REDWOOD'S SENSATION.

The Eoman Catholic Archbishop of New Zealand has created a stir in religious circles in the sister colony of New South Wales that almost establishes a record. It was but reasonable to expect that the sermon preached on so great an occasion as the dedication of the Cathedral presided over by the highest dignitary of the Eoman Church in Australasia should be of an exceptional character; but that it should prove such a deliverance as the report published in the Sydney press showed it to be has proved a shock to the whole Protestant community from which it will take sometime to recover. It is but fitting .that so high an ecclesiastical dignitary should extol the faith of the Church to which he belonged on such an occasion, and that he should gratefully mention her roll of saints and martyrs and workers; but that it should be made the opportunity for publishing to the world a deliberate attack upon those who profess the Christian faith after another order is conduct that needs no comment. It may safely be left to the good taste of the average reader ,to form an opinion upon the following sentences which appeared in the published report of the Archbishop's sermon:—"The leaders and founders of Protestantism, Luther, Calvin, Zwingli, were notorious for their vices. Protestantism cohered Europe with blood and ruins in the sixteenth century, and has ever since been the helper and instrument of the worst foes of Christianity. It desecrated the home, it polluted the nuptial bed, it lowered the dignity of womanhood, it devastated the school, and it stopped the progress of science." It may easily be imagined what the feelings of the other portions of the Christian Church were on learning that the Governor of the Colony, Earl Beauchamp, with Governors of other colonies, and many of the leading civic.and State officials were present officially at the deliverance of Archbishop Eedwood's sermon, they being Protestant, and servants of a Protestant Queen, and that from them there was no protest forthcoming. The floods 'of indignant protest, however, were soon let loose by a dignified protest from the secretaries of the Evangelical Council. After noting the -presence of the Protestant representatives of the Queen at the delivery of the sermon in question, the protest continues:—"The Council notes that, so far as k reported, these words were listened to without protest by Her Majesty's representatives. It regards these statements as a direct calumny on Her Majesty, as the most illustrious member of the Anglican Church, to which the preacher specially referred, and on all her subjects of Protestant faith; and in listening to them without protest, His Excellency and the other public officials present were made to appear to be parties to an attack upon the faith hold by our sovereign and an overwhelmning majority of her Englishspeaking subjects. This Council also regards the statements made with reference to the pollution of the nuptial bed and the desecration of the home as "an implication of personal immorality on the part of members of the Protestant communions, .• . .The. Council would also point out that by Her Majesty's oath her attendance at the Mass is precluded; and it is thero-

iore a matter oi surprise that .Her Majesty's representative in .New South Wales should have done that which Her Majesty herself is by oath disallowed from doing."

As might be expected, such a protest advanced tiie interest evoked another stage-. A press representative waited upon Archbishop iiedwood to ascertain his opinion upon the exception taken to his utterances by prominent members of the community, and leaine.d v.-itli .surprise that tiie Archbishop had not given utterance to the statements to "which exception -had been taken. He further volunteered the information that the sermon in question had beeii prepared for a wholly Catholic congregation; that it had been set np in print for him by the "Freeman's Journal/" and that on account of time it would take to deliver the whole sermon, and certain delicate considerations, he had made several "cuts" in the discourse, so that the statements objected to by the Evangelical Council had not been used by him at all in the delivery. This was further supported by Mr G. H. Reid, Leader of the Opposition, who stated that he sat during the service where he could hear every word, and was positive that "the gross attacks on Protestants alluded to formed no part of the sermon." "And/ he added, "I should have felt it to be my duty to protest against being invited to a religious ceremony disfigured by utterances so grossly offensive to the Protestant community, but the sermon that I heard offered no sort of provocation." This, and similar letters to the press, cleared the Protestant leaders from any complicity, but at the same time brought the editor of the "Sydney Morning Herald" to his feet. He stated: "The representatives of the newspapers were on Sunday morning last allotted seats in the Cathedral, from which it was not possible to hear the preacher's utterances connectedly. It was intimated to them, however, on arrival, that Archbishop Redwood had reserved for them printed copies of his sermon, which would be made available forpublication at the close of the service, and, in pursuance of that intimation, Archbishop Eedwood personally gave the printed proofs of his sermon to the representative of the "Sydney Morning Herald." These proofs contained the words in question. Dr. Redwood accompanied his tenderof the sermon by k - request that, if possible, the sermon should be published in full; The words reported 'in the "Sydney Morning Herald" are also reported in the "Catholic Press"' and "Freeman's Journal." Thus is Archbishop Eedwood placed on the horns of a dilemma. He claims refuge ■on the ground that he did not utter the offensive words in his sermon at the dedication of St. Mary's; yet he himself gave to the reporters the sermon in print containing the objectionable words, with the reqxiest that the sermon should be printed in full. Did he desire his audience to have one kind of sermon, and then desire to give- the world, through the medium of the Press, to ■understand that, the sermon contained elements that were insulting to many of his invited hearers? Another assumption is that the printed sermon Was a truly Eoman Catholic sermon, intended for a wholly Catholic audience, and that the delivered sermon was Roman Catholicism in dilution, intended for a mixed audience. Either the words objected to were true, or they were not true. If true, it woiild have been worthy of the courage of an Archbishop to have uttered them before all hearers; if not true, they ought never to have been printed. ' The time has come when all public speakers should recognise that the Press has indefinitely extended its sphere of influence; additional care, then, should be taken that only words of truth and soberness should be spoken. After the recent Stoke School disclosures, the Archbishop was indeed lacking in judgment to make such sweeping 'charges in condemnation of Protestantism; while criminal statistics and the present condition of those countries where Roman Catholicism predominates -show such charges to be absolutely false.