FRENCH DISESTABLISHMENT

Auckland Star, Volume XXXVII, Issue 195, 16 August 1906, Page 4

FRENCH DISESTABLISHMENT

(I) WHAT THE ASSOCIATIONS ARE.

(2) A ROMAN CATHOLIC'S VIEW.

POPE'S STRONG ENCYCLICAL RENEWS THE CONFLICT. (By Cable.—Press Association.—Copyright.) ROltE, August 15.

The Pope received the Prussian Minister to the Vatican yesterday, and in the course of conversation incidentally expressed his regret that the action of the French Government had rendered it impossible for the Church to avoid a conflict Yvith the civil authorities. PARIS, August 15. The Pope's encyclical to the French bishops on the separation law has been published in Paris.

In it the Pope deplores the coming trials of the Church, and vigorously denounces the Separation Law, which, he says, is uot separation, but oppression and civic discord. He rejects the Public Worship Associations provided for under the Act. and says they are impossible, and advises the forming of canonical associations instead, until the latter are legally and irrevocably made- . These canonical associations are to embody the divine aud immutable rights of the Pontiff and the bishops, as constituting their authority over Church property and edifices.

The Pope urges the bishops and French Catholics to employ all the means the law recognises as within the rights of all citizens to organise for public worship, and to struggle vigorously in defence of their religion, without recourse to ' sedition or violence. He predicts that such action will result in the rescinding of the Separation Law.

"Le Temps" says: "The encyclical will grieve all the friends of religious peace. The Vatican's intolerance will bear its fruits. This is a country of common sense, desiring, above all ehe, calm. We will not admit that the present decision of the Pope is the result of a truly Christian and reasonable inspiration. The places of worship offered by the State are refused by the religious authorities."

The new state of things brought about by the Separation Law can be described clearly and briefly enough. In the first place, the Churches — Roman Catholic, Protestant, and Jewish — are henceforward to be regarded as mere Associations, and dealt with according to the Law of 1901 as Associations. Consequently, the Pope, bishops and priests will be ignored as spiritual leaders, and recognised only as belonging to, or presiding over, Associations of a certain character- These Associations are to consist—according to the population of the parish they represent—of seven, fifteen or twenty-five members. With these alone will the civil authorities have any intercourse. If these Associations are legally established within six months of the promulgation of the law, they will be entitled (a) to the possession of the churches and synagogues for an unlimited period, (b) to the use of the semin-. Aries and presbyteries for five years, (c) to pensions of between £21 and £25 to be paid to priests, ministers and rabbis upwards of fifty-five years of age, (d) to civil personality—i.e., the power to own property, which, however, is qualified by rather stringent regulations, for the Associations will be bound to submit their accounts to the State inspectors, to invest all their property in stocks, and the said property must In no case be such as to bring in more than the income necessary for a year's expenditure plus a small reserve. Latest information shows that the Pope made a distinction between Public Worship Associations (as required in the Separation Act) and Canonical Associations under the approval of the priests and bishops.

A Roman Catholic correspondent, writing to "The Times" before Disestablishment, put the question temperately from the standpoint of a liberal churchman, and his views are interesting in face of their partial justification by the new encyclical. He says: "Opinion is much divided in all parties in France as to the desirability of ending the Concordat. While Radicals and Socialists clamour for the separation of the Church and State, there are large numbers of Republicans, including many supporters of the present Government and some members of the Government itself, Who fear that such a step would increase the power of the clericalists and still more of the Vatican, and lead to the organisations of the Catholic Church in France as a clericalist political party taking its orders from Rome and bitterly hostile to the French Republic. They have not much fear that the Republic would succumb; the possibility of a clericalist reaction in France is \-ery remote, and the bold of the existing regime on the nation seems to be growing stronger every day; but there are many staunch anti-clericalists who cannot contemplate with satisfaction a prolonged and bitter religious warfare which must be detrimental to the progress and welfare of the nation whatever its ultimate reSult. might be: they are, moreover, aware that the uncontrolled domination of Rome and of the fanatical clericalist party o\ r er the French Church would probably complete the destruction of French religion." VIEW OF "THE TIMES. (Received 5.52 aan.) LONDON, August 15. "The Times," in commenting on the Pope's Encyclical, states that the burden on French Roman Catholics which the Pope imposes, is. as he foresees, heavy, for they may have to provide from their own resources for the maintenance of worship, and then at the same time bo deprived ;of their forefathers' churches.