BISHOP LISTON CASE.

Press, Volume LVIII, Issue 17430, 15 April 1922, Page 11

BISHOP LISTON CASE.

AN ADJOURNMENT. inUBS JJSOCIATION TKLXCIUX.) AUCKLAND. April 13. At the Police -Court to-day, before Mr J. W. Poyaton, S.M., James M. Listen, Roman Catholic Coadjutor Bishop of Auckland, was called to answer a charge that ho made seditious utterances in tho speech at tho Town Hall on March 17th. Defendant did not appear, but was represented by Mr Conlan. Mr Meredith appeared for the Crown. The latter read quotations from the speech as published in the Press. The charge, made on the information of Reginald Ward, detective-sergeant at Auckland, is*. That in tho presence of a large audience of people at a grand Irish iconoert held at the Town Hall, Auckland, on_ March 17th, he did utter certain seditious words, to wit: '"Friends of Ireland, it is very fitting I should be speaking to you this night, as my desoent and the rank I hold in the Church give me the right to speak. My parents were driven from the country in which they were bom and in which they would have been content to live. Why were thoy driven out? _ Because their foreign masters (meaning tho Government of the United Kingdom) did not want Irish men and women peopling their own land, but wanted to use it as a cattle ranch for the snobs of the Empire. So my father and my little Irish mother and thou&inds of others had to go. They came to this coontry with the memory kept sacred of their privations and wrongo. . They have left to us the sacred traditions of their sorrow. I am a native of New Zealand. I love my eoimtrv much. Well, m every land the children of Ireland this day are gathered by the same, common and holy impulse to rejoice that at the long last they have won some measure i of freedom, and to hope for complete deliverance from the house of bondage. A year ago we lived in hope only, ami some good and true men thought that hope very forlorn. Ido not say for one moment Ireland has got all she asked for and all that her sons died for, but she has got the fitst instalment of her freedom, and is determined to have the whole of it. I, say that because the Omnipotent Hand of God made Ireland a nation, and while grass grows and water flows there will be plenty to fight, and even to die, that God's deairea may be realised. On the stage of the world's history Ireland has played many parts. Her sons have given the best of their talents to countries which have received them. Above all, Ireland has been the builder of empires, not for hereelf, but for others,, not for filthy lucre, but for God's cause, honour, and freedom. Many are thinking that the difficulties in the face of the Irish Free State are almost insuperable. I think that well-wishers, ihonld not b® dismayed. Ireland has gone through the worst of her trials. She haa repeatedly been declared dead and done for, Mid completely defective, but she is stilll there. There are also difficulties ahead, but why should we fear them? TJiere is a mighty Empire and it still claims to l>e the greatest onev It also bus its difficulties. It they hope to do this, why should not the rulers of our little Empire be able to meet these difficulties? It seems to mo providential that, when Ireland was faced with difficulties, the man who has carried us so far and enabled us to win, is there to see that the rulers are not doped by England. We mast :iot forget the martyrs who died in the fighting of 1916, that glorious Easter (referring to the Insurrection iii Dublin of April 24th, 191(3, find succeeding days). I have here a list of men and wornen who were proud to die for their country. Some were shox, some were hanged, some diad on a hunger strike, murdered by foreign troops, (meaning thereby fioldWiß of the British Empire). We cannot forget these men and women, bat, in order that our dream about Ireland liiay come true, while we cannot foruefc, we can forgive. My thought .should say to Irelimd as eho enters a period or rehewed prosperity and glory: 'God prosper you in all, ways, protect you, .and : His Everlasting Arras enfold yon'" (or worde to like effect, being an indictable offence). - ; By consent, of counsel the case; was adjourned until 20th inst.. when, it is stated, a data will be definitely fixed for the hearing of the charge.