POT-POURRI.

Otago Daily Times, Issue 17320, 21 May 1918, Page 6

POT-POURRI.

TO THX EDITOB. Sib, —There is a. distinct improvement m the Irisli stew" up by your cook on last Saturday morning. The ingredients used consisted of a little of Lever, a little of the Stage Irishman, a mixture of Homo Rule, Sinn Fein, and Anti-conscrip-tion, the usual cheap-Jack pretence, that the attacks made are against the politics of Catholics or the Catholic Church, not against the religion—all harmless ingredients which may be partaken of without danger of ptomaine poisoning, and which may bo allowed to pass as, at best, poor stuff. Your correspondent, Mr F. Wilkinson, has discovered a formula which ho thinks is a clincher, and so ho hastens to givo it to the public. He puts it in this way: " Ireland is demanding Home Rule. An important minority in Ireland do not want Home Rule. They tell the majority, you can have Home Rule, but leave us out of it. We are content as wo are." This, ho says, is, according to me, "rank blasphemy. ' Let us see 1 otv the form-ula will act when applied to another question nearer home. Put "New Zealand" for "Ireland." and "secular education" for "Homo Rule," and find who will be the rank blasphemer, Father Coffey or Mr Wilkinson. It runs thus: "New Zealand wants secular education. A large and important minority m New Zealand say wo do not want secular education. Wo do not want to pay for it. They say to the majority, 'You can have it if you like, but leave us out of it. Wo are content as we are.' " This, according to Mr_ Wilkinson, is rank blasphemy. Thcro is such a thing as a two-edged sword. Home Rulo for Ireland, which would leavo out .an important minority of the people, is a contradiction, and therefore an impossibility. Your contributor, Mr J. Wilson, is not a very busy man, or—shall I say—he has more time for other people's business than ho has for his own, as witness the sample ot patchwork he prod need in Saturday's of the Daily Times. I am pleased ivita his letter in so far as it allows mo thank for the hundivxith time the generous people of every denomination in Otago for the sympathy and assistance they have given to any work of charity and religion undertaken by the Catholic body. No words of mine can give adequate expression to my gratitude to thorn; I would bo very sorry to use one word in the pulpit or in the press to hnrt the genuine feelings of any religious body or person, and I hope I have never dene so willingly. I deeply respect the religions opinions of every man, as long as lie Keeps to them and minds his own business, and leavo3 others to mind theirs. In every community persons are to be found, too many, alas, who are morbidly curious. Spread 'a Teport that a dead whale has been stranded on the beach, close to one of our large cities, and at once you create a harvest for the tram comoanies. The more the carcase smells the larger the crowds who desire to regulc their olfactory nerves "with the rotten odours. On the sarno principle of human philosophy, start a heresy hunt! and all the- harriers join in tho chase until the howl thev sot up torments and sickens decent peop.e. It has been known before now_ that the harriers, finding they were deceived, turned and rent to pieces the deceiver. rhe same will happen again. One correspondent asks why I do not invite all denominations to ioin in devotions in St. Joseph's. St- Joseph's is open from 6 o clock to 9 p.m. every day for tho seven days of the week, and if mv friend comes and prays there lie is welcome.. and he will find many poor mothero and sisters—yea, and fathers and brothers— on their knees offering tip a silent prayer to God for their desr ones who are fighting for tho protection and freedom of'my anonymous friend and others who sit round the home firesides and toll stories of the iniquities of their Catholic neighbours and of the persecutions of tho Catholic Church —all Hobgoblin yarns.—l am, etc., James Coffet. St. Joseph's Cathedral, May 20.