EXEMPTIAN OF PRIESTS.

Star (Christchurch), Issue 12056, 11 July 1917, Page 5

EXEMPTIAN OF PRIESTS.

RECRUITING RECORD OF ROMAN CATHOLIC CHURCH. STATEMENT BY BISHOP BRODIE. in the course of a special address delivered at the half-yearly meeting of the Clnistehurch Diocesan Council of the New Zealand Catholic Federation at the Hibernian Hall last evening; Bishop Brodie, who presided, said ho felt it his duty to placo before delegates certain information which he had obtained in connection with appearances before the Military Service Boards. Many people seemed to have gained an impression that Catholics were asking for an enormous number of exemptions, and he «i.shed to correct that impression by giving the facte. It was a, face that the Catholics, as a community, had an excellent recruiting record. In the Samoan Expeditionary Foice, consisting of HOO men, no fewer than 500 were Catholics. In March of this year, when appearing before a. Military Service Board in Wellington, Archbishop O'Shea was able to say, in connection with the allotment of a chaplain to every 1000 men of a given denomination, that there were at. that date in the Expeditionary Force 14,000 Catholics. At that time there were hardly more than 70,000 men enrolled, so that it was apparent that the Catholics, composing oneseventh of the population, had provided one-fifth of the recruits up to that date. The record of Catholic Clubs and organisations -was aloo instructive. The Maiist "Brothers' Old Boys' Association of Christc'iurch, out of 280 members had sent 220 to the front under the voluntary system. The kindred organisation in Auckland had sent 170 men out of a membership of 180, and th» Wellington organisation had 200 of its members on active service. Pride of place, however, must ha given to St Patrick's College Old Boys' Club, which had no fewer than 400 members on active service. In tho Battle of Messines nine were killed, eight wounded, and two received tho Military Cross. Turning from organisations they might cite the case of individual families. Within the speaker's personal knowledge Catholic families had sent from three up to seven sons to tho war. One fami ';■■ at To Aroha, Auckland, sent six s<ms in the first two Reinforcements. If they turned to tho casualty lists his hearers would find ample evidence that Catholic lads at the. front did not. shirk danger. A chaplain of one of the hospital ships told the speaker that out of 390 invalided soldiers on one ship recently 79 were Catholics, or over one-fifth of the total. The speaker was not. exalting in war; far from it. but he wanted to show that Catholics luul not been backward in joining with their fellow citizens in the defence of the Empire. (Applause.) Dealing with the matter of applications for exemptions on behalf of Catholic priests, students and teachers, the Bishop said • that owing to their vows of celibacy all priests and religious brothers fell into the First Division. Jn Now Zealand there wore 2-50 priests, and 105 of them were of military age. Owing to the effects of severe illness, operations and so forth, they might set down the number of unfit as 34. Fifteen were chaplains with the forces, and three were chaplains discharged, leaving a modest balance of 53 for whom exemption was claimed For theological students the total number of exemptions asked for was 30. The total number of religious brothers in New Zealand was 49. Of these f; were over military age 7 were unfit, and the balance for whom exemption was asked was 33. The total number of oxen.ptions asked for, therefore, was:— Priests . . , 0.l Students . . .30 Brothers . . .33 Total . . .116 To recapitulate. 150,000 Catholics had provided 14,000 soldiers, and had asked for 11(5 exemptions of men urgently necessjtry for the work of tho Catholic Faith. It was not. an exorbitant no' 1 an extravagant request, ft must be admitted that the Military Service Act was faulty in that it did not make specific provision for certain exemptions, and the absence of such provision had been the cause of much anxiety to the Catholic hierarchy. There were some phases of this matter which were to be first considered confidentially by the hierarchy in conference, and they would bo placed before his hearers in due course. For the present it had been decided to say nothing, pending developments which anight take place in connection with, the Military Service Act.