CATHOLIC INTELLIGENCE.

New Zealand Tablet, Volume I, Issue 34, 20 December 1873, Page 11

CATHOLIC INTELLIGENCE.

The ' Echo,' after noticing what it consiJers the " sinonlar fact that in the United States* where the Roman Catholic Church hus dimply hiH a lair field, and no fa7or, that stupendous religious organization has dovelop<«d itself with uuusuul rapidity, and success," so tiut it coun Is about 5,000 priests, and C2l religious houses, and already claims one fourth of the whole population; the 'Echo' coutiuuw thus .— It must further be remembered that American Catholics" though many of them wereformeily Unitarians, Episcopalians, or New England Puritans- "are thorough UUramontanes, « GaUieonism' being emiiH'ly unknown among them." This is so true, that when *he ex-monk j^on went to America, exporting to bo embraced by a oro-wd of libeiMl Catholics, he was received everywhere with such contemptuous aversion, that in a few days he Ued to more congenial regions. °

On Sunday the 27th July, Kt. Rev. M. Domenec administered the Siifiument of Confirmation in St. Thomas's Church, Bedford He confirmed IS persons, six cf whora were converts. On that occasion the I)it.!'<?p pieaohed at Mnaa and lectured in the evening . Biaaeford, Me.— Tho French Catholics are' erecting a new church vi this s oodiy city. AJtliough they already have a good sized brick

church which, they bought from, the Methodists, they have already commenced on the foundation of a new one which will rival the Port'••id Cathedral, if not in splendor at least in size.' The French, in Bidrleford are very enthusiastic in matters pertaining to their religion, and already outnumber the Irish in population. Father Sommerheisen, a venerable Catholic missionary, has followed the Yellowstone expedition, going alone where 1,500 soldierswere sent to protect the expedition, and meeting with no difficulty. He says that faith in tho Cross took him through.—' Boston Herald.' The • Louisville Catholic Advocate' complains of the apathy of the Catholics of Louisville in permitting the injustice which is being done them in respect to taxation for school purposes. Eight congregations of the thirteen iuto which the Catholics of Cleveland, Ohio, are divided, are building churches and other parochial edifices, the aggregate cost of which will be about ft ye hundred and sixty thousand dollars. It is stated that the Archbishop of Baltimore, within one week, recently confirmed one thousand four hundred and twenty persons in churches at Washington, several hundred 6f whom were converts. •ii !^ ble Workera — A few weekß ago the Sisters of Charity at Mayaville, Ky., made an offer to that city to take care, without payment, of all the cases of cholera that might occur. A similar offer wa» made in Boston lately, when the small-pox was prevalent in nnd around the city ; and although for some reason the unselfish offer was not accepted, Siveral Protestant papers spoke their admiration and gratitude. Rev. Edward O'Forney, a minister of the German Reformed Church, was recently received into the fold of the one true faith by the Venerable Augustine Bailey, SJ., pastor of the Church of the Blessed sacrament, at Church ville, Peun. The Holy Philip Masaarenghi, Bishop of Bitont, Naples, ia proposed for beatification. This holy man died in 1648, and wa« r throughout his life, renowned for his virtue, learning, and inexhaustible charity. Several miracles are recorded as having been worked at Ins tomb.

In -France notlving can be more remarkable than the spontaneity of the pilgrimage movement. It is pushed on by no one, and least of oil hy the ecclesiastical authorities j but the pious laity seem to hawe taken an initiative in the matter, which fully refutes the charge of its being a manoeuvre of the clergy. On the contrary, they have been carried away by the current in many Dioceses, and have shown extreme oaution in the beginning. There was pi Wished in Rome, in anticipation of the festival of fct. Peter s Chains (Aug. 1), a brief of his Holiness addressed- to all Catholics, in which the Pope enjoins, uuder the calamitous circumstances of the Church at this time, increased devotion to the saints, and especially to the nrost Blessed l 'eter, Prince of the Apostles. The Archbishop of Paris has been granted the right to purchase a site on the blood-grained heights of Montinartre, where he intends to erect a church to the Sacred Heart. Accession to the Catholic Union.— lt will be learned with much pleasure thy. the Earl of Denbigh is amongst those \vho3e names aue to be submitted to the Council of the Catholic Union for election as members, his lordship's Irish Peerage. Earl of Desmond and Viscount Oallan, giving him the required claim to be a member of tho Council. Una announcement will, we- are sure, be received with sincere gratification by every member of the Catholic Union in Ireland, who will h.Mrtily welcome one whose zeal and energy in the cause of religion hsive more than once won the marked approbation of the Sovereign Por.tiff.— • Freeman.' °

St. ector's Church in Rome required for its erection .one hundred and seventy-six yews, and to complete the structure, an additional hundred and twenty-four years. Irs .cost was fifty million dollars in gold, and to keep it in repair requires an annual expenditure of twenty thousand dollars. Of its vast dimensions, perhaps the best idea is. (O.iveyed by the statement that it covers eii?lit acres of ground. Archbishop Manning and tho whole Catholic Hierarchy of England have sent a memorial to their brethren of the clrrgy and laity of Switzerland, congratulating them on their noble constancy in their persecutions. The Bishop of Switzerland replied in words of fjrstitode and fraternal feeling. Rev. Thomas Mctfamara, Rector of the Irish College,. Parts, Ikm appealed to Ireland to aid this institution, which has lost so much by the late war. He says :— " It is one of those establishments, nnd th& principal one now remaining, founded on the Oonjtioent by thu pious generosity of our Catholic ancestors, in those dismal times, when Catholic, and more especially ecclesiastical education was a crime in Ireland, under tho persecuting laws to which the Catholic reli 'ion was so long and so cruelly subjected in this country. During tho whole ofi that afflicted period the Irish College in Paris not only bore signal testimony abroad to the unconquerable tenacity with which Ireland clung to the religion of St. Patrick, but generation after generatioa it continued to stfiid home its heroia missionaries •to fight the good fight,' and • contend earnestly for the faith once delivered to tk© saints.' "

Archbishop Manning, iv coime- of a sermon in Soho on July 6, denouncid as impious and tyrannical the proposal to exclude religious teaching from the school course in Boman Catholic seminaries. ° Religious instruction, he said, was absoluiely necessary for Catholic children if they were to remain faithful to the Church ; and he therefore counselled strenuous opposition to the scheme wherever it was pre* p.uided. A correspondent from Europe gires the following excellent definition of those that call themselves "Old Catholics" — "Messieurs of 'Left Centre in the Kingdom of ,Gbd !" .Another conversion is announced in England : the eldest daughter —Lady Mary— of Lady Herbert of Lea, <md sister of the Earl of Pembroke, has just been received into the Catholic Church by llu Her G-ernld M' Mullen, at St. Mary's, Cbelssa. It is stulel that another sister will till c a similar step. The Catholic Committee of Rome pvoposes that all the young monks belonging to the suppressed monasteries should go to Bolivia to await the resloratioa of their cstabliahmz-nts.

The « Riforma,' of Rome, says that M. de Courcelles, the French Vatican ambassador, had a long conversation with the Pope, when the latter said, " Let MacMahon know that I pray for the success of his task." Nuns as Nurses in Ireland. — A return has just leen presented to Parliament showing the workhouses in Ireland in which nuns are engaged as nurses. There are eight workhouses— Ba'linasloe, Cork, O-alway, Killarney, Kilmacthcmas, Limerick, Tullamore, and Wexlord—in which women of religious orders are employed as nurses. In all cases they are resident in the institution, and are paid salaries. The nuns belong almost exclusively to the Order of Mercy. Eight sisters are employed at Cork at stipends amounting to £240 a year, and in other cases the stipends range from £10 to £10 a year each. Besides the pDorhouses already enumerated, four nuns have been appointed and s motioned as nurses for the woikhouse of the Kilkenny Uniou, but have not as yet taken charge, owing to the necessary accommodation not having been provided for them.—' Cork Telegraph.' The ex-Empress Eugenic said lately : " It is clear that the foes of order and religion have gone as far as the good God will permit, them to go, at least in our day ; and that we are about to witness a general return of the peoples to faith and sobriety. France is still the inpirator and tho guide of the world, and France is to-day more fervent m her love for God and for his vicar than she has been forages. What is going on in France today? Everywhere the churches are filled as never before ; everywhere immense pilgrim iges to the holy ehrmes ; everywhere addresses of sympathy and encouragement to the Holy Father— whom may God preserve to 'see the ruin of all his foes; everywhere the enemies of religion and society are dispirited and cast down, or if they still retain hope they prepare for new excesses which will only hasten their final discomfiture. Do you know with w hat fear this awakening of Catholic Franco inspires the Pied montese Government at Rome, the anti-Christian and pagan court, at Berlin, and the wild communards at Madrid ? They tremble as did Balthasar when he read the writing on the wall." The Earl of Denbigh said lately, at a meeting in London, " It was a great mistake to have education carried on without religion— in tact there was no education without religion, it wa« perfect nonsense to think so. Education really meant the development of all the powers of man — the development of his mind, body, heart and soul — for one great object, and that object was the only one for widen they were trouglit into the world, viz., to love God. How was it possible that a child could perform that great duty ? How could ha serve God it he wa9 not taught who God was? If they attempt to instruct a mm s intelligence and his mind, and at the same time omitted to inform and instruct his conscience, they produced a most dangerous member cf society —they produced those men who turned France upside down, and had created such disturbance in Spain and Italy, and would do the same in .England if they could." The Earl is a Catholic. Over twenty-five thousand persons went from Tourcoing to Notre Dame de 1& Marhere in procession, reciting the rosary and pravino for Pius IX, the Church, and France. °