The New Zealand Tablet Fiat Justitia. FRIDAY, JULY 1, 1881. THE ALL-IMPORTANT QUESTION.

New Zealand Tablet, Volume IX, Issue 429, 1 July 1881, Page 13

The New Zealand Tablet Fiat Justitia. FRIDAY, JULY 1, 18 81. THE ALL-IM PORTANT QUESTION.

fT a reception held last May in the Vatican of a deputation from the Federation ot the Catholic Societies of Rome, the Holy father once more was careful to impress upon his hearers the necessity of securing Catholic education for the young ; he recommended to them the " most assiduous cares " and the " most generous efforts " to bring about such an end. The Pope looking out over all the world, and deeply grieved by the state of things that there meets his eyes, knows that the only safety for his children lies in the preservation of their faith, and this, he also knows, there is no more subtle or effective method for destroying than that cunningly undertaken by the secret societies in the secular system. He knows how powerfully the foe is working by these means to overthrow the Catholic religion, and how every obstacle is thrown in the way of Catholic parents giving to

their children a Catholic education. " Assiduous cares " and " generous efforts " he knows to be necessary on our part, if we would indeed preserve the faith of our children, for there is a great conspiracy against us in opposition to whose designs it behoves us to strati e. Nor is there any sign as yet apparent that the struggle is about to become lighter to us here in New Zealand. Our Government give no hope that they mean to lighten our burden in this matter, and from both the parties who are united in opposing us, much as they differ from each other, petitions have gone up to Parliament against us ; each desires to secure that which seems to it calculated to advance its own cause, and, though botli make a wordy pretency of desiring justice, true justice is far from their intentions — the one would force upon us its false Christianity, the other would continue to impose upon us its godlessness — with all th« consequences of that dark and hopeless state. Those, on the other hand, who regard our case with consideration are few. Still some there are who do so, and it would ill become us to pass them by, when they come under our notice, without due recognition. We desire, then, to acknowledge the last utterance of this rare and welcome kind that we have met with and which we find in the letter of the Anglican Bishop of Waiapu to one of our Napier contemporaries ; the extract with which we are particularly engaged runs as follows :—: — If the Roman Catholic section of the community — strong in the exceptional teaching staff at their command, and conscientiously opposed, as I understand, to the association of their children in common schools with other Christians— is able to maintain in approved efficiency, sectarian (i.e., denominational) schools, I should consider such schools to have a fair claim to a grant in aid on the principle of payment by results, that is, a capitation grant for every child passing in the secular standards. I should not be afraid of abuses springing up in a system of grants in aid to schools under State inspection. And, if abuses can be guarded against, then surely we are strong enough to be just. Nothing can be fairer than this, and it does the Bishop I honor. His Lordship, nevertheless, hardly states the case with strict correctness when he says that Catholics conscientiously object " to the association of their children in common schools with other Christians." If a Catholic education couldso be given to Catholic children we should have no such objection and our sole objection is to the absence of such an education in the Government schools as at present constituted. At the same time we do not believe that the association of Catholic children with those of other denominations in State schools is one calculated to promote anything that is desirable. It is sr id that such a mixture tends to prevent prejudice and the growth of ill-will that must result from education in separate schools. But on the contrary, we hold that much more prominently would the religious differences that exist be brought out amongst children who, attending the same schools, should be separated at certain times, that religious instruction might be given to one section of them, and much more probably would bad blood result from the arguments and disputes sure to follow on such a course. — To prevent this in Catholic schools attended by. Protestant children special precautions are taken and rigorously enforced. In the existing secular schools while such books for instance as Collier's History are used there, again, a like evil condition of things is certain to obtain and even though Catholic children may possibly be here and there excused from the anti-Catholic studies, the vile calumnies that they contain are sure to be cast in their teeth by Protestant or Freethinking companions, and to be the cause of much bitterness and undesirable feeling. Children educated in separate schools would in their hours of play and intercourse be much more unlikely to happen upon subjects of the kind. But deserving of attention as are the words of the Bishop of Waiapu, we can hardly look to them as destined to effect much in our favour. Our opponents are too determined, and the influences under which they act too strong, to admit of their being induced to attend to the voice of justice, however it may be uttered. (Jur sole reliance is on our own "assiduous cares" and "generous efforts " as ivcommended to us —to the Catholic world gum-rally— by the Holy Father, and here we must not falter. It is time, aguiu, that we bethought us, once more, of our only effective weapon— (he ballot. To this also, indeed, the Pope directed our minds the other day, when, at the audience already mentioned by us, he told his people that, in order to protect Catholic interests, and the interests of the family and of society, it was necessary for them to take an active part in the only field of public life {that lay open to

them — that of the municipal and provincial administrations. The Holy Father did not recommend to his hearers Parliamentary life or anything connected -with it, for, as he said, reasons of the highest order shut out from Italian Catholics for the present any other field than that mentioned by him. Had it been otherwise, we are warranted in concluding that the career in question would also have been recommended to their attention. But for us Catholics in New Zealand the ballot is allimportant : it is our only means of making our influence felt, and the only weapon we can employ with any hope of success. Nor must we be too sanguine of success, or too much discouraged by failure, or even repeated failure. Our duty is to quit us like men, in any case, and leave the rest to God. Education, then, must still be our crucial point, and no Parliamentary candidate, who has either opposed us in the past or who does not distinctly pledge himself to help us in the future, should obtain the vote of any sincere Catholic. The education question takes precedence of all other questions with us, and the Pope himself recommends it to our assiduous care. His recommendations are not lightly made.