THE FINGER OF GOD.

New Zealand Tablet, Volume IX, Issue 433, 29 July 1881, Page 5

THE FINGER OF GOD.

(Translated for the Oregon Catholic Sentinel.') The Lord is forbearing and extremely merciful. He does not wish the death, but the conversion and spiritual regeneration of the sinner. But His very mercifulness requires by times the temporal and exemplary chastisement especially of sacrilegious and scandalous offenders, in order to bring back many an erring one to the path of duty and conscience. We borrow from the Roman jonrnal Aurora the following particulars concerning some irreligious proceedings at Casamicciola. The whole world knows by this time how, on the 4th of March, that place was utterly destroyed by a dire earthquake, and how almost half its inhabitants were either smothered or crushed by the ruins of their own dwellings. But what is not generally known is, that a few days before, on the occasion of the Carnival, a lot of fanatics had organised an insolent mimicking of a religious procession. It was in vain that the priest of the parish made his utmost exertions to prevent that sacrilege. Neither his entreaties noi his tears could move the obdurate hearts of those wretches. A large doll made of straw and nailed to a cross was dragged through the streets of the town, masked persons sang by mockery religious songs, and God and His servants were the objects of derision and ridicule. Evil example is contagious ; youths in great numbers congregated to witness that BCene ; patents were too cowardly timid to interfere, and the devil's triumph was complete. Three days afterward the earth was torn asunder under the blighting curse of heaven ; dismay, despair, and death, succeeded those abominable orgies ; and when the storm of Divine wrath was over, and when the Finger of God had left its mark on the ruined houses and crushed corpses of the sacrilegious criminals, an aged man was found among the ruins, unhurt and devoutly embracing a large crucifix. Verily, the Lord is both just and merciful 1