Current Topics

New Zealand Tablet, Volume XVI, Issue 14, 27 July 1888, Page 1

Current Topics

AT HOME AND ABROAD.

A writer, who signs himself " A Catholic," pubAFPAIRS AT THE lishes in United Ireland an article on the Roman Vatican. Cuiia and Cardinal Monaco. The Pope, ho tells us, most probably koew little or nothing of the Decree which has created so great a sensation in connection with Irish affairs. His personal examination into the matter would involve his complete absorption in Irish business, to the neglect of that of the whole Catholic world outside of Ireland. The Pope, therefore had to take the word of a Congregation of Cardinals as to the evidence laid before them. And such, says the writer, is the rule, for, even were he of a strength beyond that of ordinary human nature, he could not attend, to the miss of business dealt with by the Congregations of the Curia. But the Pope, on the contrary, is a feeble old man, concerning whose successor speculation is already rife. And Cardinal Monaco is spoken of as most likely to replace him. Toe business transacted at the Court of Roma is the business of the whole Catholic world, the writer tells us, and into it there enter several particulars that are of more importance from a religious point of view than the settlem-nt of the Irish question. The officials, however, on whom the Pope necessarily relies, are by no means infallible, and we have a proof of this in the loss of the temporal power, which may be traced to their blundermg. Many of them, nevertheless, place hi fore all spiritual interests the recovery of the temporalities, and with this view set a bigh value 01 an intrigue With a poweiful Government like that of England. Cardinal Monaco meantime, the author and prumu'gator of the Decree, is a man of great personal ment-fal-ely accu-ed of being a miier, but, on the contrary, of bounteous chanty, and particularly disiinguisaefi for hu dcv tion to the poor duiing a certain outbreak of cholera. He is an unswerving supporter of the da. ms of th i temporal power, but not inclined towards extreme measures for its recovery, believing that the present at a c of affairs is oppose 1 to the will of G jd. and, therefore cannot last. But the politics of the Curia are much tempered by worldhness. They raise a fog through which Ireland, for example, is seen as much smaller than it really is, ana England, with its " Impjnal race," looks unnaturally big. The Vatican statesmen are dazzled by the idea of forming an alliance with this great power, and vis ons of the temporal principality, formed in connection with it lead many Cardinals astray.

The Nation in an article on the Bishop of dangebous Limerick's letter, puts the position very forcibly conditions, before the world, aud shows the danger that must follow on the enforcement of the Papal Decree. Dr. O'Dwyer, it says, speaks of his readiness to undergo persecution' but the risk of persecution seems more clearly on the other side. More than 9,000 writs of eviction, involving the fate of some 32,000 people, are hanging over the heads of th.> tenants, and the hand of the landlord has been staid by fear of consLquences. But if boycotting and the Plan of Campaign, the safeguards of the people against tho l.mdgrabber and certain starvation be put down, nothing remains except the resources of men drivm to detperat^n— that is bloodshed and the secret society. Venly, the alternative is one that a Catholic Bishop should weigh with due consideration before he accepted it. We do not expect a Catholic Bishop to find that comfort and support in the idea of the hangman, that so much sustain others who deal with liish affairs.

United Ireland of June 2nd, pub'ishes the first WRONG portion of an article in wh eh the Rev. E O'Brien, DEFINITIONS. PP, V.F., Colcraine, explains that the Papal decree has no be iring on the condition of ihinga in Ireland. Father O'Biien bases his argument oa the Latin words looatorcs and conductores , in which landlords and tenants are named by the decree. The word locatores, he explains, is properly used only of owners who have an absolute and entire right to the property let by them, and

conductores is righ ly applied only to those who hire what belongs completely to another aud m w'aoae ownership they bare no claim t° share, not in even the r-outest degree. Bat. all <ho world knows that the Irish landlord has n t an absolute and entire right to the holding he leta to his tenant but that thn tenant also hni a rested right in it. If the landlord were to le.t the land as nature left i» to him— and it the rent at which it was justly valued iv each m stale, he woald bo what is meant by the Latin term locator, and, under the tame oondL tions, the tenant would ba what is meant by the term eonduaUr. But, as the case Btands, the land is Talued according to the improvements made in it by the tenant— and on tni« basis the rent is enforced. The decree, therefore, when it speaks of looatortt and »oi%duetore» speaks of relations that do not exist in Ireland, aii, consequently , itr condemnation is null and void.

Eten to the remotest parts of the earth, it would A livbly seem, the Times and its correspondents understand anxiety. the mind and attitude of all ecclesiastics towards the Irish question. Here we find a telegram from the correspondent at Vienna, assuring his newspaper that Cardinal Moran's visit to Rome has nothing to do with Irish affairs, but it merely a visit of congratulation on the Sacerdotal Jubilee. This tele* gram, however, we quote for the curiosity of the thing, for we do not count ourselves more authorised than is the Times' correspondent at Vienna to inquire into the motives of his Eminence's visii.— But, as Mr, Healy has rematked in a speech lately delivered by him, there is no one moro qualified than is Cardinal Mor*n to lay a true and con* vincing statement of Irish affiirs before the Holy Father. His Eminence's decision particularly, as Bibhop of Ossory, that the landlords were bound to make restitution, and to which Mr. Healy also adverted, should b rye to throw a very effective light on the natuie of the Plan of Campaign. It, moreover, ceitainly gives a very strong support to Father O'Brien's argument, quoted by ua from United Ireland, in which he points out the unfitness of the Latin terms used in the Papal decree. Meantime, it serves further to show the anxiety felt by the enemies of the Iribh cause when we find them alarmed lest Irish advocacy should be urged at the Vatican, for that is the meaning of this telegram— fiom a correspondent in a distant European capital respecting the movements of the Australian Cardinal. There is no part of the world where the enemies of Ireland are now a peace.

If we were in want of any further proofs that IBIBH intrigue against the Irish cause had been going on Catholics in Rome, we should find it in the admission of the bettaeb, Koman correspondent of the Times that he is hand in glove with a personage of great rank whom ha has consulted as to a certain article published by the London Tablet in reply to the Dublin Freeman. He tells us besides that he knows the Tablet's article to be an authoritative utterance, whose writer hai had «ccp f ional opportunities of learning the interpretation of (he Papal decree. — We sco, therefore, the kind of communication ia which high Roman officials are, and we also see the relationships maintained by writers for the Tablet. And yet th» Tablet has h»d the audacity to deny point-blank that there had beea any anti-Irish intriguing at Rome. — It is, meantime, especially well fox us ia these colonies to \>i warned that the Tablet ani the Times art in league, for the Times is an advocate of the establnhmeot of dlplomatic relations between England and the Vatican, with espeoial reference to the appointment of colonial bishops, and it is important for us to learn how the oraole is- worked. With the men who control the Tablet influencing the appointment of our bishops the prospects of the Irish Catholic population would be sombre indeed. Tnere would not be a biehop in any colony who had not undertaken as a primary part of his duties to stamp out every vestige of Irish nationality — lei the danger to religion be whatit might. And, as we see, the combination of the Tablet and the Times is powerful, and stands well with high Roman officials. The correspondent to whom we allude speaks of the official personage to whom ho had recourse on the occasion mentioned, as " one of the highest dignitaries of the Church in Rome." Let the Irish Catholics of the colonies, therefor*, be oa their guard.

THB Roman correspondent of the Times finds a grain FBIBNDLY of comfort in the manner in which the Papal rescript ADVICE. baa been received in Ireland. The Time*, generally, we may add, has become a great Catholic authority, and is, in particular, as well acquainted with the mind of the Pope as if it bad attained to some share in his Holiness's infallibility. But tbe Boman correspondent says : " The English Government ought to be more than any content with this revolt against the decree, for it i« destroying the illusi-n that the Irish are persecuted because they are Oatbolici, and the equally ill-founded idea that they are good Catholics." There it goes ! At one blow the false reputation ramed through ages is destroyed and thu penal laws and alt the villauy o! the past and preseut are seen in theit true iieht. They «re recognised as measures taken against the liish people, merely for something— because they were Irish, perhaps, and as having no religions significitioo whatever. How conld they, in fact, wben the people were not and are not good Catholics, but adherents to the Catholic Church through pare devilment alone. Bat let us recollect, for our consolation, that a "good Catholic " in the eyes of fchej Times and his correspondents, is a weak-minded, superstitious creature, degraded by false beliefs and idolatrous practices and daring to exercise neither a will nor a judgment of bis own. Judged in this light the Irish people certaialy tr« not good Catholics, and what ia more they need not be ashamed to confess their failing. But can anyone bo deceived as to th« tru« mind of the Time* J He told us a little time ago, refening to » certain sermon of Cardinal Manning's, that England was quite Jirepartd to r«new her ill- treatment of Catholics if she saw the least reason for it. He told us later on that it was a flaw in tbe career of the late Emperor William tbat he had made concesiions to the Pope. And, therefore, when he accuses Irish Catholics of not being good Catholics, or of being "nominal Catholics," as he accuses them elsewhere, we can understand what he means, and gain courage from the straits to which b« ia rednced. When the Times preaches to the Irish ptople unquestioning submission to the Vatican on peiil of spiritual damnation, he means that they are lo submit to the Salisbury Government and relinquish the certainty of national salvation.

lv bis Holiness cannot make hia roice beard in Ire. AN ancient land it will not be the fault of the strange allie B Hbathen to vrbo are hastening from everywhere to hi« aid. And TUB rescue, if it is not love of the Pope but hatred of some one else that is impelling them, sure it all comes to the sams thing in the end. Here thtn is Mr. M. Monier William*. Professor of Sanskrit at Oxford, who has rummaged back through al] antiquity to find a maxim to sustain his Uoliness. He has gone all the waj back to the "Law book" of Manu, written, he tells us, before ever thrre was a Pope at all. and found something worthy of his search. Liiten to this that comes down to us from the days before St Peter was born, »nd the like of which none of ns, of course ever kD«w a ha'p'orth about up to this time of our lives. " Law ig rooted in religion, morality, and the practices of good men." Is not it worth the trouble of learning Sanskrit to discover all that for the first time ? But what are thi religion, the morality, and the practices of good men, connected with the average Irish landlord^ ar d the average Government official in lie' and in who*e cxi stence imh laws kave their rai&on rf' etrc 1 If Manu had knowa anyth ing about them, ancient heathen ns he was, he might well have entered another maxim in his •' Law-book " that would have been more to tbe point If his Holioees, then, has Any aid to receive from Manu, it will be in the way of learning that even the old heathen woi ld itself condemned and abhorred the principles on which Irelani is and has been governed.

The Roman correspondent of the Times argues NO go, badly that the fact of the Irish people's being Catholics does not enter into the opposition of the Government against their ctuse. It has been distinctly admitted and persistently urged by the Government and their supporters that_ because tbe Nationalists are (Jai holies, the Orangemen of Ulster have a strong cage against them and lightly claim to be supported in opposing them. But if the Oranpemen can be persuaded that the Nationalists, as the Times and its correspondent assert, are not good Catholic?, but are nominal Catholics only, peihaps their attitnde may become less determined and rss threatening. What we believe h that the Orangemen will perfectly understand the sitontion, and will well interpret all that the Times or its correspondents have to say ia preter dr d defence of the Catholic Church. Nevertheless, the Orangerot n may possibly take a lesson from llie palpable fact thr.t Home Bule does not mean Rome lule. They would certt.nly do so if secular ounedness as well as religious bigotry did not enter iuto the essence of their constitution. Bat the argument of the Time? correspondent M to the freedom from religious bias of the Tory Goveinmeut is com. pletelj pro Ted a failure, as we see.