"ROMISH "' METHODS.

New Zealand Tablet, Volume XIX, Issue 20, 13 February 1891, Page 17

"ROMISH "' METHODS.

fREV. CANON, who has within the last week or so arrived in Dunodin, pledges himself to the flock to whom he has come to minister that he will not be" Komish." Whether the Rev. Canon will succeed in keeping his pledge in the eyes of every member of his Hock, while at the same he fulfils another pledge given by him to do all that the Church of England allows, remains to be seen. But, if we may judge by the decision recently given by the Archbishop of Canterbury in the case of the Bishop of Lincoln, it seems hardly probable that such will be the result. So far, however, as lites and ceremonies stripped of all their meaning and performed by men uuable and uncommissioned to perform them in their valid state may be signified by the reproachful and vulgar epithet " Ronvsh," we think that the Rev. Canon is wise in having nothing to do with it. Whether, again, the rev. Canon and the Church he represents might not with advantage to themselves in other respects pursue " Romish " ways is another question. We have, in fact, just had before our eyes in Dunedin visible proof of the efficacy of •'Romish" ways. What, for example, was suggested to v-, a day or two ago by the presence among us of the Archbishop of Melbourne and the Bishops who accompanied him ? The results of " Romish " ways were clearly made evident to us in this. The presence of these prelates was due to the living faith that " Roniibh " rites and ceremonies, performed with authority and administered by men who are duly commissioned, awaken and sustain in the hearts of those who seek their aid. This it is which has built up the Catholic Church in Australia. Duly considered, indeed, this Church i>> an institution of almost a miraculous character. The way in which it was built up and established, was, we admit, '' Romish " ; but it may be questioned as to whether the work could otherwise have been accomplished. The Church in Australia, that great Church that has filled the colonies with its shrines, its schools, and its colleges and convpnt? ; nn«l o^er which Jisthwaioliud scholars and men eminent for their abilities and acquirements preside, is the work of a poor and struggling population. Great and noble as that Church is to-day its founders were the pocr, and the poor still form the great buik of its supporters. People tell us, in fact — some of them with alarm — that the whole future of the colonies will be " Romish,'' and, so far as Christianity is concerned, they very probably tell us the truth. There was no vain warning given on Sunday evening by the Archbishop of Melbourne in exhoiting the Catholic people of JJuuedin {v continue their support of Catholic

schools, by which, his Grace declared, the infidelity, whose prevalence would make it better the country had never been created, might alone I c averted. Whatever, therefore, may be thought of rites and ceremonies that arc '' Romish," the success and object of many " Romish " methods clearly have much to recommend them. Such metliods, nevertheless, in order to be effectual, need the quickening force of rites and ceremonies that are not a mere, vapid, empty mockery, stripped of all meaning and performed by men usurping, nay, for it cannot be usurped, pretending to fill an office to which they have no right and which they are incapable of filling. " Romish " rites and ceremonies, then, are vindicated by their fruits. A mockery of them must necessarily be worse than fruitless, and the Rev. Canon, as we have said, is wise to avoid it. In fact, he could not be " Romish " even if he were to try.