PROGRESS AND JUSTICE IN THE NINETEENTH CENTURY.

New Zealand Tablet, Volume XXII, Issue 3, 17 May 1895, Page 17

PROGRESS AND JUSTICE IN THE NINETEENTH CENTURY.

The Cathoncs of New Zealand provide, at their own sole expense, an excellent education for their own children. Yet guch is the sense of justice and policy in the New Zealand Legislature that it compels these Catholics, after having manfully provided for their own children, to contribute largely towards the free and godless education of other people's children !! 1 This is tyranny, oppression, and plunder.

about an English National movement to Rome, wo do not think the wise law of the Western Church will have any exception on the shores of Britain. Of course, it is not intended by tho advocates of Corporate Reunion that, in the future, a married clergy should be allowed in England. Concession in favour of the present generation of Anglican clergymen is only spoken of. We have heard, as a reason for the concession being granted, that St Paul, the favourite apostle of Protestants, was married ! We always believed that the author of the phrase " Even as I " was, like the beloved disciple, unmarried, and waß not even a widower, as Canon Farrau and others hold. It is certainly very difficult to imagine a wife accompanying the apoßtolio wanderer, to whom storms at sea with shipwreck, nights in jail with insult, journeyings by land and sea with privations wero very ordinary experiences. Whether any other of the apostles except St Peter was married is a question which the advocates of married clergy will find very difficult to prove. Anyhow after tbeir call to the apostolato they left 4t all things," which meant separation from all earthly ties and single-minded devotion to their glorious work. Instead of relaxing the law of celibacy the tendency is rather to extend the law. The trend of feeling in the East is in the direction of a celibate priesthood. The Maronites of Mount Lebanon, for instance, we were assured by a Maronite priest who lately visited New Zealand, have practically for the la3t fifty years fallen into line on this point with the "Western Church. A married priest is now unknown among them. Whatever con . cessions the Pope may make we are convinced the even partial relaxing of the law of celibacy will not be among the number. Conversions in England, as elsewhere, will be the result of instruction and grace of Gcd. Those who are thoroughly in earnest rarely ask for concessions.

In answer to many inquiries about the health of the Bishop of Dunedin, we regret to say th-it we cannot announcj much improvement since the last attack prostrated him some week 9 ago. After a consultation held recently, his pbysicianp, who found him in a very feeble condition physically, recommended, in view of his avoiding exertion of every kind, that he should be relieved of all business in connection with the diocese. His Lordship has appointed his secretary, tbe Very Rev P. LyDch, St Joseph's Catbedral, administrator of the diocese, and fully authorised him to transact all diocesan bnsinesa.

We regret to find that the report of a witch-burning case in Tipperary, recent'y published here, waß only too true. In fact, as we learn from the WeeMy Freeman of March 30, the details were still worse than those narrated here. The horrible crime took place on March 15 at a place called Cloneen, near Olotmel. " There is a fierce indignation," cays tbe Freeman, " amoDgst the people of Clcnmel and district regarding the Cloneen outrage, and the popular antipathy towards the prisoners is deep and strongly marked, as was evidenced by the hostile demonstration by the people when the prisoners were being conveyed to and from the cour' bouse. Oleary and Ganey, the berb doctor, came in for special attention. There were cries from tbe people, as they lushed after the prisoners hooting and gro«ning, of " Hang them," and "Oh I the fairies," " Where is tbe heib doctor now?" la Cloneen parish, whers the outrage occurred, tl c people feel the matter keenly."

At New Plymouth on Monday evening (says the Wellington Post of the 11th inst) the Bey Father McKenna was presented by the ladies of his congregation with an illuminated address and a purse ol sovereigns The presentation was made at a social gathering hold in honour of the rev gentlemaD, and the addres9 specially referred to the great interest he had taken in thu spiritual and temporal welfare of the Catholic community, and the high refpect and esteem in which be was held by all.

A SAD case ia reported from Paris where a lady named Amelot went mad the other day and murdered her confessor — 'he Abbe Broglie, brother of the Dake of that name. To make the case more distressing Madame Amelot had been a good and piouß woman, devoting a large fortune to charitable objects,

"We are glad to learn from an Auckland correspondent that the Gaelic movement bids fair to be vigorously taken up in the city in qnestion. Tbe Rev Mr Jordan, of Tauranga, will deliver a lecture on the subject at an early date, and Mr James O'Sullivan, who is an IrishGaelic scholar of high attainments, has kindly offered to throw open to those engaged in the work a library of looks in the ancient tongue- The Cacholic Literary Society will also give their able assistance.

The following ib a cablegram under date Adelaide, Kay 14 :—: — Mr Michael Davitt was cordially welcomed on arrival. He origi. na'ly intended to remain ia the colonies six or eight months, but owing to ihe death of bia child is now unlikely to stop as many tieeks. He returns via America.

We, (Melbourne Advocate, May 4) are in a position to give this week a few more particulars respecting Mr Davitt's visit than were hcrutofore available. Id reply to a cable meflpape he received at Colombo frnm Mr Jtap-ph "Winter, manager of this journal, Mr Davitt has fixrd Monday evening, 20th May, for bis first lecture, and it will bo delivered in th<s Hibernian Hall, tbe subj.-ct being " Parliamentary Photographs." In several quarters there will, no doubt, be a wish that Mr Davitt should turn aside from his purpose, and discourse on subjects not included in his programme. That is natural, but it would be unkind to place him under the slightest constraint. Motive, however good in itself, would be no excuse for subjecting him to any pressure in matters of the kind. Well and good if at any time in the course of his visit he should find time to depart from his programme, and be willing to do so for the gratification of his admirers, or any section of them ; bat no step should be taken that might embarrass him, or in any way prejudice his prospects of success, There is the more reason foi such abstinence in the fact that his admirers are not all of one mind as to his viewa on several different subjects. He will take up no subject on which he may not be regarded as an authority and an intelligent exponent, and he will so treat none of his choice rs to offend thoße who differ from him. He will deal with national or social questions as a dis« passionate public lectnrer, and not as a partisan, and he Bhould not, and will not, we hope, be asked to present himself in any otbe l character. And that would be unavoidable if on any occasion he particularly identified himself with any section of bis admirers.

Judging by their declamatory and ungrammatical resolutions (says the Freeman) the Irish landlords find it difficult to make a case against the Land Bill. They are very rich in abuse of the Bill, but very poor in argument, That much-laboured old word " confiscation " is resurrected for the occasion. Every Irish Land Bill has been denounced in turn as confiscation by the landlords. They have all confiscated more or less the right of the landlords to thieve and evict, It was confiscation to order compensation for disturbance and for unexhausted improvement. It was confiscation to give fixity of tenure and fair — or what was supposed to be fair — rents. It is now confiscation to rescue from the grip of the landlords, who have done nothing for the soil of Ireland but " salt it well with rack-rents," as the late Colonel King-Harman once put it. the improvements made by the Irish tenants and to admit the excluded tenantry of the country to the benefit of tbe Land Acts. Parliament, it appears rejected the proposals embodied in Mr Morley's Bill twenty-five years ago ; therefore they are bad. This is the argument of the leading lights of the party that contains all " the educated intelligence " of the country. What a waste of good money to educate the intellect that offsrs such a reison in opposition to popular reform.

Tue Irish episcopacy (says the Dublin Freeman) ba9 lost another jsialous and able member by the death of the Bishop of Down and Connor, which occurred on Tuesday March 26, from a painful disease, the tortures of which were borne with most heroic fortitude. Moßfc Eev Dr M'Alister was, until disabled by disease, a most energetic prelate. During hiß all too brief reign the work of Catholic organisation in Down and Connor was earned on with vigour, and the traditions of priestly z al and patriotio devotion which he received from his beloved predecessor, Dr Dorrian, were worthily maintained, Becently through failing health his labours were i'lterrupted, and tbe priests of the diocese bad already chosen names to be submitted to Borne for the appointment of a coadjutor with the right of succession. As in the case of the late Bishop of Blpbin, the Most Bey Dr McAlister was not destined to witness the consecration of his successor. The Catholics of Down and Connor have lost a worthy pastor.

The eminent French author, Huysmanap, has become a convert from advanced Freethought to Catholicism. In a book recently published by him, named En Route, he describes, with extreme candour, tho work of his conversion.

Judging (sayß the Paris correspondent of the Catholic Times of March 29) from the resume that M. Loyeon (ex Pere Hyacinthe) haß sent home of his recent discourses in Algeria, his mind is drifting farther and farther from firm land. The latest chimera to which he has devoted his ill-controlled enthusiasm is the "religious alliance of the Gospel and the Koran." How far M. Loyson has gone adrift from sound doctrine may be judged from the following passage:— "l am a Christian prie9t, but as a sincere disciple of Jesus, I do not believe that I offend Him in recognising Mahomraed as the prophet of the Arabs, It was not without the Divine inspiration that he founded the grand religion of Islam. By the political

alliance of France and Islam we Bhall create a military power with which the world will have to count, and by the religious alliance of the Gospel and the Koran we shall maki a light shine upon souls such aa they have not yet seen."

In the course of his Bermon at the opening of the new church at Waitati on Sunday last, Father Lynch said that Dr Moran, in a conversution on the previous evening, had spoken iv fco'ing terms of tho zeal and activity of hia priests and of the faith and generosity of his people, as shown in the erection of no fewer than six or seven churches in the diocese during his illness. The opening of the Waitati church would bs followed in a sbort time by the reopening of an enlarged and beautifnl church in Southland.