THE CATHOLIC WAVE.

New Zealand Tablet, Volume XXV, Issue 37, 14 January 1898, Page 4

THE CATHOLIC WAVE.

A tidal wave of Catholicity is sweeping over the earth. In Catholic countries it is seen in the ' extraordinary interest taken by Catholics in social and economic questions, in the promotion of Catholic scientific congresses, in the dawning triumph of the religious idea in education, in the unification of great religious orders like the Trappists, the Friars Minor, the Carmelites, in the eclipse of anti-religious agitation.

Protestant countries afford many evidences of the same happy condition of things. Catholicity is continuously making great gains in every one of them. The Scandinavian countries, always the deepest rooted and most uncompromising in their Protestantism, have begun to be touched by the Catholic spirit. Only the othei day the Storthing of Norway abrogated the law forbidding religious orders in the country ; almost simultaneously the Freeman 'published an announcement of important conversions to Catholicity in Denmark and Sweden ; Switzerland is now half Catholic : Germany can no longer be considered a Protestant country, as more than a third of the population is Catholic, and this proportion is continually increasing ; Holland, one of the most progressive countries in the world, is more progressive in its Catholicity than in anything else, and is now two-filths Catholic ; distinguished conversions to the Catholic Church in England have become so much a matter of course that the newspapers do not publish them, but the Holy Father has found it necessary to establish a special college in Rome for the education of ex- Anglican clergymen, who desiie to become priests ; it is estimated that 30,000 converts are being annually added to the Catholic Church in the United State?, and the estimate is undoubtedly low. On the other hand, Protestantism is becoming more and more divided, more and more rationalistic. It has lost its

hold on the masses ; its churches are being gradually doserte d. It has begotten a religious apathy which has unhappily affected even some Catholics, and which has ruined its own prospects. The Catholic wave is even more visible in schis natic countries. Russia, the inveterate foe of Rome, has relaxed her penal code ; Catholic seminaries, long closed, have bee - a reopened ; Catholic bishoprics, long widowed of their bishops, have again become centres of Catholic life, the desire for reunion has begun to leaven the mass of orthodoxy. Our Rome correspondent a few weeks ago gave some account of the movement for the reunion of Christendom, which is worth quoting here.

"'Another important audience was that given Lo Mgr. Bonctti, the Apostolic D^egate of Constantinople who was sent to Rome to acquaint His Holiness with the details of the religious situation in the East, now so pregnant with importance for the hopes of Christian reunion. It may be said here that Pope Leo's encyclicals are producing a wonderful effect. The Sacred Congregation of Propaganda is continually receiving the most consoling news on the subject. By way of example I may mention two details from the report of Mgr. G-eraigny. At Rufoir, a small town in his dioce«e, forty-two families have embraced the Catholic faith, and in the village of Blath the whole population, with the exception of one family, has refused the services of its Schismatic priest and is clamoring to be received into the unity of the Catholic Church. When Mgr- Geraigny had an audience with Pope Leo in Rome some twelve months ago His Holiness dismissed him with these words : ' On your accession to your vast diocese you found 300 Catholics there ; at your death see that there are only :500 Schismatics. This is the task the Pope sets before you.' And the good Bishop seems to be in a fair way of fulfilling his great mission."

Within less than two years in the dioe°se of Thebes alone 6,000 conversions from Schism were recorded, and a recent letter from the same place announces that the stream of conversions is still going on.

" These latter days," this letter says, '• 2r>o Schismatics of Nazlet-el-Kadi came to make their submission to Mgr. Ignance ; tweDty-five families of Deir-G-ana-dela have followed their example. More than 400 persons of Haguer-Michta have also embraced Catholicity, and they have recently expelled the Schismatic bishop of Abontig, who visited them with the object of turning them against the Catholic Church. At Mallaoni (in Upper Egypt) every day sees new conversions."' The Copts are being converted by thousands, and their conversion -will in time probably lead to the conversion of Abyssinia with its four millions of dissidents. Such are some of the first fruits of Leo's pet work for the reunion of Christendom.

Catholic missions in pagan countries are flourishing. China, Japan, India. Africa are daily furnishing thousands of new children to the Catholic Church, and the great island of Madagascar bids fair to become a Catholic country in a few years.

The world is bscoming Catholic. At the close of the century of light and progress the Catholic Church reckons the number of her children at 2SO.OOO.O'K>. The, future is hers. With »00l reason, then, has she bigun pr. p.uations for solemn service- of thanksgiving at the end of tlu nineteenth century. — J*w >,• Yorh Catholic Freeman.