The Anticlerical Hobby

New Zealand Tablet, 26 July 1906, Page 10

The Anticlerical Hobby

Every dog— <and fad—h a s its day. ' The harder a bad hobby is ridden ', says Dickens, ' the better ; for the sooner it is ridden to death '. The anticlerical f a d or hobby waS for a long period ridden in Italy a t a pace that, if maintained, was sure to kill. The appearance of the grim spectre of anarchist socialism in the path led lo the application of the curb in Italy, as it did in Germany, and as it probably will in France. Anticlericalism is now vastly eased off in Italy, by comparison with the passionate days of the eighties and the nineties. This decadence of antielericalism is, says the 4 Ciyilta Cattolica ' ('Literary Digest's' translation), ' manifested more plainly in^the latter times, and this is especially the ease in the active arena of administrative and political life, wherei n former times there was manifested the greatest hostility to any religious influence whatever. And the following may be stated as the causes of the change. The anticlerical agitation which preceded the unification of Italy has naturally died away on the completion of that unification, and in public life a very natural instinct and^ feeling ha\e arisen that the Church and State should be welded together by a sort of moral cohesion. The anarchistic propaganda of socialism with its revolutionary a nd anti-militaristic war-cry have driven the- well-balanced and pacific minds of the Italians to band together the conservative forces of the country, in order to promote a reaction against the subversive tendencies of these destructive ~mo\ements. Public

opinion has also been affected by the sight of anticlerical France and her decadence ; while the progress'of AnglQSaxon nations as well as the prosperity of Catfiblic •Germany have in deflivgring official and lay Italy from that miserable bondage under which for more than a century Italians were led to believe that they could not safely follow their own religious instincts, but must adopt the extravagant theories of France. Thus Italians have" recovered the liberty they had lost of showing themsel\es spontaneously devoted as a Oatholic nation to the cause of the Church.' ♦ Herein, as in the lesson of C4ermany, shines the star of hope for France. 'In that lodge-ridden and persecuted land, our brethren of Hie Faith need to pray, as their fathers did long before, ' Our foes press on from every side, 'Ihine aid supply, Ihy strength bestow.' ... And the final result for France— as it has been for the Fatherland— will, we trust, be to furnish a fresh illustration of the truth of Sir Thomas Browne's adage : ' Persecution is a bad and indirect way to plant religion '.