The Catholic World

New Zealand Tablet, 30 May 1912, Page 55

The Catholic World

CANADA CAMPAIGN AGAINST SOCIALISM. According - to the Montreal correspondent of the Yorkshire Post, the Catholic Bishops of the Province of Quebec are uniting for a vigorous campaign against the internationalisation of trade unions and societies, on the ground that while local unions confine themselves to local affairs, international unions tend to encourage Socialism and godlessness. • Archbishop Begin has the assistance of Bishop Blais, of Rimouski; Bishop Labrecque, Chicoutimi; Bishop Cloutier, of Three Rivers; Bishop Brunault, of Nicolet; and Bishop Blanche, of St. Lawrence; and it is probable that Archbishop Bruschesi, of Montreal, and other members of the hierarchy, will join in the campaign. FRANCE INDICTMENT OF STATE EDUCATION. The crushing indictment of the French State Education in the 'ecoleslaiques' contained in Tisseau's letter to his counsel, written on the eve of his execution for murder and robbery, has caused a decided fluttering in the French anti-clerical dove-cotes (remarks the Catholic Weekly). First, the anti-Christian press ' bowdlerised' the letter, so as to exclude the most damning passages. This forgery being exposed by the Catholic press, something else had to be devised to take the edge off the exposure of ' lay ' moral training.- Accordingly the anti-clerical press asserted that the condemned soldier, who, it will be remembered, had become sincerely converted in prison, had written his indictment at the dictation of the chaplain. But this new piece of dishonesty has been refuted by the chaplain himself. In a letter to the Catholic press, M. l'Abbe Grandin declares that he had nothing whatever to do with the writing of the letter, and challenges the calumniators to come to the Mans military prison and interview the official in whose presence Tisseau penned it. La Croix, in its issue for April 4, publishes a facsimile of the original letter. This fresh object lesson in the demoralising effects of education without God; should further confirm the growing conviction among sections of French society, which are by no means '.clerical,' as to the necessity for returning to religious education. These saner portions of the nation note with alarm the horrible increase of crime amongst young people that has taken place under the 'lay' system of education. Tisseau and his companion criminal were respectively but 20 and 22 years of age when they expiated their crime on the scaffold. Both met death in the most edifying and courageous dispositions. r - ITALY THE GOVERNMENT AND THE CHURCH. At Valtellina, near Turin, Father Zuliani was fined 83 lire because he had not previously warned the Prefect of Police that he was going to give a lecture to his parishioners. In the same place Father Giacomini was summoned because he invited a missionary to preach . a sermon in a place not recognised as a place of worship. The place was an oratory dedicated to St. George. Several other witnesses proved the same factviz., that the place was one of public worship, and the judge was forced to acquit the accused. In the same place again a Catholic layman, Signor Zanchetta, was summoned for having 'roused up hatred against the social classes and for having exhorted the Catholics to obtain at every risk the teaching of the catechism in the schools.' RUSSIA INTOLERABLE POSITION OF THE. CHURCHY Count Sigismond Wielpolski, member of the Council of State of the Russian Empire, has just published

a memorial on the intolerable position of the Catholic Church in the kingdom. of Poland (Russian Poland). The memorial shows the clergy remorselessly crushed under the implacable hatred of the police, courts, and Russian bureaucracy. The Archie pisconal Curia of Warsaw recently received from the Russian Imperial Minister of the Interior an edict' imposing uoon the Catholic Church officials in Poland the following restrictions: (1) Dignities and honors conferred upon Catholic priests by the Holy See are to be disregarded, unless the consent and approval of the Russial Imperial officials .shall have first been obtained. (2) The words engraved on seals used by the Church authorities must be in the Russian tongue; Latin words may be made use of only on such seals as are needed for strictly ecclesiastical documents. (3) Certificates issued as the official documents required in the case of the publication of marriage bans must bear a Russian Government stamp. CATHOLICS IN ST. PETERSBURG. A conservative estimate places the number of English-speaking people in St. Petersburg at about two thousand, of whom about two hundred are Catholics. There is no English-speaking Catholic parish in the Russian capital, and until the Very Rev. Antonio Staerk, 0.5.8., of St. Mary's Abbey, Buckfast, Devonshire, England, took the matter in hand no instruction was provided for the English-speaking children beyond what was given them at home. Father Staerk: recently presented a class of seven for Confirmation in the Church of St. Stanislaus of which the nastor is Monsignor Count O'Rourke, a descendant' of the royal house of Ireland whose forefathers have lived for three centuries in France and for one in Poland. The service was held on Sunday, March 4, which, according to the Russian calendar, corresponds to our March'l7 St Patrick's Day. The Sacrament of Confirmation' was administered by the Most Reverend Vincent Kluczynski, Archbishop of Mohiliff, and Metropolitan of all the Catholic Churches in the Russian Empire. The sermon was preached in English by Father Staerk, GENERAL IRISH PATRON SAINTS. t In connection with the St. Patrick's Day celebrations it may be well to recall (says the Catholic Bulletin) that among the saints -whom Ireland sent forth 150 are now honored as patrons of places in Germany, of whom 36 were martyrs; 45 Irish saints are patrons of places in Gaul, of whom six were martyrs; 30 in Belgium 44 in England, 13 in Italy, and eight in Iceland and Norway It has been calculated that the ancient Irish monks had thirteen monastic foundations in Scotland, twelve in England, seven in France, twelve in Armonc Gaul, seven in Lotharingia or Lorraine, eleven in Burgundy, nine in Belgium, ten in Alsace, sixteen in Bavaria, six in Italy, and fifteen in Rhetia, Helvetia and Suevia, besides many in Thuringia and on the