OUR LETTER FROM FRANCE

New Zealand Tablet, 18 December 1913, Page 24

OUR LETTER FROM FRANCE

Paris, October 29. A Valiant Servian Girl. ' Who shall find a valiant woman ? From afar ! From the remotest Coasts is the price of her.' But valor and girlhood' going together—who shall find them? What is the price of her who owns them ? Can she be found in our soft, luxurious time ? When one looks out into the streets and sees there those specimens of female humanity forced into tight sugar-bags. When one sees these specimens, thick as leaves in Vallombrosa around him, he cannot refrain from asking the question of the Wise Man of old : Where shall we find a brave woman ? How great the value of her! But as among the crowd of men, hungering for mere animal comfort and hogwash you find a Menendez, an Ozanam, and, thank heaven, many more; so from this throng of apparently brainless feminines you will find to arise great- and ' valiant women ' like Mesdames Barat, Duchesne, Catherine McAuley, Mary Aikenhead, and, thank heaven again, so many more. Would you like, in this drab October month of 1913, to hear of one of these? If so, transfer your mind for a moment to the bureau-de-police at Belgrade, the capital of Servia. There you see, forced down upon her knees before a body of officials, who are trying to frighten her into denying her

faith, a young Servian girl, Georgina Pavolvitz, who, to every rough onslaught, replies by repeating from her prayer-book the short Act of Faith ! Her Little History. About twelve months ago, Georgina Pavlovitz, who belongs to a good family and is highly educated, left the Greek Orthodox Church, that is the Servian Established Church, and became a Catholic. The Catholic Archbishop, Mgr. Stadler, received her into the Church according to the legal formalities required in the case of a conversion from 'orthodoxy' to any other Church. Still, the local press attacked the girl for leaving the Greek schism, and the Archbishop for receiving her into the Catholic Church. ' The girl took no notice of this exhibition of bigotry; in a few months she entered as a postulant the Convent of the Nuns of the. Holy Infancy. On October 8 she and her companions went out on their round of duties. While passing along a quiet street, Miss Pavlovitz was violently seized and carried off by some of her former 'orthodox' friends. On the interpellation of the Catholic Archbishop, she was rescued by the police and brought to the police station, where she declared that she had become a Catholic freely and deliberately and had entered the convent freely and deliberately. That was not enough. For three days she was submitted to gross moral torture with a view of breaking her resolution. The Government Commissary, Baron Collas, alternately promised and threatened. He promised to have her received into the orthodox convent at Cettinje; he threatened to have her confined in a lunatic asylum. He placed her on her knees and brought in a Greek priest who, reading from a great book, solemnly excommunicated her. She was three times brought before the orthodox consistory' (a kind of kirk-session), which went so far as to declare her act of conversion illegal and null. Even her mother was brought in and forced to curse her kneeling daughter! But before every threat and every attack the brave girl stood firm. At the great crises in the inquiry she held the Catholic Act of Faith in her hands, recited it aloud, and declared that in that Faith she would live, and for it she was ready to die.. So she defeated her persecutors. Afraid to proceed to bodily punishments, and hopeless of changing her in her beliefs, the officials let her go free. Here is an instance to show that we have, amidst all our feminine frivolity, vitiated taste, and stupidity, some of whom it may be said, as it was said in the days of the martyred Perpetuas, Agathas, and Cecilias, 'Oh, how great are these women of the Christians!' Here, too, is an illustration of the spirit of persecution which still possesses the Greco-Russian schismatic Church. But that spirit is so well known, so flagrantly active even at the present moment, that it is unnecessary for me to call attention to it. When the Balkan War was on the sympathies of most people were with the Servians and Bulgarians. They regarded their victories as the triumph of the Cross over the Crescent. But they forgot the character of the cross that was triumphant—a very disreputable kind of cross it is.

True Men and no Flunkies. M. Poincare, the newly elected President of the Republic, is going about our leading cities and towns on an official visit, laying foundation stones, opening new buildings, and delivering nice soft speeches on peace and harmony and national unity at balls and garden parties. He is enjoying himself right royally. He is trying—a delicate task in the circumstances—to make himself all things to all men. He visits M. de Mun, the supposed leader of the French Catholics, and he does not forget to go to the villa of M. Villiani at Bouraneuf. Poincare declares his special pleasure in meeting Villiani, the old blasphemer, whose boast is that he and his confreres Clemenceau, Briand, and Co have ' extinguished the stars of God and lit the lanterns of reason'! He talks soft things to Catholics at the very moment that his atheistic, Masonic Government is closing Catholic schools and plundering and selling Catholic colleges and institutions. And wonderful to relate, Catholic poltroons—those who say that politics is one thing and religion another—are proud at being

invited to these Poincare fetes. There are congenital flunkies everywhere, who will hang around any Jack-in-office to catch his smiles and the scraps that fall from his table. But on the other hand, glad to say, we have many, lay and clerical, with whom the shortest way to their hearts is not through their stomachs, but by the way of their faith and their Baptismal vows. The chicken and champagne and soft presidential eloquence count little with them; their religion and its interests are for them first and all in all. They are true men, not flunkies or time-servers of those in power. They remember the saying: ' Seek ye first the Kingdom of God.' A Case in Point. The other day M. Poincare visited the Department of Lot. The Prefect invited all the county councillors to the presidential banquet. He received the following letter from M. Calmon-Maison, member for the canton of Gramat: —' Sir, —You have done me the honor to invite me to the dinner and soiree to be given on October 13 by our Council to the President of the Republic. You will understand, sir, that despite my respect for the head of the State, I cannot, by assisting at this fete, associate myself with a Government whose acts tend to transform our country into an atheistic nation.' Bravo! M. Calmon-Maison! Your mind and heart cannot be reached through your stomach. You will remain outside the doors J>f that banquet-hall, wherein the streams of soft eloquence and sparkling champagne will commingle. But all honor to you that is the place which becomes every true Catholic in the present condition of politics in France. Well for the nation if the electorates bestirred themselves, roused themselves from their political torpor, and voted at the ballot boxes for representatives like yon. Some Electorates are Bestirring Themselves. Here is an instance just to hand. The executive of tha Catholic Alliance of Haute-Garonne has addressed the following letter to candidates at the departmental elections : —' Monsieur, —If our information be correct you are a candidate at the cantonal elections in our department. Hence the Catholic Alliance of Haute-Garonne permits itself the honor to ask you for some explanations which your loyalty and manliness will not allow you to refuse. Departmental and cantonal councillors in their capacity of electors of Senators [members of the Upper House] have an important part in the political direction of the affairs of State. Consequently, those who aspire to the functions of councillors should make their political principles known to the body of the electors. The Catholic Alliance uses its right in demanding from you a clear declaration of your principles in regard to questions at present of greatest moment to the welfare of the nation. We would have you, therefore, clearly to declare(l) Are you in favor of the re-establishment of good relations between the Church and the State? (2) Are you in favor of granting recognition of and true liberty of teaching to private schools? (3) Are you in favor of

securing sincere respect on the part of teachers and officials for the faith of Catholic children in the public schools? (4) Are you in favor of granting equality of opportunity in the matter of offices in Army, Navy, and the public administration of the country? On your answers to these questions will depend the attitude of the Catholic Alliance towards your candidature. —Ch. Niel, President.' That is plain speaking. Might this letter be useful as a copy for committees of the Catholic Federation of New Zealand at election times? The Adversary Disturbed: A Good Sign. Such movements as the setting up of Catholic Confederations, Alliances, and Un : ons up and down the land are causing much disquiet to the dark-lanternists and to people like M. Clemenceau. They see that the great Catholic masses hitherto inert and politically asleep are going to take a hand in managing the social and political affairs of their country. Hence notes of alarm, loud and strong, are being sounded by all the anti-Christian buglers. The Lanterne, ' a radical and Masonic organ, comes out to-day with a strong appeal to les groupes desorganisees de la libre pense. The writer declares that the freethought groups are going to sleep, that their success for years has enervated them; that over-confidence is the evil of democracies; that even Freemasonry itself is waveringflechissante ! Then the writer appeals to the scattered ranks of the ' enlightened to unite, make a final sursaut, and dash and wipe out all ' clerical' resistance ! Organisons-nous, he exclaims, let us organise while there is time; our societies are mere skeletons; we need compact bodies full of audacity and activity, pleines d'audace et d'impatience d'agir ! M. Clemenceau, in his paper, Homme Libre, joins in the cry. He thinks there are ' indications ' that the Government is falling away from its former anti-Christian fervor. There is the Prime Minister issuing a circular permitting parents to complain if schoolmasters use atheistic class-books to demoralise their children—a fearful act of weak compromise; and there is M. Baudin, Minister of War, permitting the French Navy in foreign waters to raise the ships' colors and fire off cannon salutes on Good Friday. Intolerable compromise with Christian sentiment all this ! Ignatius Loyola and Vincent of Paul are coming back to drive out Diderot and Voltaire from the Pantheon ! Vision of a terrible calamity ! Let all freethinkers, free-livers, free-lovers, Freemasons, radicals, socialists, and men imbued with the modern idea of the ' liberated spirit' arise and save ' our most enlightened patrie ' from so dire a disaster. It is pleasant to hear these men screaming in this way — shows things are getting on the right track.

(To be continued.)