The Catholic World

New Zealand Tablet, 18 March 1915, Page 55

The Catholic World

ENGLAND WESTMINSTER CATHEDRAL. The brick and stone shell of the interior of Westminster Cathedral is being gradually faced with glowing marbles and mosaics. An important part of the general decorative scheme is the completion of the side altars. The Chapel of ,St. Andrew and the Saints of Scotland is the first of what may be called the three national chapels to be finished. Altars have- been set up in the Chapel of St. George and the English Martyrs, and the Chapel of St. Patrick and the Saints of Ireland ; but the adornment of neither has yet been begun. The other chapels completed are those of. the Blessed Sacrament, on the Gospel side of the high altar our Blessed Lady, on the Epistle side and the Holy Souls and St. Gregory and St. Augustine, in the aisles. The Chapel of St. Andrew and the Saints of Scotland is the gift of Lord Bute. It is a rich example of mosaic and marble decoration by English craftsmen. The altar is of black Alloa marble supported on five pillars of red Peterhead granite, with bronze capitals and bases of grey Aberdeen granite. The reredos is of marble with a cross inlaid of antique Egyptian porphyry, upon which is a large bronze figure of Christ'. Scotland’s great saints, including " St. Andrew, St. Ninian, St. Columba, and St. Margaret, are represented in sculptured reliefs on either side of the altar. The marble pavement, representing the sea, has inlaid fishes of colored stone. The dado of one of the walls is of blue and white marble, the colors of Scotland and St. Andrew, and the arch of the last wall behind the altar has a large jewelled Si. Andrew’s Cross on a flowery field with white doves flying around. MASS AT ETON ONCE MORE. On January 20 (says the London Tablet) a Catholic church was opened at Eton, and Mass celebrated after a lapse of 356 years. In 1440, Henry VI. founded a college ‘ to endure to the end of time to the praise, glory, and honor of our crucified Lord to the exaltation of the most glorious Virgin Marv, IT is Mother, and to the support of the Holy Church, His Bride.’ The King’s College of our Lady of Eton beside Windsor (as its title ran) was a body corporate, capable of holding lands in perpetuity, but in 1553 the wishes of the founder were set at nought. The Privy Council ordered the bells of Eton College confiscated, and the Church goods converted ‘ from monuraentes of superstition to necessarie uses.’ The College plate was sold. On the accession of Queen Mary the high altar was ’restored and the holy water stoup replaced ; but when Elizabeth came to power, the last Catholic provost and rector of Eton, Provost Cole, was cast into Fleet prison, and ‘ended a memorable career in such obscurity that even the date and place of his death are not known with certainty.’ The high altar was destroyed for the second time, and from that date to this memorable year Mass was not said in the parish of Eton. The new church has been built by Lord Braye. FRANCE ADDRESS TO THE QUEEN OF THE BELGIANS. In recognition of what Belgium has done for France by stemming the German tide of invasion at the opening of the war, the women of France, through the Comtesse de Saint-Laurent, have in the name of 40,000 members of the League of Frenchwomen, of which the Comtesse is President-General, sent an address to the Queen of the Belgians, together with a medal bearing the impress of the Sacred Heart and of Mary Immaculate. There is no ‘ quenching the lights of heaven ’ in Franc© just at present. The anti-religious forces are still active, but the war has thrown the troubled country into the arms of the Church.

ITALY THE GOVERNMENT RELENTS. Mgr. Caron, who was appointed Archbishop of Genoa on April 19, 1912, has at last deceived .'the Royal Exequatur. There is a feeling ,of satisfaction in ecclesiastical and lay circles that the Government has at last recognised its mistake and endeavored to repair the injury done to the distinguished prelate. Mgr. Caron has written to the Minister of Justice - thanking v the Government for its action, but adding that his advanced age and the sufferings of the last three years have so weakened him that he could not undertake the responsibility of governing such an important diocese. He has asked the Holy Father to accept his resignation, and this his Holiness has done most unwillingly. On account of the great gifts which he devotes to ecclesiastical work, Mgr. Caron is to remain in Rome. As his successor in the See of Genoa, the Holy Father has appointed Mgr. Gavotti, transferring him from the episcopal See of Casale Monferato. ROME PEACE DAY. February 7 was a most remarkable day in Rome. It seemed as if the whole city obeyed the behest of his Holiness to implore peace from God. Over 60,000 persons gathered in and about St. Peter’s to join the Pope iu piayer. His Holiness entered the great basilica in the simplest manner, and knelt before the altar, surrounded by numerous Cardinals and other officials of various grades of dignity and responsibility. All classes and conditions of men, nobles and peasants, rich and poor, foreign ambassadors and lackeys, joined in the prayer which the Pope himself intoned. Benediction of the Blessed Sacrament was given, and his Holiness then retired amid prolonged cheering and cries of Long live the Pope, Give us peace.’ .Similar services were held throughout France, without interference on the part of the Government, which had originally ordered the Pope’s prayer for peace seized. At these latter services a short sermon was delivered, in which it was declared that France desired an honorable peace ‘with wrongs righted.’ SCOTLAND the catholic POPULATION. The Scottish Catholic Directory, which has just been issued, contains the usual interesting particulars regarding the condition of Catholicity in Scotland. The total estimated Catholic population is 527,500; the country is divided into five dioceses with two Archbishops, three Bishops, 450 secular priests, and 95 regular priests. The total number of missions is 232 churches, chapels, and stations, 373 ; convents, 52; institutions, 62; and schools, 281. Glasgow archdiocese still maintains its premier position in regard to Catholic population, with a total of 400,000, or over 75 per cent, of the whole. This is, of course, mainly due to the great influx of Irish immigrants who settle in Glasgow and the other great industrial and mining towns within the confines of the archdiocese. UNITED STATES THE LATE ARCHBISHOP OF SAN FRANCISCO. The will of the late Archbishop Riordan showed that the beloved prelate, who in life controlled, by virtue of his office of Archbishop of San Francisco, immense properties and revenues, died a poor man (says the Sacred Heart Review). All that he, who had handled many millions annually, was able personally to dispose of was a small amount of property in Chicago which formerly constituted part of the estate of the late Archbishop’s father, his books, his pectoral cross, and his amethyst ring. ' - .