THE CATHOLIC WORLD

New Zealand Tablet, 20 March 1919, Page 39

THE CATHOLIC WORLD

GENERAL. At the end of the year the membership of the Society of Foreign Missions, Paris, Bishops" and missionaries, 1234 the number of Catholics, 1,639,853. There are at present in the 35 missions of the society, 1043 Domiciled clergy, 3268 Catechists, 6184 churches and chapels, 50 seminaries with 2369 students, 5322 schools with 184,093 boys and girls, 388 orphanages with 22,079 children of either sex, 476 medical halls and dispensaries and 114 hospitals and leper asylums. During the year they record the death of 26 missionaries. Father Dalrymple, S.J., during a discourse at St. Peter's, Aldrington. Sussex, England, on the occasion of a Solemn Requiem Mass for the fallen in the war, used the following illuminating illustration of the roll of honor of Britain and the "nations associated with her:—"lf all the Allies who have perished were marshalled at the entrance of this church in ranks of four and wore steadily to march past day and night, it would be a fortnight and perhaps three weeks before the last man of that vast host—for we can. call it no less than that—passed by." On the occasion recently of celebrating a Mass of the Holy Ghost in the Lady Chapel of Westminster Cathedral for the members of the University of London Catholic Students' Society, his Eminence Cardinal Bourne, addressing himself to the students who met him in the sacristy, exhorted them to sanctify their studies by prayer and the constant invocation of the Holy Ghost, the Spirit of wisdom. Turning then to the nun students, of whom some 20 had come, either from the University Hostel for Nuns, attached to Bedford College for women, or from their own convents, the Cardinal insisted on (he high responsibility resting upon them, as the pioneers of the new movement giving Catholic nuns such a leading part in the upbuilding of higher education of Catholic girls to ensure now the establishment of a high tradition at' the hostel and university, which others, coming after them would then follow. ' m The following testimony to the Catholic Church in England in her "fight for the Catholic school," by a writer m the Protestant Guardian, is worth remembering, and its implied recommendations, worth applying (says the Madras Catholic Watchman). "The (Anglican) Church has failed through the tremendous growth of secularism," he writes; "and it has been Powerless to arrest its growth. The Catholics fought for their schools and kept them, knowing the importance of definite religious teaching. The Church of England through its leaders has in part surrendered its schools with the result that little or no religious teaching of a definite type is being given in many of its schools. The (Anglican) Church is not a fighting Church; she has surrendered one citadel after another, because her bishops, her leaders, are not fighters, but opportunists." The Holy See has Nuncios, Internuncios, and Envoys Extraordinary at the capitals of Austria, Argentina, Bavaria, Belgium, Colombia, Costa Rica Bolivia, Brazil, Honduras, Holland, Haiti, Nicaragua, Luxemburg, Peru, Portugal, Spain, Venezuela, and San Salvador. All these are in diplomatic communication with it Besides these, there are many Apostolic Delegations m the government of the Church. Portugal has been celebrating the victory of the Allies, to which l e contributed. In the famous church of the Estrella at Lisbon a Solemn Mass of thanksgiving was sung by the Patriarch in presence of the President or the Kepuwic and the members of the Corps Diplomatic. .This is the first occasion that members of the Government and the head of the State, as at present constituted have attended a Catholic ceremony since the Revolution; and it marks the final reconciliation of Church and State. The Ceremony was of a most impressive character, and representatives of the various armies of the Allies, who were present, were accorded

an ovation by the populace on coming forth from the church. -° - , On December 21, his Holiness the Pope celebrated the fortieth anniversary of his priesthood, and on the following day the anniversary of his first Mass and that pi his episcopal consecration. His fellow citizens of the archdiocese of Genoa, with the Archbishop at their head, determined to keep the latter of the two dates as a day of jubilation and prayer. They are offering the Pope a little gift consisting of a reproduction in silver of his souvenir of ordination. The little picture which the new priest then distributed to his friends seemed' to be a prediction of future events. It represented a cross surmounting the globe and over it the Infant Jesus with the chalice and Host, From the Host rays of light went forth illuminating the Basilica of St Peter's—a fit souvenir, indeed, for one who was afterwards to rule the Universal Church from the Vatican. Catholicity will be well represented in the new democratic States that are in process of formation in Europe as a result of the downfall of the Central Empires This will be especially the case in Czechoslovakia, which is composed of Moravia and Bohemia According to the last census the Bohemian population was 6,458,000; and of this number 6,210,000 were Catholics. Moravia had a population of 2,500.000 in 1900, and all but 100,000 were Catholics. . The territory of the Slovaks across the Carpathians in northwestern Hungary had, according to the latest available data, about 2,000,000 Catholics, forming over 70 per cent of the entire people. Taking, the Czechs and blovaks together in their present union the percentage of non-Catholics in the population of the new State is exceedingly small. In the ninth century Moravia and Bohemia were converted to Christianity by SS. Cyril and Methodius, who have since then been the patron saints of the two countries. Of all Slav literature, with the exception of the Bulgarian, the Czech is the oldest, and it was until the seventeenth century also the richest. J

A PRINCE'S DEATH. Much sympathy has been felt with the Orleans lamly over the sad accident which caused the death of Prince Antoine d'Orleans, son of the Comte d'Eu, who after flying from France was caught in a fog near London, and, with another officer, was killed in a descent on some houses (writes the London correspondent of the Catholic Herald of India under date November 18). The young prince when picked up was still alive and was carried to the local hospital where he received the absolution in articulo -mortis, but soon succumbed. Hospitality was afforded to his body by the Sisters of Charity, who formed a clncpclle ardente for it and prayed unceasingly beside him until the funeral, which took place yesterday at the Catholic Church'of St. Edmund, Lower Edmunton. A military cortege left the convent at 11.30- a.m., for 'the prince was an officer in the 3rd Canadian Dragoons, being determined to fight in the great cause, against _ France's hereditary enemy, and being denied, that satisfaction by the Government of his native land. After Solemn Requiem Mass, which was celebrated at midday, and the last military tribute, the body was entrained for France, where it will be placed in the family vault of the Orleans at Dreux. The Requiem Mass was sun" by Father Bernard Vaughan, and amongst those pre* sent at the Requiem were King Manoel of Portugal and his Queen, and several members of the Orleans and Braganza families.