THE DOUBLE MISTAKE OF THE PEACE CONFERENCE

New Zealand Tablet, 21 August 1919, Page 18

THE DOUBLE MISTAKE OF THE PEACE CONFERENCE

(By Archbishop Redwood.)

The Peace Conference made two fatal mistakes: (1) In not invoking the blessing of God ; upon deliberations fraught with such tremendous and far-reaching consequences to the world; and (2) in not admitting the Pope, the Vicar of the Prince of Peace, to the membership of the Conference. The first is more than a blunder, it is a crime, because it savors of State atheism, ' which, if it does not yet openly deny, the Creator, at least ignores Him. The demand made, in that secret and ignominious treaty, the Pact of London, that the three great Powers, then at war with Germany and Austria-Hungary, should combine with Italy to bar the Pope from the future Peace Conference, and prevent him from becoming in any way a factor in' making peace, was alike uustatesmanlike and unjust. If Italy feared that, at the Conference, the Pope would claim the restoration of the Temporal Power, the fear was groundless. He was not aiming at the disruption of Italy. In November, 1914,; a month, after his elevation to the Pontifical Throne, he apprised the world that he did not tamely submit to a state of apparent vassalage towards the Italian Government, but at the same time he clearly showed, both by his own • acts and by the authoritative statements of his Secretary .of State, Cardinal Gasparri, that the Holy See did not intend to create embarrassment for the Italian Government. To that policy he adhered during the war, and he would have followed the same at the Peace Conference. But lie was iguominiously thrust aside. The successor of the Lens, the Gregories, the Innocents, and the Alexanders, who saved civilisation from Attila and the Huns, tamed the lawlessness and rebuked the cruelty of the German Emperors of the 11th century, curbed the passions of wicked kings, and were among the first" to pronounce the doctrine that all men are equal by nature, was excluded from the councils of a world distraught, and at its wit's end to find a remedy for the evils of the day, or what ramparts and dikes to build to stem the mounting waters of social ruin and anarchy. . Yet the work of the Conference shows that the Pope was sadly needed there. He had a natural place in its.sessions. For in the great world congresses, ever since the days of those first international conventions known as the Councils of the Church, his voice has been heard in almost every gathering, where the fate of empires and peoples was settled. In such assemblies of the past, history proclaims that the predecessors of Pope Benedict XV. were hardly ever mistaken, and that at times their voice was the only one "lifted up for the people. Benedict would surely have followed so glorious a precedent. Now shorn of temporal power,"he has no interest at stake but the welfare of all. lie has his spiritual children m Ireland, in Poland, in Germany, in the United States, in England, in disputed Fiume, in France and Alsace-Lorraine. He is an Italian by birth and blood, by racial and- family traditions. He would do his beloved Italy justice, but not to the wrong or prejudice of others. The Vatican is the international clearing house of. the policies of the world. The Pope, because he is the spiritual head of almost 360,000,000 of faithful subjects scattered throughout every continent, every isle of the sea, is better acquainted with the trend of the world's affairs, the needs and the just aspirations of peoples, than any Cabinet or combination of statesmen. Unswayed by prejudice he is above the pettiness of party or the dictates of a narrow nationalism. The Papacy is old and trained in the knowledge of the world. Without the golden keys (which regard another and Divine sphere) the Pope has the key of those ever-recurring world-problems with, which he has been . dealing for centuries. The statesmanship and the policies of the oldest and most experienced Cabinets in the world are young indeed, and but. of yesterday,, when, compared with those of

the ever-renewed lino of the white Shepherds of tho Sevenr;Hills, -y 'BVi'T. ‘ . . Why* then, was the Pope,debarred'from-the- Peace Conference? The fundamental reason, when all others are- considered, was 1 that unnatural and dangerous; theory of the separation, the complete divorce of religion from the realms of politics and international law.. On that theory statesmanship and religion should be placed in separate and tightly-sealed bulkheads they have nothing to do with each other, different laws preside over their respective departments. Statecraft has; its own morality, it need not submit itself to-the prin-ciples-of religion, when it finds these in contradiction! with its own-.interests.and demands. It relegates religion to the private life and activities of the individual,, it rejects, its restraints in the open form of the policies, of the world — which is practical Atheism. Seriously-minded Christians feel disheartened when they see religion and God kept out of every place where His guidance is most, needed and His* help absolutely necessary. For “unless the Lord build the house, they labor in vain who build it.” (Ps. 126, !.).■ Great was the unwisdom of Italy in barring out the Supreme. Pontiff from the Conference. And the guilt and folly of the other signers of the Pact of London were not less. The Pope would have been Italy’s best adviser and friend. Ah! but, as the Roman Tacitus - says, the criminal, usually hates the victim of his injustice ! He both hates arid fears him. For bis presence is a continual reminder of his wrongdoing. His victim is a living indictment of his crime. Heirs of the unscrupulous statesmen who unjustly seized Rome, the representatives of the Italian Government, would have felt ill at ease before the victim of that cruel spoliation. They would have constantly dreaded an appeal from that august victim. As we have said, that fear would have been groundless. For the moment, -Benedict XV., great as are his wrongs, and intolerable as his position at Rome is, would have generously let his grievances slumber. None more wisely, more justly, and unselfishly than he, would have labored for the prosperity and the happiness of the world. None better than he could have outlined and laid down the secure foundations of a strong and permanent temple of peace.