THE CHURCH IN NEW ZEALAND

New Zealand Tablet, 22 January 1920, Page 33

THE CHURCH IN NEW ZEALAND

Lecture delivered in Town Hall, Auckland, on November 28, 1918, by Rev. M. Edge. (Concluded.) The Mass is a sure index to the religion of a people. Where the Mass is there is Catholicism. From the 6th to the 16th centuries the Mass was the central act of worship of Englishmen. In the 16th century a boy nine years of age, Edward VI., was placed on the throne of England. Ho was England's first Protestant Sovereign; but as he was only a child the kingdom was governed by a Council composed of Protestants— first Protestant 'Government of England—and of it a Protestant historian says: —"The councillors had shown themselves to be mere greedy selfseekers, who under the guise of religion robbed (Joel and the poor to till .their own pockets." (Ransome, p. 196.) "Equal opportunity for all, privilege lor none," probably was their motto. "To fill their own pockets" these worthies suppressed the Muss, replacing it by the first Protestant sen-ice book ever introduced to Englishmen; of which Ransome says:"Within a week of its first being read the men of Devonshire and Cornwall were in arms, deviandinn the restoration of the Mass . . . and nil the time-honored ceremonies of their fathers. For six weeks they besieged Exeter, and when Russell came up with same Herman [troops whom the Government hud hired as a standing army, so stoutly did they hold their ground that it was only after a fiercely-fought battle at St. Mary's clvst, in which the English peasants astonished trained soldiers' by their steadiness, that the Devonshire men were put down". In the fighting not less than 4000 men were killed." (Short History of England, pp. 196-197.) In one glorious, unequal, and unsuccessful fight 4000 brave Dcvons died defending the Mass against hired German cut-throats. Gornian might conquered British right on the soil of England when England was betrayed by her first Protestant ernment. 0 Protestantism, behold thv apostles I The missionaries that brought thee to England, that banished "the Mass and the time-honored ceremonies of our fathers" were "German troops 'whom the (,'„,.,-,•niiu-nt laid hired" And thou art. not alien to England! The Alas- alien' Enaway in that twilight-time of England's history where Arthur and his knights quest lor the Holv Grail, where Alfred neglects the precious bread on the hearth of an Athelney peasant, countless priests mar be seen ascendinu countless altars to offer Mass with what, even then, were the tune-honored ceremonies of their fathers For 15()() years that adorable Sacrifice has never ceased to sanctifv the atmosphere of England, although for 300 of that total it was banished to alleys and caves and inaccessible hidingplaces by "German troops whom the Government had tired. Not only has Catholicism been the religion of England wholly or in part, for 1500 years; it laid the foundations of England s greatness. Her navy is England's <dorv • its foundations were laid by a. Catholic, Admiral Howard When the Spanish Armada sailed for our shores, Queen Elizabeth the first really responsible Protestant sovereign of England, did all she could to t>etray her country She refused money to provide food for our sailors, powder for our ships, wages for our officers and men. She ordered some of our few ships to be laid aside; but this gallant Catholic seaman fitted them out. at his own. expense and put them in the fighting line. He prized England more than wealth, more than life. Thinking only of England he swaggered forth in his contemptible little hearts of oak; he made for the nearest Spanish monster he hum, on its heels, he climbed its back, ho broke its neck From the vessel thus captured he took food and powder for his men and his guns, and leaped without fear at the next enemy warship. The elements, admiring his pluck took a hand in the game, helped to destroy the great Armada to save -England in spite of Protestant Elizabeth! to lav the foundations of the incomparable British Navy. (Vide Lingard.) That day and that man made the noblest page in the history of England, made the greatest of those sublime traditions that are the soul of England's navy. And that man was a Catholic (Ransome, p. 216) a Catholic at a time when, having imported a religion from Germany, an English foster mother could not hope for the survival of her adopted monstrosity unless she exterminated Catholicism with the aid of "German troops whom the Government had hired." - To Catholics, too, England owes the beginnings of her overseas Empire. As a marriage dowry Catherine of Braganza, a daughter of Catholic Portugal, brought to a bankrupt English sovereign £500,000 (about £5,000,000 of our present,, money): she brought also Bombay in' India* and Tangiers in Africa—a colossal fortune and the seeds '

of an .empire. (See Lingard—reign of Charles II.) Protestants betrayed Calais, sold Dunkirk, lost the American Colonies by driving exasperated colonists into revolt, gave Heligoland to the Germans. It was a Protestant Duke of .Albany and a Protestant Duke of Cumberland that, at the » outbreak of , th late Mar hurried to Germany to info ..^V " Slan ?-* I ? Tery Catholic that married into an English royal family came to England royally, brought to England, an abundant fortune. , Can as much be sad for the Protestants brought from abroad to ascend neither 11 P £*°, ma S r y lts occupant? Catholicism is alien neithei to England nor to New Zealand. I think it augurs happily for Church in this young country that lf n r ? Colo "! sts bought to its shores for the settlement of laranaki were men from Devon and Corn-wall-descendants of the brave fellows who in the 16th century- fought the lured Germans in defence of "the Mass and the time-honored ceremonies of their fathers"- for in spite of our free secular, and compulsory education people some day will come to know the history of EngBishop Pompallier and his colleagues are too near us to bo great; but the authentic story of Patrick's' apostolic labors for Ireland surpass the grand epic of the planting of the cross in New Zealand by John Baptist Francis lompaher in no way save only the gratitude of the land o his love. So young is the Church in this country that Lie glorious past is hardly yet dissevered from the present: there lue to-day some who were privileged to know the Apostle ol New Zealand. ChnZr- Zealand entered into the hierarchical life of the Church in 1843: two years later a hierarchy was restored " > 'Ji a "J- * fc -"''n d ' i t|"uk, be safe to say that since ho() the Catholic Church m England has welcomed into her fold at least a million converts taken from every state and condition of life, including a representative of the royal family—Princess Ena. During the same period America has seen its Catholicism expand in greater measure, in New Zealand, however, conversions of Protestants are remarkably few. We seem content to retain those horn Catholics whose own fidelity or the Church's watchfulness keep them within the fold. It is no part of my aim to-night to discover why conversions are so few hero compared with England and America. Put it must be said .or these two countries that great results are the fruits of great efforts. To expand, the Church must have light; she is a plant divinely set. to which darkness spells death. Our first duty towards the Church, therefore, is to spread light— impart knowledge, to promote education. Darkness is the ( liurch s greatest enemy, ignorance her greatest obstacle. Look back to the groat Bolshevik movement of the 16th century, called the Reformation ; look back to every schism and heresy, they were patrons of darkness, they harvested in the. night, they spread where ignorance was'rife where education was least advanced. The Greek schism found its victims chiefly among the illiterate Balkans and the ignorant masses of Russia. Protestantism reaped its unhappy harvest, not in the countries of the Renaissance, not, in the countries where the new learning made greatest strides, but in semi-barbarous Prussia, in half-educated Scandinavia and Denmark. What about England? My statement is as true of England as of the rest of the world. Protestantism could get no footing in England until Henry VIII. and others, by robbing the Church and the guilds, had ruined education, had banished learning, had opened England's doors to the darkness of ignorance under the aegis of which heresy spreads. In the loth century England ranked with the most learned countries in the world, and therefore was Catholic: from the 16th to the 19th centuries intellectual darkness intensified, England ranked among the most uneducated countries of Europe, and heresy revelled within her borders. During the past 75 years considerable educational facilities have been given to the people of England, and with the light of returning knowledge a million of them have discovered a. path to "the Mass and the time-honored ceremonies of their fathers." , - It is the nature of darkness to obscure, &o obscured are the minds of some people in New Zealand that, they see in a"-. German piano a terrible menace to the safety of our country ; but they see no menace in a society with a German patron. The s Orange Society in Auckland has at least one of its lodges (No. 70) placed under the patronage of, and dedicated to, that German, Martin Luther, whom the ex-Kaiser declared to be his teacher, his inspiration, his moral guide. Numerous memorials of .Luther, have been jettisoned by Protestants in England and. the United States of America; Australia expressed dislike of. Lutheran churches; New Zealand grew alarmed at the presence . v of;;a<:piano with its formidable array of padded hammers --Auckland Liedertafel discarded its name; but

Auckland Orangemen see no unfitness in keeping a lodge dedicated to Martin Luther, in expecting the young manhood of this city to revere, to obey, to imitate the man whom the ex-Kaiser claimed for his teacher and guide. If the late war has made any two names anathema to Britishers, they are Luther and Wittenberg. It is interesting to note that the objection to a German piano came from Taranaki, the original settlers in which hailed from Devon and Cornwall — two counties whose manhood turned out in the 16th century to defend "the Mass and the timehonored ceremonies of their fathers" against "German troops whom the Government had hired." Who would do yeoman service to the Church must spread knowledge, the chief sources of which are the school in all its stages right up to the University, the press, the pulpit, the platform. Every attempt to perfect education is a help to the apostolate of the Catholic Church. In light the Church flourishes, in darkness she decays. American and English Catholicism owe very much to their cultured Catholic press. Long ago the Church in New Zealand called this agency to her aid, and right well has it served her. That it could do better is (I think) undeniable; that it will do better is certain if the Catholic public give it reasonable support. Up to the present the Church in New Zealand has made little or no use of the public platform. Perhaps the time was inopportune; yet in other parts of the world the platform is doing its bit towards the evolution of light that is leading men to the true fold. For obvious reasons I may not speak of tho pulpit's utility here and now. You are in a better position to judge of it than I. Action is evidence of life: a Church that is thoroughly alive will be up and doing all the time ; and much of her activity will be devoted to social conditions. The questions of to-day are social questions. A perfect solution of all our social difficulties can bo found in tho wonderful encyclicals of Pope Leo XIII. But while many of us talk readily enough about "the working man's charter," how many of us have read it? Not one layman in a thousand, not one priest in ten. Principals are effective only when applied: they cannot be applied if they are not known. We serve God Whom wo cannot see, when we serve our fellow-man whom we can see. Thus the Catholic religion, because it is the perfect worship of the true God, is essentially the' religion of service. When Dr. Pompallier came to New Zealand he truthfully told the Natives that he came here to take nothing from them : but to share with them all he had, especially tho divine gift of tho Catholic Faith. And to-day the Catholic Church in New Zealand, as in other lands, presents a picture of social service unparalleled outside her borders. About 1400 members of religious Orders, in schools, in hospitals, in benevolent institutions, have, by vow, consecrated themselves for tile to the service of others without desire of reward or praise: They live detached days; They labor not for praise ; For gold, They are not sold. They have wedded service as others wed a spouse, for good and all, until death calls them away. In proportion to numbers the other religious bodies in New Zealand should have 10,000 workers consecrated for life, wedded for life, to the religion of social servicethey have not ten dozen. In a sense the religion of consecrated social service, the religion that inspires men and women to swear that they will live only to serve, like the Mass and the time-honored ceremonies of our fathers, is alien to a great part of New Zealand. At the request of Dr. Pompallier, Captain Hobson, when ho annexed New Zealand to the British Empire, guaranteed "free and equal protection" to all religions. Nowadays we hear much about "equal rights for all, privilege for none." Would these advocates of equal rights and no privileges allow his Majesty the King equal rights with the least of his subjects to worship God according to the dictates of his conscience ? Do they not force his Majesty, under pain of forfeiture of his throne, to profess a religion imported from Germany, whether his conscience approves of it or not? Did they not force him to repudiate "the Mass and those time-honored ceremonies of our fathers" that were suppressed in England by "German troops whom the Government had hired"? King George V. happily reigning has always shown a decided preference for things English. If we exclude James 11. (who became a Catholic), who married and buried Lady Anne Hyde before he became heir-presumptive, King George V. is the only English Sovereign that has found an Englishwoman good enough to be his wife, since Henry VIII. married Katherine ;; Parr 376 years ; ago. When England was Catholic, Englishwomen were considered good enough to be

Queens. Since England became Protestant no Englishwoman was thought fit 'to wear a crown in England until King George V. made an English Mary his Queen. When sane democracy takes the reins of government in England, and in every land, it will, I hope, abolish all religious tests. Then will the King of England have liberty, should his conscience dictate it, to cherish "the Mass and the time-honored ceremonies of their fathers," for which the good old Devon men fought the hired German troops. "Their fathers" — ours: for we are no alien worshippers in a British Dominion who hold firmly to the faith of Edward the Confessor, of Caedmon and Bede, of Cuthbert and Boniface, of Willibrord, of Wilfrid, of Dunstan, of Thomas a'Beckett, of Sir Thomas More. We are no aliens in a British Dominion whose Catholic fathers built the universities and cathedrals of England; drew up the Magna Charta; made the most luminous pages in England's history. With pardonable pride we cherish the thought that we descend from a noble few that never ratted; that could neither be weaned by bribes nor driven by Prussian brutality from "the time-honored ceremonies of their fathers." We still prize the faith of old England; we still salute the flag on which our Catholic fathers' placed a cross; we look confidently for the day when light, dissipating the darkness of ignorance, will dispel bigotry and restore to our countrymen the lost jewel of the Catholic Faith, "the Mass and the time-honored ceremonies of their fathers."