The New Zealand Tablet THURSDAY, SEPTEMBER 23, 1920. BY THEIR FRUITS YE SHALL KNOW THEM

New Zealand Tablet, 23 September 1920, Page 25

The New Zealand Tablet THURSDAY, SEPTEMBER 23, 1920. BY THEIR FRUITS YE SHALL KNOW THEM

■" ]-——-—•—. , ■ ::- : , "'■■' § v REDERICK JOSEPH KINSMAN, Pro/JlisU testant. Bishop of Delaware, was led, by his special studies in history, and by the grace of God working in a sincere Christian, to overcome the prejudices of early training and to recognise and embrace the f o *®* truth in the One, Holy,, Catholic, ' and Apostolic Church, founded by Christ, its • invisible * head, -and < governed on earth by Christ's Vicar at Rome, ' its visible head. Conversion is usually a complicated process, especially in the case of a student : who seeks light and conviction on many details that would, for a less learned person, be covered by some general .principle. More than to anything else, Dr. Kinsman', attributed his conversion to a letter from the Reverend Dr. Laird, who attacked the Catholic Church, particularly,in,South America, and concluded by quoting: "By their fruits ye shall : know them. ' Dr. Laird was an old friend of Dr. Kinsman's and it is surely. a neat revenge that a letter written to discredit; Rome drove into ' its' fold one of the most esteemed and. cultured of American Episcopalians. Of the letter Dr. Kinsman says: "It led me to undertake a task which would not have: been' thought of without some such stimulating occasion. This was' to learn all I could of the work ■ and influence of the Roman

Catholic Church in the United States • The chapter in his book, Salve Mater, in which he tells of the result of his inquiry ought .to be read to many members of the New Zealand Cabinet and to all members of the Council of Churches.

Dr. Kinsman now realised that he had often written and spoken of the Catholic Church, and that he had neglected so obvious a duty as to make first-hand investigations: “I presumed to instruct on matters connected with the Roman Catholic Church, deriving most of my notions from the thirteenth century and the other side of the Atlantic.” Dr. Laird’s words gave him the final impulse to inquire for himself. He had a poor opinion of Catholic preachers; he had read of catechisms that taught that no faith should be kept with heretics and that it was a venial sin to steal from Protestants. Tyrrell’s remark about a man who left the house with smoky chimneys for one where, the drains were out of order suggested to him that there was evil beneath the surface in the Church. He wished honestly to find out for himself what the truth was. Thus he went on his voyage of discovery in his own country. To his surprise he felt even more at home in Catholic churches in New York, Philadelphia, and Portland than he had done in Rome and Africa ; and he learned that “the Mass is primarily worship of Our Lord, affecting the minds and manners as well as morals of successive congregations of thousands as they go from the beauty and silence of the great Sacrifice to their myriad homes” ; and, as compared with his own High Church, he saw that “it is one thing to have the Church doing these things always for all her children, and another to have a good priest struggling for them against the inertia of his congregation.” As he expected, he liked the Mass and the reverent administration of the Sacraments, but he thought he should rather disparage the preaching. To his surprise he was agreeably astonished: “In the Roman churches I have heard every kind of poor sermon I ever heard elsewhere except two: a discourse on some subject of general interest in which Christianity is vaguely referred Jo, or one obviously intended to serve as an exhibition of the ability and personal fascination of a self-conscious preacher. Nevertheless, I have never heard one which, whatever may have been its crudities and awkwardnesses, was not an effort to expound some Christian truth in a practical way, with greatest reverence for Holy Scripture and constant recognition of the authority of ‘ Our Divine Lord.’ The kind of preaching which I invariably heard in Roman churches is that which, as a boy at St. Paul’s, I came to believe in as ideal. . . In my own preaching I aimed at giving a simple message in Our Lord’s Name; yet I recognised that in this regard it would compare unfavorably with that of any young Catholic priest. . The most eloquent long address I- ever listened to was delivered by Cardinal O’Connell at a" mass-meeting in Madison Square Garden, and the best address on a religious subject by a layman, by Mr. Bourke Cockran at a dinner in Wilmington. . . The preaching of the Roman Catholic, priesthood in the United States can rank with the best.” He had much conceit of Protestant scholarship, but when he examined the Catholic Encyclopedia he got the shock of his life; “A distinctly sobering effect is in store for any clergyman of the Episcopal Church who wishes to examine this and then imagine what he and his colleagues would have made of a similar attempt.” In history, he was by way of. being a specialist. He now came to read Catholic historians and got another shock “By ,revealing unsuspected abysses of ignorance they have made me wish to do all my history work over again.” When he came to investigate the moral teaching of the Catholic Church he felt sorry for the Protestant children because they had not such advantages as the youth in Catholic . schools; “I discovered a body of varied practical teaching for all classes of people, inculcating the highest standards of strict" morality and affording practical training, in the science of holiness, altogether ad-

mirable, and having no parallel in' the similar literature of my own religious body or. of any Protestant denomination of which I had knowledge." Especially was he moved to admiration by the sound position of the Church in all that concerns the sanctity of the marriages-tie and, of the home. When he went on to inquire into the Church's dealing with economic and social questions he was amazed at the full knowledge displayed and at the uncompromising way in which all subjects were viewed in the light of - Christian principles. Lastly,' the test of the War, showing him how nobly the Catholics did their part, and how much religion was to their soldiers, gave a final proof of the good fruit borne by the branches of the great tree of the Catholic Church in the United States. Verily, "by their fruits ye shall know them." * The chapters on Anglican Orders, and on the Reformation are intensely interesting to students of theology and history. They are full of self-revelation, and a testimony not only to the ability but to the sincerity of this honest seeker after truth. In all, the book is another splendid tribute to the Catholic Church from the pen of an earnest, religious man who was qualified by a life-time of study to write with authority. It is a work that will appeal to Catholic students and also to the educated ministers of the Anglican and Presbyterian Churches who will be able to appreciate its logic and learning. Needless to say it is not a book that the average P.P.A., or Council-of-Churches parson could follow intelligently. For them, the Menace, the Sentinel, and the Nation with Michael McCarthy and Chiniquy as "Catholic" authorities. '