Catholic World

New Zealand Tablet, 15 September 1921, Page 39

Catholic World

THE POPE AND OCEANIA. A Rome message (says the Irish Catholic for July 23) states that the Pope on Sunday received in private audience Right Rev. Felix Blanc, Vicar-Apostolic of Central Oceania. His Holiness took a great interest in the report on these distant islands and their inhabitants, and made inquiries about their native population. THE MAR IST ORDER IN JAPAN. A writer in La Croix recalls the fact that some months ago the French Academy gave its highest award to the Congregation of the Marists for the valued educational work accomplished by its members in Japan. The college of the "Star of the Morning" has more than one thousand students, the college of the "Star of the Sea" has six hundred, and the college of St. Joseph has three hundred pupils. The teaching of the Marists is so much appreciated by the Japanese Government that it has conferred several Chairs in its University on the Marists. Two members of the Order teach the French language and also literature at the Imperial University at Tokio, the capital of Japan. All the young men entering the diplomatic career study under their direction. A large number of Marists' pupils hold high positions in Japan. Some were present at the Peaco Conference. GROWTH OF CATHOLIC SCHOOLS IN FRANCE. It is an almost incredible paradox (writes a correspondent in Paris to an exchange) that, in spite of all the dislocation caused by the war, and the number of casualties among the French school teachers, and in spite of the enormous rise in the cost of education, the number of pupils in the Catholic schools, which are conducted without any subvention from the State, has increased substantially since before the war. In 1914 the estimated number of boys and girls receiving their education in the "free" Catholic primary schools was roughly nine hundred thousand. An investigation which has been just completed shows that in only 75 of the 96 French dioceses the total is now not less than 960,000, and that there are now 12,000 of these schools, and 29,000 schoolmasters and mistresses in these dioceses alone. This progress is all the more marvellous in view of all the difficulties in obtaining financial support on a larger scale than was formerly needed, especially since the old French aristocratic families, which have always been the most generous benefactors of the free schools, have nearly all been seriously impoverished by the war. It would have been as much as could be reasonably expected if the number of schools and pupils had remained stationary: it has actually increased, to such an extent that in 75 of the "free" dioceses of France, alone the total is greater than the total for the whole country before the war. Moreover, the inquiry show's that in some dioceses these voluntary Catholic schools already comprise more than half the total number of children in their districts. THE RIGHTS OF PARENTS IN EDUCATION: THE CATHOLIC POSITION IN ENGLAND DEFINED. At a recent meeting of the Executive Committee of the Catholic Education Council, the speech delivered by the Archbishop of Canterbury on May 24, at the annual meeting of the National Society was very carefully considered, and it was unanimously resolved, with the approval of the Hierarchy of England and Wales, to again re-state the Catholic position with regard to education, as expressed in the following resolutions originally passed in 1906, and reaffirmed in 1919, viz: (a) That no settlement of the education question can be accepted by Catholics which takes away from Catholic v parents the right (1) to have for their children Catholic schools, in which the teachers shall be Catholics, and shall

give definite religious instruction under Catholic control during school hours, (2) to have new Catholic schools recognised and maintained and enlargement of existing schools sanctioned, where the needs of the Catholic population so demand. (b) That no settlement can be accepted which does not safeguard the Catholic character of Catholic schools, either by retaining the existing proportion and powers of the foundation managers, or by some equally effectual means. (c) That no settlement can be accepted which does not provide for the continuance and maintenance of the existing Catholic training colleges and Catholic pupil teacher centres, and which does not grant facilities for extending the means of giving Catholic training to Catholic teachers. (d) That any proposal to lease, rent, or assign Catholic schools to the local education authority cannot be viewed but with grave anxiety, and that any such proposal which conflicts with their Catholic character, must be rejected. ANCIENT CORNWALL. Members of the Royal Cornwall Polytechnic Society motored through the beautiful woods in the Vale of Lanherne on Tuesday, July 5, and paid a visit at Lanherne Convent. The chaplain, Rev. J. Shryane, showed the visitors the chapel, and other parts of the convent such as arc open to visitors. The Lanherne Carmelite Convent is the old manor house of the Arundells, which has always remained in Catholic hands. There is a well-attested tradition that even through the most perilous periods of the Reformation a priest, sometimes several, were to bo. found at Lanherne, and that the Blessed Sacrament has always been kept there without a break through all the years of religious disaster. Lanherne is the oldest mission in Cornwall, having preserved unbroken its connection with pre-Reformation times. The manor house was handed over to the Carmelite Nuns in 1794, when they were driven from Antwerp by the Revolution. Its original owners, the Arundells, suffered much for the Faith. Amidst the changes and disasters of the Reformation they were the foremost champions of the ancient Faith of England. In the reign of Edward VI. Humphrey Arundell died gloriously for his Faith. His son, Sir John Arundell, was CAST INTO PRISON. for his Faith by Queen Elizabeth, and the next heir, for the same holy cause, suffered the forfeiture of two-thirds of his estates and of all his goods, and saved the remnants of his possessions only by paying a fine of £3OOO and an annual fine of £240 for non-attendance at the Established Church. Lanherne is a hallowed spot in Catholic history. The visitors then went on to Rialton, where they viewed the so-called priory, which was once a grange of the monks of St. Petrock's Priory, Bodmin, Cornwall, who held the manor at the time of the Domesday Survey in 1087. There were Augustinian Canons at Bodmin in the old days, and by a happy coincidence St. Mary's Priory, Bodmin, is to-day peopled by Augustinian Canons of the Lateran. The names of the old Augustinian Priors from the beginning of the twelfth century are known until the 27th February, 1538,. when Thomas Wandsworth, the last Prior, and eight Canons Regular, were obliged to surrender the Priory with its one hundred and ten acres of "demayne lands" which afterwards were sold to the Prideaux family, while their beautiful church, the largest in Cornwall, was given over to the vicars of THE NEW STATE ESTABLISHED RELIGION. . For three hundred years there was no Catholic church in Bodmin. An opening was made in 1846. In 1881 Dom Felix Menchini, C.R.L., an exile from France, from which his community had been forcibly expelled by the law of M. Constans, took up his abode in Bodmin. With him was Rev. Gilbert Higgins, C.R.L., now titular Prior of Bridlington. So for nearly half a century the Canons Regular have been settled at Bodmin, which is the mother house of all their English foundations. The site of the present Priory occupies about four acres. It is a fine building of three storeys, with guest-room community-room, refectory, on the ground floor, and rooms for the Fathers and a chapel upstairs. There is accommodation for twenty-five members of the Order of Canons Regular of the Lateran. The present Prior is Very Rev. G. MacGregor, D.D., whose parents resided for many years at Exeter.