Our Roman Letter

New Zealand Tablet, 29 December 1921, Page 17

Our Roman Letter

(By “Stannous.”) '•

A very large pilgrimage of Irish Franciscan Tertiaries’ arrived here recently in connection with the celebration of the seventh centenary of the founding of the Third Order of St. Francis. The Catholic nations were all adequately represented, but one of the most imposing delegations was that from our own country. The General Congress was in session for three whole days and practically all the Franciscan churches in Rome were utilised by the various bands of pilgrims. The Irish celebration centred round the Church of St. Isidore, a hallowed spot, sanctified for all generations of Irishmen by the memory of the famous Irish Franciscan friar, Father Luke Wadding. One of the noteworthy features in this very devotional Irish pilgrimage was the frequency with which one heard the welcome words of the old tongue. At the General Congress The Irish delegate delivered his address in his own

national language and at one of the subsidiary sessions at St. Isidore’s the Reverend Director of the pilgrimage gave a stirring address in the same tongue. During the days of their sojourn here many of the pilgrims visited the Irish College where they were hospitably received by the genial and courteous Rector, Few of them left Rome without a visit to the residence of Mr. Gavan-Duffy, the Dail Eireann representative in the Eternal City ; in the. Envoy’s absence at Dublin his charming wife bade the pilgrims the hundred thousand welcomes to her Roman home.

Mention of our Irish Envoy reminds me of the text of a little known, letter written by Michael Davitt more than thirty-four years ago on this very subject of a lay representative at Rome of the Irish people. In passing I may recall the fact that “ecclesiastical Ireland has for long been ably represented by an unbroken line of brilliant Churchmen. But Davitt wanted a duly accredited ambassador of the Irish laity and mentioned his desire in the letter I refer to. That letter was written from Ballybrack under date April 18, 1887, and was directed to Prior Glynn, who at the time was collecting funds for the erection here in Rome of the Church of St. Patrick. Davitt believed that Irish representation here would not only help tfie National Cause but would be of service also to the Labor movement. It is worth ■while quoting one or tAvo passages

(a) To one so well acquainted as yourself with the history of English intrigues in Romeand one who for ft years has done yeoman service there in protecting Irish interestsit is unnecessary for me to dwell at any length upon the immense advantage it would be to the cause of Ireland if a duly accredited agent representing those interests, were resident in the Eternal City. The system of moral assassination now in full swing has, as you well know, been carried on in Rome against Irish National movements by English agents during a great portion of this century. More than once there has been grave danger of such unscrupulous emissaries succeeding in bringing our people into what would have been a disastrous conflict. If our enemies have not succeeded in their design it was not through any neglect on their part in attaching full importance to Rome as a point from which they might successfully attack our dearest interests. On the other hand whatever success we have scored against the enemy there, has been in spite of the indifference with which many amongst us regard Rome as a post which could thus be occupied to our disadvantage. (b) In proportion as the influence of the Irish race is felt in the great Labor movements of the English-speaking world will be the efforts of . our* enemies to poison the ear of Rome against us; and it will be as much the interest of our people in America and the British Colonies as it is ours here at home to counteract this as fa*t as possible in the only practical way in which it -can be done. Men of Irish birth are the chief inspiration of most of the advanced reform movements of the day. Compelled by the infamy of England’s rule in Ireland to become “hewers of woodland drawers of water” at home and abroad, we are, both as a nation and as a race, leading the righteous cause of labor in a giant contest, against monopolies and privileges on both sides of the Atlantic. . We must see to it .that the ruling classes* of England, representing as they do the heartless civilisation of laissez-faire , shall not misrepresent us at the centre of the Spiritual Empire of

the world, where we , should ambition ,-to be known and rightly . understood asTTstriving i for a civilisation of - justice and - humanity in conformity "With the doctrines preached; in the Sermon on the" Mount. " ; pt. The Irish race has done more for the Catholic Church than all the other nations of Europe, and this, quenchless national ambition of ours ought to have equal recognition with other Christian nationalities at the headquarters of . the Christian world. England, it is true, will not permit' a representative of the Vatican to come to Ireland. But she cannot prevent Ireland from having a duly recognised Irish representative in Rome.’ 3 , . 3 * From the last extract it is evident that Davitt’s optimism must have been very much greater than his practical knowledge of England’s power in'the sphere of international politics. Hs is, however, almost mathematically accurate besides being very happy in his phrasing, when he refers to what he so graphically describes as the system of moral assassination that is one of the ordinary principles of British diplomacy. Here in this very city the records are * not few of how dearly Irish ecclesiastics have had sometimes to pay for the exercise of their right to love their country. Going back through the archives of the past hundred‘years ’ one finds example after example of this system of petty persecution wherein one representative Irishman after another has had to endure months of social ostracism and perhaps years of ecclesiastical neglect. One wonders sometimes why it is that men’s hearts do not break under it all." Decade after decade, the task of watching Irish in- - terests has meant a vigilance so unwearying and a reward so thankless that I sometimes ask myself, in the midst of old letters and records of- struggles that never end, what is the mystery of Irish patriotism, the mystery that makes men count all tilings else as loss if they but serve, though ever so little, the country God gave them to love. Looking across the history of this Roman defence of the Irish Church and the Irish people and recalling how bravely men like Cullen, Moran, O’Riordan, and one or two others bore the hurts of life, how patiently they met ingratitude even from some among their own, how loyally they walked the lonely ways of their thankless service in a poisonous atmosphere of petty gossip and villainous intrigue. I ask myself what heroic folly it is, what grand and glorious madness it is, that sends other men to the same prosaic warfare through all the days of their academic lives. Is it all folly, yonder, hour by hour, ' To choose not peace but strife, and there to dare The lion couched in his unnative lair, The world-famed lion, mighty to devour? Oh, that some folly as splendid were a flower, Not, on all shores but those, so wondrous rarel Common as weed in Ireland everywhere That splendid folly blooms, and hath the power To make a mere slight boy not only face . Death with no tremblings, with no coward alarms, Bu(. like a lover woo it to his arms, Clasp with a joyous and a rapt embrace Death’s beauty, death’s dear sweetness, death’s pure grace, And count all else as naught beside death’s charms. When Sir William Watson wrote those lines for Ireland’s gallant youth he had no smallest thought for Ireland’s men of maturer years who no less gallantly should go into another battle. He knew nothing of the stern and dogged determination of older men who in each generation-, have stood up to a system of moral assassination, 'that moral assassination of which Davitt had knowledge more .than thirty years ago. Moral assassination! The phrase is photographic in its correspondence with the bitter fact. Rome has an atmosphere that is favorable to reminis-' cence. Sometimes of an evening, when I look out on the changes taking place throughout the world and see the thrones and kingdoms that are departing and the vigorous new States that are everywhere springing into existence, sometimes my thoughts turn to the contemplation of the way in which our own dear land was regarded in international politics in the days of long* ago. What recurs most often now is the memory of the gradual elimination, of the title of Kingdom of Ireland from the papal documents of the centuries. Generally speaking, up to the -

. -fourteenth century our country was regularly referred to fourteenth century our country was regularly referred to * r in i such - documents as the - Kingdom of Ireland. * For in- . stance* during the ’.pontificate of Honorius the Third ;*. (1216-1226) that nomenclature is frequently found in documents emanating from the Supreme Pontiff. ’ This usage *.underwent -a 1 change in subsequent pontificates. Indeed, : *;it - had practically disappeared altogether by - the time of John XXII., whose pontificate of eighteen years began in ’ the year 1316, and w as beginning to be replaced I by such . equivalents >• as the land of I Ireland; or the parts of Irelandr, i or simply; Ireland. The; country was regarded as subject Ti to .the- sway of- the- English sovereign, under the overlordship of the Pope. From the English point of view this was -1 a delightfully ’ satisfactory • assumption to the dominant I:, parties i concerned. fi; This ‘ convenient assumption was accep- , . ted without protest or objection oh the part of the English t: > till the day when Pharaoh arose who knew not Joseph. • When Henry.-the Eighth, of matrimonial memory, had , begun his quarrel with the Pope he was naturally anxious : -to ,be beholden to the "Supreme Pontiff in nothing whatso- ; - ever.- :( . He .could not brook the thought that his Irish do- : minion depended in any- way on the Pope of Rome, and of course he -did not wish i other peoples or other nations > to -twit* him with his temporal vassalage to him who ; sat - on the Fisherman’s throned . Accordingly one fine day in • the year 1542 bluff King Hal convened what he playfully .i , called- an ;Irish, Parliament and bade that cringing assem- .. bly to proclaim him with all speed King of Ireland. The ;: royal -behest, was dutifully carried out . with all pomp and ~ ceremony, i and Ireland was thus proclaimed as a kingdom * subject to none ' other than the Tudor king. And as King .- of . Ireland Henry the Eighth reigned until- at last he was -gathered - unto his wives. « A -few'-years later the turn of the-wheel of fortune placed a Catholic queen on the thrones of England and ...Ireland. In regard to her sovereignty of England the ■ royal lady’s position was- clear in fact and safe in law. But there was -quite a delicate situation to be considered in regard to-her. claim to . the sovereignty of Ireland. , Certainly, as legitimate * heir: to Henry the Eighth her .. father, . and. to . Edward ■ the : Sixth her brother, she was Queen of. Ireland -as far as.- an Act of a faked Parliament could make her so. But as a good Catholic she remembered the overlordship ?of the Pope, i and she had conscientious objections to , assuming the; title , of Queen of Ireland for the quite evident reason; that any such assumption would come perilously near to an infringement of the preiogative of the. Supreme Pontiff. The problem seemed at first insoluble, but-diplomatic finesse , found a 'perfectly simple solution. ...In ’a ■;Consistory held in the Vatican om .< June 7, 1555, his Holiness; Pope Paul IV., surrounded by the cardinals, solemnly-,declared Ireland to be a kingdom, and handed the said Kingdom of Ireland over to her Gracious Majesty Queen*,Mary,- thus : setting the royal conscience at rest. A few days later a document"was drawn up and duly signed,; setting- forth the fact that Ireland was to be regarded, as a : Kingdom for evermore;. with all the rights, .■privileges,, honors, and dignities attaching at that time to kingdoms in each- and every part of the civilised ■ - world. • ■ When Mary, thus ; Queen of Ireland as well as Queen of England, had-been laid to rest , she was succeeded by Elizabeth, who boldly took over the Kingdom of Ireland without , any qualms about what - the Holy . Father might think of the step. Thus iti happened that each succeeding monarch, legitimate or otherwise, held himself to be King of Ireland as well : as King of England. And the title Kingdom of Jreland” appears to -have- been duly recognised in English judicial procedure. At the same time, the Vatican And: its ministers continued to employ the title because Pope Paul IV. had solemnly established it forever. v The { . English sovereigns were no less ready to use it because it had been conferred, on them by the obedient Irish' Parliament convened by Henry the Eighth • * besides, it increased their dignity to have one. more kingdom added to their, dominions. The title therefore conJ . nd ‘“ al usc tiU «><> year 1800. . In that year it . served England s purpose to dispense with it. By a starthng cn.no,donee It disappear,.,l from Roman documents about the same time But in the long interval that elap-. a between i° 5 and 1800 lrel “ d in. the eyes, of Pope . Ireland 1118 ” " ah ayS re S arded as. the Kingdom of