Current Topics

New Zealand Tablet, Volume L, Issue 36, 13 September 1923, Page 18

Current Topics

Teaching the Catechism The N.C.W.C. News Service reports from Rome the publication of a Motu Proprio establishing a new section, in the Congregation of the Council to supervise the teaching of the catechism. Besides common catechism instruction, his Holiness recommends that schools for the training of teachers in Christian doctrine be established. Members of the episcopate are requested to report to the Congregation of Council, every third year, concerning the teaching of doctrine in their respective dioceses. It has been announced that the Holy See is preparing a new text of a catechism for the use of the universal Church. The Ku Klux Klan , . Apparently the parsons whose idea of- Christian ■ charity is the oblation of the lives and property of their Catholic neighbors want the infamous Ku Klux Klan amongst us here, as in Australia. We have had a visit (in Dunedin) from one of these wild hotgospel men from Canterbury, and judging from the murderous specimens of “Protestant Literature” circulated at his meeting, the Klan cannot be too too hot or heavy for himself and those of his kidney. Sir Francis Bell, to whom a policeman armed at least with a baton is not a fact, finds such infamous attacks on Catholics quite in order, which is what one might expect from the godfather of the stupid, bigoted, and ill-drafted Marriage Bill but it is to be hoped that,- apart from the Acting Prime Minister in whose election the people have had no voice, there may be enough gentlemen in the New Zealand Government to prevent the establishment among us of a society against which the law of the land has been rightly set in motion in several States of America. No doubt the fact that the Klan has been accused of burning Catholic property in Canada and the United States is a strong commendation of it for . certain New Zealand parsons and politicians. Do not forget that to assert our right to defend ourselves against attackers of the Church is something akin to felony in the eyes of the people who gave police-protection to such dear friends and worthy associates of theirs. How Catholics regard the Klan in America is clear from the following reference at the Convention of the A.0.H., in Montreal, July 20: President James Deery, in his annual report, declared that no greater duty faced the order than exposure of the Klan. Specifically, he urged the support of the Unity League of America, which, he said, Was organised in the United States to combat the Klan there. “In the United States,” he asserted, “the Klan questions the right of Jews, Catholics, negroes, and foreigners, to enjoy the,-right of American citizenship, and has entered the field of practical politics in many States, successfully electing senators, judges, governors, mayors, and sheriffs. It appeals to the ignorant and prejudiced mind. It is well financed and well led. “It is not the Jews, or negroes, or Catholics who are ii? danger; it is American liberty.” An Anglican Scholar Reviewing a recently published book, called Anglican Essays, a writer in the Review of Reviews, referring to Rev. x Mr. Coulton’s essay on “Rome as Unreformed,” tells us that this gentleman approaches his subject as a Cambridge scholar, with all the medieval Latin lore at his finger-tips. If Mr. Coulton is representative of ’either Anglican or Cambridge scholarship, it is not saying much for the one or the other. We here give a sample of what his boasted knowledge of Latin lore is like; says the Month , “there occur in one sentence no less than three mistakes which would be justly called ‘ howlers ’ if one were dealing with a schoolboy. In Canon

1060 of the New Codex occurs the phrase: Quodsi adserit perversionis perieulum conjugis catholici et prolis, conjugium ipsa etiam lege divina vetatur. This Mr. Coulton translates: ‘ And, if there be any danger of the perversion of the Catholic spouse or the children, let the marriage itself be forbidden even by divine law.’ It is really too' bad: et translated as or, ipsa , taken as if it agreed with conjugium, and vetatur mistaken for the present subjunctive. No wonder the Church forbids unauthorised translations.” We merely note that when a “Cambridge scholar” can make- such mistakes in translating very simple Latin, it is small wonder that our uneducated P.P.A. parsons are guilty of such blunders as we sometimes see here. Anglo-Catholics About fifty years ago the Church of England began to take serious notice of the Ritualist Movement. Various persecutory measures were advanced which only made the victims more popular. Then freedom was tacitly allowed to the Anglo-Catholics within the Church of England, even when the freedom was contradictory to the judicial pronouncements of the authorities. In 1904 there was an official investigation into the state of things. At the present time, Convocation, and the National Church Assembly are introducing proposals in official cognisance of the Report of the Royal Commission of Investigation. It is now known that the Anglo-Catholics refuse to accept the alleviations which are being offered them. According to the Bishop of Durham they require nothing less than the formal permission to transform the Prayer Book into a perfect replica of the Roman Missal, and also the right to impose the Confessional on Church mem ■ The proposals referred to aim at conforming the Anglican liturgy with that of the Early Church, while leaving Confession optional as by terms of the First Exhortation. As the Anglo-Catholics reject the concession, the Bishop of Durham proposes the introduction of Church Courts competent to enforce discipline; then, that the official proposals .should be carried out; finally, that the Anglo-Catholics should be compelled either to bow to the revised Prayer-Book or be compelled to quit the Church of England. This militant Bishop has logic on his side. The official titles and the terms of vows of subscription and alliance of the clergy to the Church are on his side. There is a clear vow made by every cleric of the Church to use the Prayer-Book liturgy, and not any other form, including by plain implication the Roman Missal, A vow is also made to respect the National Church and its authority, whereas at Anglo-Catholic Congresses the very . name of the Church of England is anathema. If asked why they do not take the reasonable step of going to Rome, the Anglo-Catholics reply that as they acknowledge the Pope’s “Constitutional” primacy, while rejecting his autocratic supremacy, they really consider themselves united in spirit with Rome already. And so it would seem that they are “neither here nor there.” Carson’s Contrition Some amusing instances., of the loyalty of Loyal Orangemen are found in recent Irish papers. Thus, we find the Rev. Canon Austin, M.A., Rector of Knock, telling his people not to trust the British Government any further than they can see it; and Lord Carson, in a speech to the Southern Unionists, sits on the stile and laments that all his life he has been a false guide and a deceiver of his friends, in that he urged them to trust the same British Government as good Unionists. “I was a false prophet from my youth upwards,” he cries; and it is true in a fuller sense than he intends. • But the noble lord was by no means the good Unionist he professes to have been at all times. He was an experienced lawyer of nearly forty years of age what time he joined the Home Rule Club like a decent Irishman, in the days before jobs and cheques came his way from the hands of the Government which he now'says ought not to be trusted. Concerning this renegade’s career, a writer in the Irish . Weekly says

“Men have sacrificed their worldly prospects, their wealth, their dearest worldly, interests, their lives, as teachers of the Truth. Lord Carson’s career shows that wisdom in this life lies on the side of those who prefer to figure as * false teachers.’ While-as he confesses now, he was deluding some of his countrymen, he managed to become— Crown Prosecutor in Ireland; - Solicitor-General for Ireland Solicitor-General for England; \ Attorney-General for England • First Lord of the Admiralty ; Member of the British Cabinet (without portfolio) ; M.P. for University of Dublin; M.P. for Duncairn (Belfast) ; A Knight; A Peer; and A Lord of Appeal in Ordinary, “A broken-hearted ‘ false prophet’ and c false teacher ’ with this wonderful record of success behind him who sadly announces that he has abandoned politics —THAT ‘ POLITICS ARE DEAD IN HIS SOUL ’— and that * his politics are now humanity and nothing less,” may find sympathy in some quarters: but if any one has tears to shed, I would advise .him to spare the flood until some cause more deserving than the woes of Lord Carson claims lachrymal tribute. . He avows himself ‘ a false prophet ’ and ‘ false teacher ’ of the ‘ Southern loyalists.’ Did he know as much when he abandoned them in 1918 ‘Why did he keep silence at the London Mansion House regarding his performances as a ‘rebel’ in the North of Ireland from 1910 to 1916? ‘Humanity’ will have the benefit of his services henceforward ! It was written of Edmund Burke— of the greatest and most truly disinterested of political philosophers and statesmen —that ‘ he gave up to Party what was meant for mankind .’ Poor ‘humanity’ will not thrill with joyous anticipation when it learns that the self-confessed ‘ false prophet ’ and ‘ false teacher ’ of the Coercion Courts and the military parade grounds has donned armor and volunteered for its service. It would have been good for humanity, for the human race as well as for that fraction of mankind who inhabit Ireland North and South, if the gentleman who proclaimed his failure in London the other day had never emerged from the obscurity which was his portion until the Perpetual Coercion Act of 1887 had passed through the British Parliament.” Ireland’s Difficulties The majority of the Irish people voted for the Government because it alone had a definite policy to offer for the solution of the country’s difficulties, which are neither few nor slight. Speaking of them, in an article in the Homestead, “A.E.” sums them up thus: “What we believe Ireland wants at the present time are men of intellect, of special and expert knowledge, and of character and honesty. ‘ ‘Consider the problems the next Government must Lace: the raising of huge sums of money to pay off debts incurred before and after the Treaty, the alteration of our fiscal system to suit Irish circumstance, the provision of employment for disbanded soldiers in the Irish army, for it is agreed on all sides that the army cannot be maintained permanently on its war footing. There are twelve or thirteen thousand prisoners who along with thirty thousand or more soldiers must be unloaded on a labor market already incapable of absorbing the unemployed. There is the problem of , solving our relations with North-East Ireland, the development of agriculture and industry, .education, housing, and other problems, none of which can be neglected, * and a satisfactory solution of any one of these problems -cannot be effected by mere eloquent generalisers upon freedom, law, order, agriculture, industry, but must be tackled by men who have special or expert knowledge or at least such good intellect and education that they will be competent critics or helpers of those on whom such weighty business devolves.”

- That the Government has already shewn administrative capacity is the opinion of such good judges as “A.E.” and T. P. Gill, "while the Financial Times, from its limited point of view also pays it the tribute of admiration, saying; “The Irish Exchequer returns fcfc the first quarter of the financial year are not only satisfactory in themselves, but add substantially to the growing volume of testimony to the great improvement of order in the Free State. This time, too, there is the advantage of comparison with the preceding period, an advantage which did not exist last year when the Government first came into existence. -“The ordinary receipts total £17,713,100, which is an increase of £2,587,200.” • x One of the most serious troubles in the path of progress is the number of unemployed in Ireland at the present time. The gravity of the situation may be seen from an official report which gives the following information : At July 9, 1923, the number of people recorded by Employment Exchanges and Branch Employment Offices in the Irish Free State as registered for employment was 32,016, as compared with 31,001 on July 2, showing an increase of 1,015, Week ending Previous Corresp’ding 9th of July, 1923 week week in 1922 Men • 24,571 23,927 33,479 Women 6,165 5,821 6,511 Boys 617 601 763 Girls 663 652 646 Total 32,016 31,001 41,399 The following are the Exchanges at which the largest numbers are recorded : Week ending Previous Corresp’ding 9th July, 1923 week week in 1922 Dublin ... ... 9289 9027 12,475 Cork 4219 4234 6230 Limerick ... ... 1876 1756 2109 Waterford ... 1370 1320 2025 Wexford ... 1038 1070 11,195 The total numbers of claims current on July .9, 1923, in connection with Unemployment Insurance Benefit (total unemployment) were as follows: Men ... ... ... ... 23,900 Women ... «... ... 5,165 Boys ... ... ... >••: 215 Girls ... ... •«.: ..* 219 29,499 The Missionary Spirit in Germany The German-Hungarian College in Rome, on the occasion of the recent visit of some leaders of the missionary movement in Germany, held a celebration at which various orators reviewed the position of foreign mission work in Germany (writes the Rome correspondent to the London Catholic Times). In 1914 German Catholics had 40 houses for the foreign missions (said Dr. Louis of Aix-la-Chapelle—-with 4000 missionary Fathers, 3000 Brothers, and 5000 Sisters, while 25 reviews and 20 almanachs interested German public - opinion in the work. A speciality of the German missions was the scientific missionary movement, which dates from 1909. Germany founded the first chair of missionary science in one of her universities. The ten volumes of the review Zeitschrift fur Missions Wissenschaft are a veritable arsenal for missionary action. The < great missionary unions of Germany, such as the union of St. Francis Xavier at Cologne, number hundreds of thousands of associates. Prince Louis of Lowenstein, in his closing discourse, said that the war of 1914-1918 had not dulled interest in the missions in Germany. He congratulated especially the German students in Rome on their zeal for the missionary cause., ' 1 \ [ . J