Current Topics

New Zealand Tablet, Volume LI, Issue 28, 2 July 1924, Page 18

Current Topics

An Editorial Bow

From many friends in various parts of the Dominion we have received telegrams and letters .of congratulation on account of the honor done to the Tablet by the recent message of his Holiness. To all his good friends, on behalf of the staff and of himself, the Editor returns cordial thanks for their kindness. It is a coincidence that late mails should have brought us numerous tributes , from readers at home and abroad who never dreamed that the Pope was joining them. A reader in the North Island wrote to say that the Pastor, a certain learned dignitary of the Church, recommending the Tablet, told his flock that they ought to thank God for the paper and its Editor, which was a compliment coming from such a source. From Landashire, a reader writes to say that he often receives the Tablet from N.Z. friends, and that he is in constant admiration of the soundness and -Variety of its Catholic news. From Westminster, a convert writes to tell us that she loves the New Zealand Tablet and finds it most useful and helpful, especially in connection with a catechetical class she has undertaken. An old friend from the West Coast sends a cheering line to say that for forty-seven years now he has read the Tablet and always found it a first rate Catholic paper. Well, it is consoling for an editor to find that his reward is not altogether '"fiddler’s pay”—or more kicks than ha’pence. Press Legends (Extracts from liar: Its Ratine, Cause, and Cure, by G. Lowes Dickinson.) Heie is the actual growth of a war-time press legend: Koclnischc Zeitunij. “When the fall of Antwerp got known the church bells ■were rung’’ (meaning in Germany). Le Matin. t ■ * According to the Kodnischc Zeitmuj, the clergy of Antwerp were compelled to ring the church bells when the fortress was taken.” The Times. According to what the Matin has heard from Cologne, the Belgian priests who refused to ring the church bells when Antwerp was taken have been driven away from their places.” Corriere della Sera, of Milan. s “According to what the Times has heard from Cologne, via Pans, the unfortunate Belgian priests who refused to ring the church bells when Antwerp was taken have been sentenced to hard labor.” - Matin. - - “According to information to the Corriere della Sera from Cologne, via London, it is confirmed that the barbaric conquerors of Antwerp punished the unfortunate Belgian priests for their heroic refusal to ring the church bells by hanging them as living clappers to the Fells with their .heads down.” .' The Five Plagues .. . w ; There were nine .-in, Egypt, of -course, bub -to-day there are five plagues ; destroying civilisation/ , Pope Benedict enumerated them in- an alldcuticW to the College of Cardinals, on Christmas t Eve,; 1920, ai,d liis. words found suchavor .with . the lion, .James ; .Bbyk - that Tie made them Die basis of a iking address, before,; the American Bar Association Convention., appealing ltd thateminent, body <> jurists to _ weigh, "T .the seriousness bf • the dangers to which the^dpe.ref erred.. ‘-Tim plfigitfis are: - • (1) The unprecedented challenge dh alithority in the present time; %'■ >..•\ .• 4 , b _ V-„ ' . ' * * ZiK I • • - • ' •** y (4 i 11 oq uallyjinprccedepfed" hatred;4et^e4miil^fid 11 ( n ua j-y 'unprecedented hatrfejl between 7 'mftiil and • Ilian; ... , v • - /J - K'S? : -.A : w-

(3) An abnormal aversion to work; _ : '■ - " (4) The excessive thirst for pleasure as the end-and aim of life; __ . , • (5) The gross materialism which denies the reality ofV the spiritual in human life. We have them everywhere. Now Zealand parents', mourn for the dead days when their children used to honor ' father and mother; New Zealand judges comment freely on the large numbers of- juvenile criminals brought before." them; outside the Catholic Church there is hardly a pretence at honoring God among the masses. The work of politicians and lying pressmen who taught people to hate their fellow-men during the war has borne evil fruit. Everywhere crimes of violence are more common than they used to be. Life is less sacred. , Property seems ■ to have no sacredness at all.- Homo ho mini .lupus- men have become as* wolves towards each other. The love of work has died in the hearts of men. Men work for pay alone, and do as little as they can compatibly with drawing their pay. Pride in work well done has disappeared. Shirking has replaced industry. Duty has lost its appeal. Panem el circens.es ! It is sport and pleasure before work now. The modern youth does not let duty interfere with enjoyment. The pictures, the dance, the football must come before the fulfilment of duty whether towards God or man. And a race of weeds grows anace. Eat and drink for to-morrow you die, is the gospel of the modern young man and woman. The present gross and real pleasures are weighed against the things of the soul, and they usually win. Conscience has lost' its power, and the fear and love of God have been driven out by years of training in schools specially designed to kill religion. And thus, here as in America, men and women go . on blindly until tho Voice that no dreamer can ignore calls out; “Thou fool! This night I will demand thy soul of thee.” Poincare an Anticlerical During the war, French anti-clericals were shamed into silence by the heroism of the clergy, great numbers of whom covered themselves with glory. Even many who had been expelled by French atheists came' back again to lay down their lives for Franco which even the harsh treatment they had received under French laws did not make them love less. While all this was happening there was . continual exposure of the cowardice,, and incompetency, and trickery of the Freemasons and Jews who were behind the persecutions. Consequently, fear of decent public opinion, if nothing else, kept the anti-clericals quiet for some time after the end of the' war. ; The people knew a hat the Church had done; they also knew what the Masons had failed to do hence the latter deemed it wise to make no attack until certain things were less vivid in the minds of the public. That they thought the time for. a renewal of the persecution was at hand is clear from a speech made by Poincare recently at a Republican banquet in Paris. Speaking of reforms to be undertaken, he went on to say that they must regulate, in conformity with the WaldeckRousseau plan, the status of the -religious congregations, lequiring.them to submit to the law, and stipulating that those who were authorised by the law should." bo either ' missionaries or attendants on the-sick, or capable of work-, ing in the public interest. That this movement was to be in the interests of the godless schools, which as the 1900 .. Commission reported, promote anarchy and Vice in France, was clear from,the words he used in reference to education. Catholics read in his words the first signal for a hosting of the old enemies , of religion* and his sinister- remarks * - prepared; them for persecution. Since he made that speech Poincare has, received the Order of the Boot from.the people : of-France, and, so far as he is concerned, his power ■is I ■ ~n j - present : of no account. -It is not unlikely 'that . the ’ memories oh the-people were not as short 'as'he presumed; 5 and; that the threat conveyed in his speech hastened his • downfall.' v•,n -y .v •; > ••; .-*■ ■ ... - ,

The Boundary Question N ' ■i ; The, capitalist papers in England have * recently been veering round towards the side of the Orangemen. Articles have appeared in such journals as the Times and the Daily Mail defending Sir James Craig’s attitude and arguing that England is not bound by the Treaty. It is nothing new to find such papers backing those who are ready to break faith with Ireland, but, on tips occasion, the weight of the honorable sections of the press is thrown decisively on the / side of the Free State. Following the peremptory declaration of the Manchester Guardian as to England’s clear duty, in the matter, the Nation and Athenaeum says; , ■ x Sir James Craig has announced the refusal of the Ulster Government to appoint a representative on the Boundary Commission, which the Government has decided to set up in conformity with the Irish Treaty. There is room for considerable doubt as to the precise procedure which should now be followed. Can the . Commission function legally without the Ulster representative? If not, would a representative nominated by the Governor be a representative appointed by the Government of Northern Ireland within the meaning of the Act Or must a further Act be passed, either authorising the Chairman and the Free State representative to net alone, or providing for the appointment of an alternative member? These are questions of considerable legal nicety, which must rest primarily with the Law Officers to determine. But on the es- • sential issue there .is room for no doubt at all. We must fulfil our obligation, and set up the Commission, however constituted, to revise the Ulster boundary in accordance with the provisions of the Treaty. It was entirely right to make every effort to reach an agreed settlement, before proceeding with this course. But now that these efforts have broken down, we can honorably delay no longer. We regret that the Times , in its laudable desire to do justice to the Ulster point of view, should have , cast doubts on the binding nature of our obligation, arguing sophistically that the provision for an Ulster' representative made the promise of the Commission conditional on her consent. Such an interpretation is utterly at variance with the manifest intention of the Treaty. Nor can we escape from our duty by accepting the Ulster plea that the Government of Ireland Act of 1920 constituted an equally binding and prior obligation towards her. On this point the letter of Lord Justice O’Connor in the Times of May 2 is conclusive. The Act of 1920 had neither the form nor the significance of a treaty. It was simply an Act of Parliament, v r subject, like any other, to subsequent amendment, and expressly reserving the full sovereignty of the Imperial Parliament. On the other hand, our agreement with the Free State was couched in the form of a treaty, and was . designed to represent a solemn compact between the two countries. Ulster may have reason to complain that we should have signed this treaty without consulting her. The fact remains that we did sign it, ' and subsequently ratified it; and the only possible course for us to pursue to-day is-to execute-it. Societies > ■ Tn an article on the subject of ‘ ‘Societies, Secret and Other, „ the eminent Jesuit theologian, Father Slater, gives the readers of the Catholic Times for their guidance some useful information which in its essentials we publish for New' Zealand Catholics. The Catholic Church shows no desire to cramp the social instincts of her children-; but it is her duty to guide them and prevent them from going astray She does this* | in - various ways. There are some societies which she condemns, others she approves, others. again she neither condemns nor approves; she allows Catholics' to Use their ; liberty and join them if they like on their own responsibility. */,/„.,, Canon 684 tells us that “the faithful are worthy of

commendation if they join associations which .are erected or at, least approved by the Church'; but let’ them keep aloof from secret .societies, from those which are condemned, seditious, suspect, or * which strive to withdraw themselves from-th® lawful vigilance of the Church.” In this Canon Catholics are forbidden to join five hinds of'societies,, ' -v ‘ - - . ; First, they must keep aloof from secret societies which often under oath require a promise of secrecy from their members even towards ecclesiastical and civil authorities, and blind obedience to the orders which may be give* them by the heads of the secret societies. Certain secret societies have been condemned by name. By Canon 2335 those Catholics incur excommunication simply reserved to the Holy See who join the Freemasons or other societies of the same kind which machinate against the Church or lawful civil authority. The Sacred Congregation of th® Holy Office issued a decree on August 20, 1894, condemning by name the three American societies known as the Oddfellows, the v Sons of Temperance, and the Knights of Pythias. The American Oddfellows during the course of last century separated from the English society of the sain® name, and developed a quasi religion and ritual of their own. Seditious societies are such as by violent and unlawful means strive to attain ends which in themselves may be lawful. Under suspect societies we may place such as the -Young Men’s Christian Association, against whose activity Bishops were warned by a letter of the Holy Office dated November 5, 1920. Any society of Catholics which endeavors to elude the lawful yigi lance of ecclesiastical authority thereby falls under suspicion. 9 The Church positively recognises only those societies which have been erected or at least approved by herself. The erection of certain societies is reserved to the Holy- . See, which frequently empowers delegates by indult t® erect them. Unless the contrary is expressly stated in th« indult the exercise of such a privilege requires the consent of the local Ordinary. But the consent of the local Ordinary for the erection in any place of a religious house implies consent for the erection in that house or in the church annexed to it of a society which is not constituted after the manner of an organic corporation and which is peculiar to the religious Order to which the house belongs. The local Ordinaries have authority to erect associations whose erection has not been reserved to. others by the Holy See. There are three kinds of religions societies of laymen. Third Orders, like that of St. Francis, have for their primary object the promotion of a more perfect Christian life among their members. ‘ Pious Unions, such as the Society of St. Vincent of Paul and the Apostleship of Prayer, have for their object the exercise of certain works of piety or charity. The Code gives the name of Sodalities to those Pious Unions which are constituted after the manner of an organic corporation with presidents and officials Sodalities erected for the increase of public worship are called by the Code Confraternities in the strict sense. Archconfraternities have power to aggregate to themselves associations of the same kind. n S " ch institlltions as these are so numerous in th* Catholic Church that nobody can possibly belong to them «1 . ilt is desirable that each one should select one or tw. which are compatible with each other and to which h. i. attracted and endeavor to practise the good works enjoined with as much fidelity and . constancy as possible. H® wdl thus, with the blessing of God, obtain the benefits which ie 'lurch had in view when she instituted these associations. .... • .•. -■ -

/ , ~ 1 . My brother, when .thou sees* a poor man behold in h.m a m.rr°r of ‘he. Lord, and, of His Mother. —St. Frances'