Catholic World

New Zealand Tablet, Volume LI, Issue 41, 1 October 1924, Page 52

Catholic World

CATHOLIC CONGRESSES IN UNIVERSITY CITIES. During the past week (says Catholic News Service for August. 11) very successful Catholic congresses have been held at Oxford and Cambridge. Tho summer ...school at Oxford, which attracted a. largo attendance, was that of. the Catholic Social Guild, at which Canada, Norway, Switzerland, Holland and Czecho-Slo-vakia were represented. Among the many topics discussed at Oxford were. "What a. New Session of the Vatican Council might do for Peace"; "The Land"; "Fascism v. Democracy"; "Basic Principles of Social Life"; and "The Foundations of Economics." The Summer School of Catholic Studies, which met at Cambridge' under the presidency of the Bishop of Northampton, occupied itself with the life and teaching of St. Thomas Aquinas. The inaugural sermon, preached by Father Martindale, S.J., of Oxford, was a well reasoned argument in favor of applying the principles of St. Thomas to the problems of to-day. Tho Dominicans were present in great force, and Ireland sent some of its best known scholars. Bishop Jamisons of Rome was to have read a paper on the Sum ma, but being unavoidably (detained, bis paper was read by the Biblical expert Father Lattey, S.J. One of the papers that made a. particularly wide .appeal was that by tho Bishop of Clifton; who spoke on the liturgical poetry of St. Thomas. About 250 members attended the courses of this summer school. NOTES FROM ROME. The translation of the body of Leo XIII to a permanent tomb is likely to take place early in October. Since the death of Leo XIII in 1903, the embalmed body of that Pontiff has rested in a temporary tomb in St. Peter's. The permanent tomb has been prepared in the Basilica of St. John Lateran. The translation was to have taken place a year or two ago, but at the time certain difficulties arose. The present, national Government is understood, to have consented to the necessary public ceremonial that would be involved in the sepulture of a Pope, and it is said that all the details are now settled. The vacation season has now settled down on Papal Rome, and almost everyone has dispersed for the holidays. Only the Holy Father remains, the Prisoner of the Vatican indeed in these torrid days. Audiences are cut down, and his Holiness seizes what leisure he has to visit the grounds of tho Vatican. With all the negotiations in connection with the Rumanian Concordat out of the way, the Cardinal Secretary of State has been able to start on his much needed holiday. Cardinal Gasparri has gone away to Montecatini, where he expects to stay for about a month. ALSATIAN CATHOLICS OPPOSE LAY LAWS. According to the official bulletin of the bishopric of Strasbourg, Mgr. Ruch, the Bishop of that See, continues to receive daily the most energetic encouragement from all sections of the Catholic Church in France, all pledging their support in his vindication of the religious liberties of Alsace and Lorraine. The six French Cardinals have all written, supporting Mgr. Ruch; so also have all the archbishops and bishops, as well as two of the titular archbishops of the French colonies. The state of feeling in Alsace and Lorraine is best shown by Mr. Michel Walter, Deputy of the Lower Rhine and President of the Committee for Religious Defence who has compiled a list of the municipal councils in Alsace and

Lorraine that have pronounced against the introduction of the French secularist laws. No fewer than 108 such municipal councils have gone on record in opposing the introduction of these laws into the provinces of Alsace and Lorraine. THE POPE AND THE LEAGUE. Lord Parmoor, former Vioar-General of the Archbishop of Canterbury and who, as Lord President of the Council, lends for the Labor Government in tho House of Lords is understood to be very anxious that the Apostolic 'See of Rome should be represented on the League of Nations. Lord Parmoor's idea seems to be that while the Holy See could hardly be represented as a member State, the cause of world peace would greatly benefit were the Sovereign Pontiff definitely included within the- counsels of the League. The Labor Government is credited with tho idea, hoping thereby to strengthen the efficacy of the League of Nations in bringing about world peace. From what can be understood about Lord Parmoor's idea, it runs a very close parallel with a remarkably well reasoned thesis which was put out last year at the Reading Conference on the national and international responsibilities of the Catholic citizen. In this thesis it was laid down that there were insuperable difficulties in the way of the Holy See becoming a State member of the League; but that as Supreme Guardian of the Moral Law the Pope should be so associated with the League, that the voice of the Holy See could be heard whenever any moral issues were raised. Lord Parmoor's aspiration is evidently to pave the way for such, an adhesion to the League on the part of tho Holy See. CATHOLIC DISABILITIES TO BE ABOLISHED. With important Catholic and High Church backing behind it, a Private Bill has been introduced in the House of Commons to abolish certain legal disabilities under which Catholics still nominally labor. Although these proscriptions are no longer actually applied they are still legal, and as events in Scotland recently showed, they can yet be invoked to serve some ignoble and sectarian purpose. If and when the new Bill becomes law tho Protestant succession to the Crown would continue to exist, and Catholics holding the right of patronage would still be prevented from collating persons to benefices in the Established Church. But apart from this, the Bill would abolish the. Act of Edward VI which forbids Catholic books of ritual even to be kept within the Realm; or the Act of George 111 which prevents a Catholic priest from officiating in a place of worship with a bell and bell tower, or wearing priestly vestments outside a church or private house. The Act of Elizabeth will be repealed which penalises religions Orders and declares trusts on their behalf to be void; also an Act of 1791 which declares unlawful all societies of persons professing the Catholic religion. Every one of these Acts is infringed daily; but until they are repealed they are part of the English law—a legacy from the bad days.