Subject: The Pope—Foe of Mankind. Part III. Romanist Activities and Mendacities in Great Britain and America.

mendacity
(mɛnˈdæsɪtɪ)
n, pl -ties
1. the tendency to be untruthful
2. a falsehood

When the Roman Catholics of the British Isles, long excluded from civil rights, not because they were Catholics, but because they were Bomanists first and British subjects after, sought in the beginning of the nineteenth century for legal relief from political disabilities, their prelatical leaders declared, openly and repeatedly, that Catholics were, in matters civil and temporal, under no obligation of obedience to the pope. Writing to Lord Liverpool in 1826, Bishop Doyle, the ablest of the Irish bishops, declared:

We are taunted with the proceedings of popes. What, my lord, have we Catholics to do with the proceedings of popes, or why should we be made accountable for them? — Essay on Catholic Claims, p. 111.

To a Committee of the House of Lords, in 1825, Bishop Doyle declared, in answer to the question :

In what, and how far, does the Roman Catholic profess to obey the pope?

He replied:

The Catholic professes to obey the pope in matters which regard his religious faith and in those matters of ecclesiastical discipline which have already been defined by the competent authorities.

To another important question:

Does that justify the objection that is made to Catholics that their allegiance is divided?

Bishop Doyle made emphatic reply :

I do not think it does in any way. “We are bound to obey the pope in those things that I have already mentioned. But our obedience to the law and the allegiance which we owe the Sovereign are complete and full and perfect and undivided, inasmuch as they extend to all political, legal, and civil rights of the King or of his subjects. I think the allegiance due to the King and the allegiance due to the pope are as distinct and as divided in their nature as any two things can possibly be.

The Vicars Apostolic, who with Episcopal authority governed the Roman Catholics of Great Britain, declared in 1826 :

The allegiance which Catholics hold to be due, and are bound to pay, to their Sovereign and to the civil authority of the State is perfect and undivided. . . .

They declare that neither the pope, nor any other prelate or ecclesiastical person of the Roman Catholic Church, . . . has any right to interfere, directly or indirectly, in the civil government, . . . nor to oppose in any manner the performance of the civil duties which are due to the King.

The Irish Bishops, addressing the Roman Catholic clergy and laity in a Pastoral, dated January 25, 1826, repeat :

It is a duty which they owe to themselves, as well as to their Protestant fellow-subjects, whose good opinion they value, to endeavor once more to remove the false imputations that have been frequently cast upon the faith and discipline of that Church which is entrusted to their care, that all may be enabled to know with accuracy their genuine principles.

Among these “genuine principles’ ‘ the Irish Bishops enumerate:

They declare on oath their belief that it is not an article of the Catholic faith, neither are they thereby required to believe, that the pope is infallible.

Then, after various recitals, they set forth:

After this full, explicit, and sworn declaration, we are utterly at a loss to conceive on what possible ground we could be justly charged with bearing toward our Most Gracious Sovereign only a divided allegiance.

The Roman Church boasts that in matters of doctrine it is unchangeable. From 1826 till 1870 the period is not lengthy, as far as historical progress is concerned. Yet what vital changes in that brief time in Roman Catholic faith !

When, in fact, we speak of the decrees of the Council of the Vatican, we use a phrase, as Mr. Gladstone well points out, “which will not bear strict examination. The Canons of the Council of Trent were, at least, the real Canons of a real Council ;” the Vatican Council’s ” decrees’ ‘ were a simple approbatory acceptance of decrees formulated and promulgated by the pope alone.

Mr. Gladstone is very explicit; so very much so as to be unanswerable in defining the scope of Papal Infallibility:

Will it be said, finally, that the Infallibility touches only matter of faith and morals? Only matter of morals! Will any of the Roman casuists kindly acquaint us what are the departments and functions of human life which do not and can not fall within the domain of morals? If they will not tell us, we must look elsewhere. In his work entitled Literature and Dogma, Mr. Matthew Arnold quaintly informs us—as they tell us nowadays how many parts of our poor bodies are solid and how many aqueous—that about seventy-five per cent of all we do belongs to the department of ‘ ‘ conduct. ‘ ‘ Conduct and morals, we may suppose, are nearly co-extensive. Threefourths, then, of life are thus handed over. But who will guarantee to us the other fourth? Certainly not St. Paul, who says, “Whether therefore ye eat, or drink, or whatsoever ye do, do all to the glory of God.” And, “Whatsoever ye do, in word or in deed, do all in the name of the Lord Jesus.” No! Such a distinction would be the unworthy device of a shallow policy, vainly used to hide the daring of that wild ambition which at Rome, not from the throne, but from behind the throne, prompts the movements of the Vatican. I care not to ask if there be dregs or tatters of human life such as can escape from the description and boundary of morals. I submit that Duty is a power which rises with us in the morning and goes to rest with us at night. It is co-extensive with the action of our intelligence. It is the shadow which cleaves to us, go where we will, and which only leaves us when we leave the light of life. So, then, it is the supreme direction of us in respect to all Duty which the pontiff declares to belong to him sacro approbante concilio; and this declaration he makes, not as an otiose opinion of the schools, but cunctis fidelibus credendam et tenendam.—The Vatican Decrees, by Gladstone, pp. 27, 28.

Speaking of 1826, Mr. Gladstone states :

Papal infallibility was most solemnly declared to be a matter on which each man might think as he pleased; the pope’s power to claim obedience was strictly and narrowly limited: it was expressly denied that he had any title, direct or indirect, to interfere in civil government. Of the right of the pope to define the limits which divide the civil from the spiritual by his own authority, not one word is said by the prelates of either country [Great Britain or Ireland].

Since that time all these propositions have been reversed. The pope’s infallibility, when he speaks ex cathedra on faith and morals, has been declared, with the assent of the bishops of the Roman Church, to be an article of faith binding on the conscience of every Christian; his claim to the obedience of his spiritual subjects has been declared in like manner without any practical limit or reserve ; and his supremacy, without any reserve of civil rights, has been similarly affirmed to include everything which relates to the discipline and government of the Church throughout the world. And these doctrines, we now know on the highest authority, it is of necessity for salvation to believe.

Independently, however, of the Vatican Decrees themselves, it is necessary for all who wish to understand what has been the amount of the wonderful change now consummated in the Constitution of the Latin Church, and what is the present degradation of its Episcopal order, to observe also the change, amounting to revolution, of form in the present as compared with other conciliatory decrees. Indeed, that spirit of centralization, the excesses of which are as fatal to vigorous life in the Church as in the State, seems now nearly to have reached the last and furthest point of possible advancement and exaltation. — The Vatican Decrees, by Gladstone, pp. 24, 25.

Accept must all Roman Catholics, as infallible judgments, the papal denunciations of the Masonic and other fraternal orders, so splendidly equipped and so noble in achievement for human betterment. The essential difference between Masonry and Papalism is well set forth by the Masonic Chonicler:

Masons often complain of the aggressive methods of members of the Catholic Church, and ask why Masons do not follow their example and thereby do more in the way of promoting each others welfare.

The answer is simple. The Catholic Church is a thoroughly organized and well-managed business and political institution, probably the greatest on earth. It wields its influence to promote and advance the interests of its members in business and political affairs. Its members recognize this powerful influence, and, being ever ready to safeguard their selfish interests, they are obedient and servile. This obedience and servility increase the power of the Church and, through the united efforts of all of its members, the material benefits derived are manifold.

On the other hand, the Masonic order is in no sense a business or political institution. It is strictly a fraternal organization, relying on Truth and Justice for its strength and support. It neither favors nor antagonizes religious beliefs, and refuses to be drawn into business or political controversies. It makes it clear to every member that he should aid and support his brother in his laudable undertakings, but such aid and support is purely voluntary, or solely within the member’s discretion. There is no law compelling a member to fulfill his obligation in this regard, nor any powerful influence exercised to induce him to do his duty. In other words, Masonry does not appeal to the selfishness of its members by holding out a reward for obeying some edict. It remains passive, relying on the honesty and devotion of its members.

Masonry can not nor will not stoop to the despicable methods of the Catholic Church in order to promote the interests of its members.

The sole offense of Masonry, in Romanist eyes, is its refusal, peremptory and perpetual, to accept Rome as mistress and mother. Let any society be as “secret” as it may; let any society be as destructive to human betterment as it can, Rome is, on its acceptance of the Roman collar of subserviency, prepared to receive it into full brotherhood and communion.

No such darksome and lethal record as the Jesuits has any organization known of civilized man; but the Jesuit is persona gratissima to pope and cardinals, because prepared to commit any abomination to further the interests of popery.

Since the re-establishment of the Jesuits, the Roman Church has fallen under the dominancy of Alphonsus de Liguori, a “Saint” of high degree, a “Doctor of the Church,” in the Roman Martyrology. De Liguori, born of a noble family, led in early life a worldly and, it is said, sinful career. He entered in due time upon the practice of law, but, called of God as his admirers and apologists put it, he determined to give himself entirely to religion. Close study of the man shows him to have been a monomaniac of so pronounced a degree that he may have been possessed of evil spirits. His so-called theological writings display a minute acquaintance, truly diabolical, with every detail of evil which hell alone could supply.

Friendly to the Jesuits, who had trained him, De Liguori used every influence to prevent their suppression. By diabolical or other agency he managed to make himself, so authentic writings disclose, appear in Pope Clement XIV’s private chamber while actually present at the same moment in his own home, many miles away. The Liguori in the pope’s chamber tried to dissuade the pontiff from suppressing the Jesuits. The other, or real Liguori, accepted the suppression, and upon the ruins of the Jesuits erected a new Religious Order, called the Redemptorists, who make it their special glory to call this demon possessed ” saint’ ‘ their founder.

Grateful to Liguori for his friendship to their Order in hours of darkest trouble, the Jesuits make his teaching the basis of all their moral ( 1) theological systems. The theology of Liguori, as far as its teaching of clean living and Christlike demeanor to men and women of the world is concerned, is a work of direct and darkest abominations.

When Hecker and his friends of the ” Brook Farm” left Protestantism to embrace the Roman creed, they first thought of attaching themselves to the Congregation of the Redemptorists. But the Redemptorists, for the most part a Belgian and German Order, soon shocked their sensibilities. They applied to Rome for the formation of a new Order, to be called the Paulists, intended especially to receive Protestant ministers desirous of qualifying themselves for duty as priestly missionaries of the Roman Catholic Church.

Hecker, being a man of blameless life, attracted some followers, but the Congregation of Paulists, approved at his instance by the pope, has demonstrated itself a failure as an instrument of religious upliftment. The Paulists are nowhere, in the few establishments they have founded, the power for good that Hecker intended them to be. Everywhere they have, on the contrary, fallen into evil ways and gainful occupations. They have descended to the level of the lascivious, greedy, secular priesthood, using the latter for unworthy purposes. See ‘ ‘ Romanism A Menace to the Nation,’ ‘ pp. 118-121.

The Paulists planned of Hecker and the Paulists of to-day are as different as auroral splendor from clouded night. The Paulists were founded for the purpose, express and exclusive, of Romanizing America — a purpose very close to the papal heart, as the following, from a leading Roman Catholic paper, demonstrates :

During the Lenten season, now drawing to a close, devotion on the part of the Catholic people of this diocese has been remarkable. Thousands have approached the communion rail every day, many missions have been given, while the customary Lenten exercises have been taken advantage of by great crowds of devout people, who have stormed high heaven with their earnest petitions. God answers prayer. He will answer the supplications of those faithful thousands.

We hope our people are not selfish in their prayers. America must become Catholic, and it is only through the prayers of the people that this can be brought about. The Apostolic Mission House at Washington [operated by the Paulists] is doing wonderful work for the conversion of our country. It is the agency for the training of priests to work effectively among non-Catholics. It is a work which should be encouraged and helped by giving generously toward its support. What greater work, what nobler work can claim the attention and sympathy and charity of a true Catholic heart?

There are those who will say this is the old, old story of dollars and cents. It is, to a certain extent, for little can be done without funds. People should remember, however, that these missionaries realize that every cent raised is given for a sacred cause. It is given to enable the gospel message to be preached to those who are not of the fold, but many of whom will save their souls by membership in the Catholic Church through conversion.

In an urgent appeal, the missionaries say:

“Relying on your constant generosity, we have great hopes of sending into neglected districts especially well-trained missionaries who will do much work for God. A great deal is being accomplished now, but we have need of a more extended apostolate. We shall not be content until every State in the Union has its missionaries to non-Catholics. This larger field calls for greater funds, and we rely on you, dear friend, to help us.”

The Roman Church is busy with the Public School System of the country, either denouncing it, or manipulating it for its own forbidding purposes. The Catholic Telegraph, of Cincinnati, 0., under date May 15, 1913, states:

Found guilty of circulating the bogus K. of C. “oath” among her pupils, a public school teacher named Miss Koch, of Marcus, Iowa, was dismissed from her position. Credit for securing her expulsion is due to the Knights of Columbus of Marcus. In the forty years of the existence of the public schools in that city but one Catholic has ever been employed as teacher.

Catholic teachers all over the country circulate books assailing Protestantism, belying historical record and conclusion. They also in many places distribute Romanist Catechisms and controversial works among Protestant pupils; and, besides, give them medals, rosary beads, and other papistical trinkets blessed by pope, prelate, or priest.

The American people ought to dissociate everlastingly the Public School from all contact with Romanism. The Roman Church dignitaries denounce the public schools as godless, fomenters of crime, and nursing places of sedition. Let these dignitaries be, therefore, kept closely to the control of their own parochial system of education, which is now so prolific in raising a plethoric population to fill the jails and penitentiaries of this Republic, and, consequently, in urgent need of firm supervision.

Americans permit no clergymen of other denominations to assume controlling interest in public schools. Is it not time that a line be drawn against the Roman priest to make him keep hands off the people’s schools? We know very well, from his parochial school effort, to what a level of degradation he would reduce the public schools. Take another item from the same paper:

After a visit to the two public schools within the confines of St. Anthony parish, New York City, Rev. Cherubino Viola, 0. F. M., obtained permission from the principals for the Catholic children, nearly all of whom are Italians, to attend special religious instructions. About one thousand boys and girls, some of whom had rarely been in a church before, attended the instructions for an hour on three successive days. As a result, four hundred are now preparing for their first communion and confirmation on May 25th.

Why should this priest be permitted to interfere with the regime of the public school on any pretext whatever?

Unfortunately, our public schools are controlled largely by ward politicians, of divers Church affiliations, who bow and cringe and fawn in the presence of a Romish priest. He can, they believe, make votes for the gangsters, who in turn are ready to sacrifice public schools, public moneys, and American patriotism itself on the altars of graft and gain, at which popish priests so gladly minister.

How subservient American non-Catholics are to Rome receives further confirmation in The Catholic Telegraph, May 15, 1913 :

Confirmation services at St. Mary Industrial School, Baltimore, last week, were attended with unusual solemnity. The Most Rev. Archbishop Bonzano, Apostolic Delegate, administered the Sacrament, and the Grand Army of the Republic, through General John R. King, presented two flags to the school. Bishop Corrigan replied to General King, accepting the flags. Mayor Preston was also present.

There had been no Grand Army of the Republic if Rome could have prevented. When the organization was first started, it encountered bitter opposition from priests all over the country. Now leading Grand Army men hand over the American flag as a tribute to Papal Delegate Bonzano, who hates a Republican form of government. To take further grip of army and navy is the very evident purpose of Rome, as this statement from The Catholic Telegraph, May 15, 1913, very clearly demonstrates :

A convention of the Catholic chaplains of the army and navy will be held next month in Washington, D. C. This is the first gathering of its kind in the country, and far-reaching results are expected from its deliberations. The plan of the convention is based largely on the suggestions offered by the Rev. George J. Waring, chaplain of the Eleventh Cavalry, in an essay entitled, “The Chaplain’s Duties,” which the War Departmen has published as an official document and has recommended as a sort of text-book for chaplains of every denomination.

One of the suggestions of Father Waring which will receive attention at the convention is the appointment by the hierarchy of a Bishop, who will have jurisdiction over Catholic chaplains in both branches of the service. This plan is followed in the British army, the Bishop at the same time governing his own diocese. The chaplains are subject to him only while in service, and from him they receive their faculties and powers. They are responsible to him for their conduct, and he is responsible for them to their respective Bishops. The plan has worked satisfactorily and to the benefit of religion, and it is held the same results would follow from its adoption in this country.

What next? Will President Wilson continue the practice of his predecessors and consult Gibbons, Farley, and O’Connell, Rome’s red princes in America, as to army and navy appointments? Will America’s army, papalized and foreignized, be so weakened and emasculated by Romanistic control as to make it easy prey for perfidious Jap? The soldiers of Spain were once justly reckoned brave and almost unconquerable. Romish control for centuries has reduced Spain to the level of a fourth or fifth-rate power. The control, the influence of Romanism, nay, its very contact, is deadly to every independent endeavor and to every achievement of bravery.

How active Romanism is in its endeavor to seize on and throttle America, the following, from the same issue of the Catholic Union and Times, March 13, 1913, establishes :

The ninth annual report of the Society for the Propagation of the Faith in the archdiocese of New York has just been issued by the director, Very Rev. John J. Dunn. It shows a remarkable increase in Catholic interest in the mission cause. Through Msgr. Dunn’s efforts the sum of $163,- 457.25 was collected for the missions during 1912, an increase of more than $40,000 over the preceding year. The money expended in collecting this large sum amounted to $11,489.71, leaving the net contribution of New York to the missions, $151,967.54.

The report is gotten up in a businesslike manner. The various expenditures are classified and the amount received from various sources clearly indicated. A business man looking over the report will be impressed with the economic manner in which the office is run. The expenses amount to less than seven per cent of the sum collected. Over ninety-three per cent went to the missions. In the body of the report Msgr. Dunn thanks all who have co-operated with him, and acknowledges his indebtedness to the press, religious and secular, for the kindly spirit which its representatives have exhibited towards his work.

The Society for the Propagation of the Faith is growing very fast in the United States. Boston and Philadelphia are only a little behind New York, which leads the entire Catholic world in aid of the mission cause. Cardinal Farley is keenly interested in the work of the society which he established in New York, and views its growth with deep interest and satisfaction. The New York office is in communication with all parts of the mission field, and the report gives some indication of the vast field and the complex problems met with by the missionaries in carrying the gospel to the heathen.

So do the subjoined, from The Catholic Telegraph, March 30, 1913 :

A suitable church being badly needed to accommodate the body of professors and students of the Catholic University, Washington, D. C, and a reasonable number of visitors, the rector, Msgr. Shahan, is appealing to the Catholic women of the United States to undertake the work of raising funds for the purpose. The proposed new church will be dedicated to the Immaculate Conception.

The annual report of the Diocesan Seminary of Philadelphia shows that the total collection during the past year was $67,402, or $5,000 in excess of the previous year. It was stated that thirty candidates were excluded for lack of room, and the rector suggests that a separate preparatory seminary be erected.

Here I may be permitted to remark that fully fifty per cent of the contributions to the Romanist development in America is given by non-Catholics ; very largely, indeed, by ardently professing Protestants. Some of the latter are out for Catholic business patronage, others for political advancement. Some conceal or have their contributions covered up under various devices; other Protestants, however, do not flinch from publicity, as for instance:

From Charlottetown, P. E. I., comes a story that bears repetition. A few weeks ago the magnificent new Cathedral of that city was burned, just as the Bishop was preparing to celebrate the paying of the last indebtedness on the property. The first to come forward with aid after the fire was a Methodist firm with a donation of $5,000, with which the Bishop purchased the old Zion Presbyterian Church as a temporary place of worship for the congregation. This was followed by a subscription of $6,000 from Frank R. Heartz, a Methodist, while another prominent Protestant gave $10,000.—The Catholic Telegraph, April 3, 1913.

While Catholics have no hesitation in asking Protestants to subscribe for the building and support of Romanist edifices, no Catholic is permitted, according to strict Catholic teaching, to give one cent towards the erection of any distinctively Protestant or professedly non-Catholic structure. So far does the prohibition of Catholics extending aid or countenance to “heresy” go, that a Catholic may not enter a Protestant church edifice to take part in the funeral services of a deceased friend, even if that friend were of closest kinship. The same prohibition extends to the attendance of Catholics at weddings, christenings, and other ceremonies in Protestant church edifices or elsewhere. Catholic young women serving as bridesmaids to Protestant young women friends are excommunicated. And the sinning excommunicated Catholics attending Protestant funerals, weddings, or christenings, are denied absolution until they have recourse to the Romanist Bishop of the diocese, who may live 200 miles away and whose mercy may have to be paid for very liberally.

This is in strict accordance with the theological teaching of the Church of Rome. However, in non-Catholic countries such grave misdemeanors are frequently tolerated, sometimes even encouraged by priests and prelates, in the hope of making those countries “dominantly Catholic”—”the end justifies the means.”

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