ii
ELLIOTT ELLIOTT
OPTICIANS PISA PERTH P R
•D•
John flHO mqr. Ex-1TlWW Bros: Sludeal Tel.
87908
•
• i.
I
J• •
i
0•01
.0 iii
pis
•R•CO
f
',/ __ 1Vr
ELLIOTT O ELLIOTT OPTICIANS Piccadilly Arcade Perth Tel. 87988
PRICE THREEPENCE.
PERTH,WEDNESDAY, MAY 16. 1945.
NO. 9,180,
'
SEVENTYSECOND YEAR.
—Why British Catholics Exert aPowerful Influence Debt of. English,- Speaking World to Irish Strength of the Catholic School System A Convert Surveys the General Outlook Educated at Harrow and Balliol, Arnold Lunn,who is awell-known English writer and observer of foreign affairs, was received into the Catholic Church in 1995. In the following article,which has been published in the "Atlantic Monthly," he explains the position of Catholics in Great Britain, and the increasing prestige of the Church among all thinking mien and women. appearance of Maisie Ward's excellent British Catholics—that is, the Ca. biography. There is an ever-increastholics of England, Scotland and Wales ing awareness of the fact that our law, —form about seven per cent. of the our Parliamentary system, and our total population, whereas twenty per higher education have their roots in cent. of the population of the United our Catholic past. States are members of the Catholic No English are more invincibly nay Church. It is therefore not surpristional, even insular, in their outlook ing that the influence of the British than those who can trace their descent Catholics is in many respect, but not through an unbroken line of Catholic in every respect, far less than that of ancestors too conservative to tolerate their co-religionists on the other side innovations in religion, too English to of the Atlantic. We read with envy have any truck with adaptations of and surprise of the indignant reactions Lutheran and Calvinistic creeds, The of the New York State legislature to hereditary Catholic, descended from the attack on the Vatican which was an unbroken line of Catholics, exists in published in Pravda. No such reac. every social stratum, but it was the tion would be conceivable in any pub• consistency of those of the landed genlic body in this country ( Britain). try who maintained and hid the misAgain, it would be difficult for the sionary priests during the penal times hierarchy of this country to organise which prevented the extermination of a campaign as effective as that which the Church in England. The American Iiierarch_v conducted Who Are the English Catholics? against a certain type of film. British Catholics may be divided 13ut the advantages are not wholly into four .. lasses, a small minority who with the American Catholics. Engbelong to families which have never lish Catholicism has its roots in more ceased to be Catholics; a large class than a thousand years of English hisdescended from Irish Catholics; the de. tory, whereas American Catholicism sc•enclants of converts; and recent conhas had its roots in Europe. The verts. It would be difficult to exagAmerican ethos is a Protestant ethos. gerate the debt which the Church in The country was founded by the shapthe English-speaking world owes to the ed by Protestants. England, on the Irish. other hand, was Cathoic for a thouIn England Catholicism is well resand vears. The great Cathedrals were pres-rated in every social stratum. The built by Catholics. The Icing is still premier Duke, the Duke of Norfolk is crowned by a ritual that is Catholic a Catholic. and Newman was followed in origin, and still Catholic in sentiinto the Church not only by a steady ment. stream of dons and Anglican clergy but The Church of England herself has also by a not inconsiderable number always steered a middle course beof converts from the aristocracy; but tween what an eighteenth century divthe Church in England owed far less ine calls " the meretricious gaudiness of to these fashionable converts than, as the Church of Rome and the squalid David Mathew said, to " the free genslimety of fanatic conventicles." The erosity of the poor ( which had built inglishman is essentiadv conservative. up their churches and schools week fie builds on the past. Nowhere for by week' They were determined and instance, was the Reformation so con. loyal; ready to defend themselves; servative as in England. The Engforthright. The churches had been lish respect for tradition is merely an paid for stone by stone out of the extension of the democratic principle small ravages of the faithful and this to the dead. There is an increasing in part accounted for their eager atreadiness to recognise English Catholtachment to the parish unit which reicism as an integral element in the mained their spiritual hearth." English way of life. Significant in this There are no Catholic universities in respect were the tributes paid to Ches , the United Kingdom and consesuently terton, as a typical Englishman, on the
For Value and Service
It would be ungenerous in this connection to omit a tribute to the Irish Catholics. Proportionately more volunteers from Eire are fighting in the British Armed Forces than from the Six Counties, The Irish volunteers are well represented -in the awards for gallantry as are also the English Catholics. The first Army officer and the first Air Force pilot to receive the most coveted of all decorations, the Victoria Cross, were Catholics, as were also the first D.StO. of the war, the first Army chaplain to be decorated, the first Army chaplain to be decomted for landing with parachute troops, the first to receive the Naval Knighthood and the George Medal for Oivilian Gallantry. On the other hand Catholics are under-represented in Parliament and in public life, for there is only one aspect of national life, frontline service in time of war, in which a disproportionate representation of Catholics does not attract hostile comment. It is far less easy for a Catholic than for a non-Catholic to be adopted as a Parliamentary candidate, and the chances Catholices go to the same universities of a Catholic being elected to some as Protestants, but every effort is such position as the mayor of a town made to induce Catholic parents to vary inversely with the number of Casend their children to Catholic schools, tholics in that town. The Catholic public schools have conAll Classes Represented. siderable prestige, and the alumni of I 6o not,however, wish to give the the Jesuit schools Stonyhurst and impression that Catholics are a perseBeaumont, or the Benedictine schools, cuted minority. This is very far from Downside and Ampleforth, suffer from 1 , eing the case. it is as true of the no defence complex when they meet Catholics as of any other compact minEtonians or flarrovians. ority that ouhsi4ees exaggerate our British Catholics are at the moment influence, and those within tend to exengaged in a battle for their schools. aggerate the hostility of those without, \\'e rlaini that our contributions to .\gain, as in the case of Jews, outsiders the taxes which support the State greatly exaggerate Catholic solidarity. schools should he returned to us in "Catholics," as Father Martindale rethe form of schools under Catholic conmarked, " use up all their available trol. We have been far more sucunity on points of defined doctrine ces4iil than American Catholics in our and have nothing left over for ordinary demand for educational justice, mainlife." Every phase of political opinly because we have hitherto enjoyed ion is represented among Catholics, the powerful support of the Anglicans, from extreme conservatism to a socialengaged in a similar campaign for the ism far more to the left than the ComAnglican schools. In the present munism of modern Moscow, struggle the Archbishop of Canterbury, The Catholic, of course, if faced with to the sorrow of many high Anglicans, the choice between two systems—one has declared himself satisfied with the that tolerates and another that perseGovernment proposals and has left the cutes the Church—reacts precisely as 'atholics as the sole representatives of those who are fighting a battle for a a Jew would react under similar circumstances. Yet whereas nobody exspecifically Christian education. pects a Jew to support Ilitler, many Their Part in the Services. people were surprised ( and pained) by Catholics have a clear-cut teaching the fact that fete Catholics could pump on the duty which we owe not only up much enthusiasm for the Repubto God but to Caesar. The Church lican Government in Spain, in whose which has canonised many soldiers has territory thousands of priests had been never canonised a conscientious objecmurdered. tor to ajust war. Though exact statThe Spanish War was a critical istics are unavailable, it is beyond point in the history of English Cathdispute that Catholics are represented olicism. Conversions, which had been ou't of all proportion to their number (Continued on Back Cover.) in the Armed Forces.
Murray St.,
u fyies ' H tel A H
o
o
ustralia&t.Perth 45 years
Pa&tesed at the Q. P.O. Perth, for U—simiesion by Post r a enwpapsr.