EMPIRE SELF-RAISING FLAMM -eg
Rises Above all Others.
RECORD
The West AUSTRALIAN
PERTH, SATURDAY, NOVEMBER 8. 1913
Recent
Outburst of Bigotry in Melbourne
Alleged Persecution of Protestants --- Crushing Reply by the Coadjutor -Archbishop
'MANY HERETICS ARE IN GOOD FAITH, AND HAVE
TILE RIGHT TO FOLLOW UNMOLESTED, THEIR RELIGIOUS CONVICTIONS."
What I am concerned with, is not day, still teaches that it
politics, but the attempt of certain politicians to promote their political ends by stirring up in Australia, as well as in Ireland, religious bigotry and hatred of the Catholic ('hinch. With many of these persons it is, of
is
her
"duty to enforce her doctrines upon heretics by coercion, even at the cost We have been of inflicting death." even told that one of the later Popes declared that the murder of a Protestant is not merely good, but most highly meritorious. That certainly beats the Presbyterian Synod. I must not degrade myself or you by further reference to that base and
Later on, a time came when the union of Christendom was hopelessly broken, when changing civilisation bad bred new ideas, and then it became more and more various kinds.
evident that physical repression of heresy had lost its power, and therefore its justification, until, in our own day, no Catholic, from the Pope down to the humblest layman, dreams of suggesting oppressive measures against heretics. That is the whole case in a few words. The Church will not admit that she exceeded her right in having recourse to physical pienuhment, as long as it was effective toil suitable for the attainment of her ends. Neither will she admit teat, in the [resent condition of the world, she is hound, in consistency or fn any other principle, to use a weapon of defence which has become useless, or
land,
Scotland,
France,
Germany,
Denmark, Sweden, Switzerland, The Netherlands, America, and even in Australia. The ('atholic Church could, at all events, coerce for:nal heretics without inconsistency. The Protestants rebelled against the Church to assert the right of private judgment, and then they turned round and coerced those opposed to them with a severity unequalled in the history of the Catholic ('hutch. But let us see on what grounds is the assertion based that the Catholic Church is in principle committed to the persecution of heretics. Catholic Tolerance If this assertion is true, the Catholice of Melbourne will be hard set to free lime, at all events, from the charge of being unfaithful to the Church. For, during my short time in this city, I have examined and catechised many thousands of candidates for Confirmation in the different churches of Melbourne, and never once, so far as I can recall, did I omit to explain that the Catholic Church recognises that at the present day heretics may be, and that many are, in good faith in their errors, and if they are in good faith, they have the right and the duty, unmolested, to follow their conscientious religious convictions. I venture think that there is scarcely a Catholic child in Melbourne, over, say, seven years of age, who does not understand that doctrine, and hold it as firmly as I do. But you, who have been reading the Melbourne press for the past few weeks, must have rubbed your eyes to find this teaching and your own belief flatly contradicted. You were told that you were bound, if possible, to persecute even unto death your non -catholic neighbours. You may have wondered in what great
course, hopeless to reason. The Synod of the Reformed Presbyterian Church of Ireland is a case in point. It should be a calm, deliberative assembly, and I wish to cowardly calumny. Now, some of you inay he amazed speak of it with all possible respect. But the synod is reported in the and puzzled by wild statements coinpress to have recently issued unan- ing from men who might be expected imously against Home Rule a syno- to weigh their words. But not one dal protest, in which are embodied of you needs to he told that this the following enlightened and toler- confident assertion, though so often repeated, is absolutely without founant views :"We regard the so-called Catho- dation. lic Emancipation Act as the first The Church's Mission 'plague spot' of the Home Rule This is not the time or place to evil. From the time of the pass- discuss at length the attitude of the ing of this Act, which gave the Romanists the franchise, dates the their tower to of beginning threaten the liberties of the Protestants of Ireland. For they are the subjects of a foreign potentate -even the Pope of Rome ; and are conscientiously bound to use their power for the interests of that wholly and foreign potentate, against the interests of the Protestant country in which they wield their sinister influence." Now, I commend that protest as a bright and shining example of the tolerance that sheds its genial ray from certain hign places in Ulster upon the poor Protestants who look up for light and leading. These poor bigots are in the 20th century, and trey still think that a catholic should he denied even the right to vote at a Parliamentary election. A Unionist candidate, standing for a Parliamentary seat in England, has had the courage and honesty to denounce and repudiate this synodal protest. But I pass it by a ithout storehouse of theological learning comment. this confident assertion was disI only ask, when this happens in the If you did consider covered. the synod, what happens in the matter, it was, no doubt, a relief to Orange Lodge? And this from people you to find, as the controversy eent whose squeals about their liberty on, that, after all, this unfamiliar Illiesa,ve circled the globe-from people and intolerant doctrine was attriwho claim to be the true and only buted to the Catholic Church on the defenders of liberty of conscience, of authority of a shilling pamphlet civil and religious freedom. written by a Protestant Bishop. Doomed Protestant Ascendancy Teaching of Pius IX. world But, after all, the whole epochwhen And we go to this to regard how knows by this time making pamphlet we find that the utterances of extreme Protestant the grounds for charging the Church factions in Ulster. with the wish, at the present day, They are in the thick of a great and, indeed, with the duty, to perA RC! IBISI1OP MANNIX. political battle, and we must not secute heretics mato death is a misjudge then) too harshly. Their disof of the teaching regard for truth, tolerance, self-re- Catholic Church towards error in re- eorse, in her hands. The world representationIX.-a misrepresentation spect is in some measure redeemed ligion. But, for iny purpose, the changes, and the Church adapts her- Pope Pius gross and inept that it could deby the great fight which they are case of the Church may be very self to new conditions. She is now so We are asked to bemaking. People laugh at them. But briefly stated. The Church has no as sincere and as single -alluded in ceive nobody. Church is committed doubt about her Divine commission. her tolerance as she was earlier in lieve that the feel that they are making a last of heretics because desperate effort to maintain the She claims that she alone has been her efforts at the repression of re- to the persecution Pius IX. taught that there may be a She is ligious error. existing and very substantial rem- sent to teach the nations. case in which a non-Catholic should nant of Protestant ascendancy in to gather them into her fold, not by Protestants and Persecution not he held "free to embrace and that force or violence, however, but by I hope and believe Ireland. In the old days, individuals, autotheir attempt will fail. But I pay persuasion. She vindicates for her- cratic and cruel, may have exceeded profess the religion he dean believe contention is so tribute to their political strategy. self the right to teach and appeal due hounds in persecuting heretics, to be true." The not waste time Their rifles will never do much dam- to outsiders without hindrance. She and we cannot wonder if opponents absurd that I shall it. I eould merely ask those age to the Parliament House in Col- further claims the right and duty to of the ('butch urge that fact against with who rely on this puerile argument I can only hope that protect her own subjects from the Catholics. The system of lege Green. coercion they themselves think that their threats of disloyalty will be corruption of error, and in the exer- may have in some places outlived its whether the Mormons, for example, should he equally powerless against the Liberal cise of that right and duty, she usefulness and justification. chat, held free to embrace and profess claims the further right to use, at stronghold at Westminster. too, is matter for fair comment. We their form of religion in Christian amid the changing and period, every in Melbourne Rabid Bigotry world, the means can even understand persons un- lands-in America or Australia? And As I have said, no exhibition of conditions of the contending if they will not sanction the proand ex- friendly to the Church necessary deems which she us. surprise can bigotry in Ulster that coercion was at all times a de- fession of Mormonism in their midst, purpose. For many pedient for her hear to But we are scarcely erepared Lnsive weapon of doubtful advantage ant I, then, justified in accusing them the sent,ments, and almost the very ages after the triumph of Christian- to the Church. of a desire to persecute all and sunstill was but ,chile there ity, synods in words, of the Ulster who do not agree with them in dry like bear with cannot what we But seemed there while to one and fold, most unlodges re-echoed in the ? But if the charge doeselot religion should Protestants that is religious maintaining a of patience he hope looked-for quarters in Melbourne. lie against theta, why should it lie this at in horror hands their hold un forinflicted upon unity, Church the Yet, as you remind tile, we have been so-called persecution of heretics by against Pius TX. and the Church for more than once within tl.e past fort- mal heretics-i.e., those of her subthe Catholic Church, as if Protes- which he spoke? This is a fair samjects who against authority rebelled night assured, here in Melbourne, had no persecutions to their ple of the only positive argument adand on high authority, that the -not merely spiritual chastisements, tants Fne- vanced in the pamphlet to prove the Catholic ('Lurch, even at the present but also i hysical punishments of credit, or discredit, in Ireland,