Part 21 (1/2)

Controversy between the Prussian Government and the papacy.-- It is a contest between the State and the Church for supremacy--Effect of dual government in Europe--Declaration by the Vatican Council of its position as to Science--The dogmatic const.i.tution of the Catholic faith.--Its definitions respecting G.o.d, Revelation, Faith, Reason.--The anathemas it p.r.o.nounces.--Its denunciation of modern civilization.

The Protestant Evangelical Alliance and its acts.

General review of the foregoing definitions, and acts.-- Present condition of the controversy, and its future prospects.

PREDOMINANCE OF CATHOLICITY. No one who is acquainted with the present tone of thought in Christendom can hide from himself the fact that an intellectual, a religious crisis is impending.

In all directions we see the lowering skies, we hear the mutterings of the coming storm. In Germany, the national party is arraying itself against the ultramontane; in France, the men of progress are struggling against the unprogressive, and in their contest the political supremacy of that great country is wellnigh neutralized or lost. In Italy, Rome has pa.s.sed into the hands of an excommunicated king. The sovereign pontiff, feigning that he is a prisoner, is fulminating from the Vatican his anathemas, and, in the midst of the most convincing proofs of his manifold errors, a.s.serting his own infallibility. A Catholic archbishop with truth declares that the whole civil society of Europe seems to be withdrawing itself in its public life from Christianity. In England and America, religious persons perceive with dismay that the intellectual basis of faith has been undermined by the spirit of the age. They prepare for the approaching disaster in the best manner they can.

The most serious trial through which society can pa.s.s is encountered in the exuviation of its religious restraints. The history of Greece and the history of Rome exhibit to us in an impressive manner how great are the perils. But it is not given to religions to endure forever. They necessarily undergo transformation with the intellectual development of man. How many countries are there professing the same religion now that they did at the birth of Christ?

It is estimated that the entire population of Europe is about three hundred and one million. Of these, one hundred and eighty-five million are Roman Catholics, thirty-three million are Greek Catholics. Of Protestants there are seventy-one million, separated into many sects. Of Jews, five million; of Mohammedans, seven million.

Of the religious subdivisions of America an accurate numerical statement cannot be given. The whole of Christian South America is Roman Catholic, the same may be said of Central America and of Mexico, as also of the Spanish and French West India possessions. In the United States and Canada the Protestant population predominates. To Australia the same remark applies. In India the spa.r.s.e Christian population sinks into insignificance in presence of two hundred million Mohammedans and other Oriental denominations. The Roman Catholic Church is the most widely diffused and the most powerfully organized of all modern societies. It is far more a political than a religious combination. Its principle is that all power is in the clergy, and that for laymen there is only the privilege of obedience. The republican forms under which the Churches existed in primitive Christianity have gradually merged into an absolute centralization, with a man as vice-G.o.d at its head. This Church a.s.serts that the divine commission under which it acts comprises civil government; that it has a right to use the state for its own purposes, but that the state has no right to intermeddle with it; that even in Protestant countries it is not merely a coordinate government, but the sovereign power. It insists that the state has no rights over any thing which it declares to be in its domain, and that Protestantism, being a mere rebellion, has no rights at all; that even in Protestant communities the Catholic bishop is the only lawful spiritual pastor.

It is plain, therefore, that of professing Christians the vast majority are Catholic; and such is the authoritative demand of the papacy for supremacy, that, in any survey of the present religious condition of Christendom, regard must be mainly had to its acts. Its movements are guided by the highest intelligence and skill. Catholicism obeys the orders of one man, and has therefore a unity, a compactness, a power, which Protestant denominations do not possess. Moreover, it derives inestimable strength from the souvenirs of the great name of Rome.

Unembarra.s.sed by any hesitating sentiment, the papacy has contemplated the coming intellectual crisis. It has p.r.o.nounced its decision, and occupied what seems to it to be the most advantageous ground.

This definition of position we find in the acts of the late Vatican Council.

THE OEc.u.mENICAL COUNCIL. Pius IX., by a bull dated June 29, 1868, convoked an Oec.u.menical Council, to meet in Rome, on December 8, 1869.

Its sessions ended in July, 1870. Among other matters submitted to its consideration, two stand forth in conspicuous prominence--they are the a.s.sertion of the infallibility of the Roman pontiff, and the definition of the relations of religion to science.

But the convocation of the Council was far from meeting with general approval.

The views of the Oriental Churches were, for the most part, unfavorable.

They affirmed that they saw a desire in the Roman pontiff to set himself up as the head of Christianity, whereas they recognized the Lord Jesus Christ alone as the head of the Church. They believed that the Council would only lead to new quarrels and scandals. The sentiment of these venerable Churches is well shown by the incident that, when, in 1867, the Nestorian Patriarch Simeon had been invited by the Chaldean Patriarch to return to Roman Catholic unity, he, in his reply, showed that there was no prospect for harmonious action between the East and the West: ”You invite me to kiss humbly the slipper of the Bishop of Rome; but is he not, in every respect, a man like yourself--is his dignity superior to yours? We will never permit to be introduced into our holy temples of wors.h.i.+p images and statues, which are nothing but abominable and impure idols. What! shall we attribute to Almighty G.o.d a mother, as you dare to do? Away from us, such blasphemy!”

EXPECTATIONS OF THE PAPACY. Eventually, the patriarchs, archbishops, and bishops, from all regions of the world, who took part in this Council, were seven hundred and four.

Rome had seen very plainly that Science was not only rapidly undermining the dogmas of the papacy, but was gathering great political power. She recognized that all over Europe there was a fast-spreading secession among persons of education, and that its true focus was North Germany.

She looked, therefore, with deep interest on the Prusso-Austrian War, giving to Austria whatever encouragement she could. The battle of Sadowa was a bitter disappointment to her.

With satisfaction again she looked upon the breaking out of the Franco-Prussian War, not doubting that its issue would be favorable to France, and therefore favorable to her. Here, again, she was doomed to disappointment at Sedan.

Having now no further hope, for many years to come, from external war, she resolved to see what could be done by internal insurrection, and the present movement in the German Empire is the result of her machinations.

Had Austria or had France succeeded, Protestantism would have been overthrown along with Prussia.

But, while these military movements were being carried on, a movement of a different, an intellectual kind, was engaged in. Its principle was, to restore the worn-out mediaeval doctrines and practices, carrying them to an extreme, no matter what the consequences might be.

ENCYCLICAL LETTER AND SYLLABUS. Not only was it a.s.serted that the papacy has a divine right to partic.i.p.ate in the government of all countries, coordinately with their temporal authorities, but that the supremacy of Rome in this matter must be recognized; and that in any question between them the temporal authority must conform itself to her order.

And, since the endangering of her position had been mainly brought about by the progress of science, she presumed to define its boundaries, and prescribe limits to its authority. Still more, she undertook to denounce modern civilization.

These measures were contemplated soon after the return of his Holiness from Gaeta in 1848, and were undertaken by the advice of the Jesuits, who, lingering in the hope that G.o.d would work the impossible, supposed that the papacy, in its old age, might be reinvigorated. The organ of the Curia proclaimed the absolute independence of the Church as regards the state; the dependence of the bishops on the pope; of the diocesan clergy on the bishops; the obligation of the Protestants to abandon their atheism, and return to the fold; the absolute condemnation of all kinds of toleration. In December, 1854, in an a.s.sembly of bishops, the pope had proclaimed the dogma of the immaculate conception. Ten years subsequently he put forth the celebrated Encyclical Letter and the Syllabus.

The Encyclical Letter is dated December 8, 1864. It was drawn up by learned ecclesiastics, and subsequently debated at the Congregation of the Holy Office, then forwarded to prelates, and finally gone over by the pope and cardinals.

ENCYCLICAL LETTER AND SYLLABUS. Many of the clergy objected to its condemnation of modern civilization. Some of the cardinals were reluctant to concur in it. The Catholic press accepted it, not, however, without misgivings and regrets. The Protestant governments put no obstacle in its way; the Catholic were embarra.s.sed by it. France allowed the publication only of that portion proclaiming the jubilee; Austria and Italy permitted its introduction, but withheld their approval.

The political press and legislatures of Catholic countries gave it an unfavorable reception. Many deplored it as likely to widen the breach between the Church and modern society. The Italian press regarded it as determining a war, without truce or armistice, between the papacy and modern civilization. Even in Spain there were journals that regretted ”the obstinacy and blindness of the court of Rome, in branding and condemning modern civilization.”