American Lancaster gazette. [volume] (Lancaster, Ohio) 1855-1860, 1855-05-31

scholar. A priest from Maynooth, taught
there only to humble the Missal; or pool
poor unlettered peasant from Mayo OF
Galway, into whose lips words are put, as
into the mouth Of a parrot, might quote to
me James v. l16, which says, Confess
your faults one to another" but will goa
do it? They might tell me that the Phar-
isees were baptised of john Baptist, econ
Tossing their sins"--that at Ephesus,
"many that believed came and confessed
and showed their deeds"-but will you do
it? If James is your authority, are not
you bound TO confess TO me, If | am TO you?
Confess your faults one to another" III
tn, text teaches auricular confession,
hold you to it. When did you put the
poor Irishman, who whispered his sins in
to your ears, in your seat in the Confess
sional, and kneeling down outside, wills
pering through the little square hole cut in
its side, your sins into his ears? This
would be eOntessing your sins one to qnoth-
er. Did you ever do this, Sir? Never,
never. l ask you again, not as a bishop,
but as scholar, whether single text quot
ed by Challoner, or Butler, or Hay, gives
a shadow OF countenance to your doctrine
of confession? Lay aside your mitre,
your crosier, your crook, and your con-
onicals, and look at those texts as simple
John Hughes, and then answer my ques-
ton. How can you account TO man or to
God for the erection of such an awful in
stitution as Auricular Confession, upon the
merest perversion of Scripture, perver-
sion which has neither sense nor wit to ex-
cuse it, and without a solitary text or ex-
ample in the Bible TO sustain it? o, why
will you do as priest, what you would
not do as a scholar, or as a man?
And, then, what aggravates the whole
matter is, that every man who is made a
priest, no matter how ignorant or wicked,
feels himself divinely appointed of heaven
to confess sinners, and to absolve them
from their sins! No matter if he is Ju-
das, he has the same authority to confess
and absolve as Peter! A priest, sir, under
your own jurisdiction, and l am sorry to
say, an Irishman also, was heard thus to
address the ostler of the hotel at which he
boarded, on returning from Mass on Sab
bath afternoon, "Pat, get up my horse l
have to go and confess a poor devil who is
dying five or six miles out in the country. 4"
l would not say this wretch is a fair sam
pie Of all your priests; hope Otherwise
But there are two many like himl And he
has the same power to confess and absolve
that you have, against whose character ]
know nothing, save that you sustain sys.
tenn which you must know to be as false as
the Koran.
1 would implore you, my dear sir, to
review this doctrine of your church. AS
to the word of God it is baseless as the fab:
ric of vision. 1t was unknown in the
Jewish church; it is untaught in the Chris
tian Scriptures. 1t crept into your church
during thedark ages. 1t was nailed upon
it at Trent. 1t it clearly device of man,
and in terrible opposition to some of the
plainest precepts Of Gods word. 1t gives
power to the priest, and enslaves the peo-
pie. 1t has been to your church, in every
land, fearful sourceof corruption. Every
thing is beneath you but the truth. Re-
ject the lie, however, long it may have
been told, and however it may increase
your income and influence. No longer
prostitute your fine talents and education
in maintaining this religious juggle, but
send the sinner to the cross. telling him
that whatsoever shall there confess and
forsake his sin, shall find mercy. In this
thing show yourself a man; and the bles-
sings of unborn generations will be upon
you.
And could l address myself to every pa
pist upon whom the sun shines, l would
say to them all, and especially to those of
your country and mine, the doctrine of con-
JcSsion is a priestiy device to gain an a6so-
late authority over your conscience. You
are no more bound to confess to a priest,
than he is to confess to you. And as to
the doctrine of Absolution, connected with
Confession, it is simply plasphemy. God
only can forgive sin. And were it not for
the fees connected with your Confession
and Absolution, there is not priest upon
the face of the earth that would care straw
about your Confession, or that would COM
NIT the plasphemy of forgiving your sins.
If bishops or priests will not, in this day
oflight, cut in pieces the net wove in the
dark ages to colfne and trammel you, it is
in your power to rise and tear it in pieces.
Irish Roman Catholics! our fathers fought
and bled and died, to obtain for themselves
and for us civil liberty. Their blood shed
by British bayonets in these struggles for
their civil rights, have crimsoued every
stream and fattened every field of Ireland.
And will you, their sons, bow your necks
to a priestly tyranny, which debases you
and morally? Will you give
yourselves to be led, and rode, and robbed,
by priests who come to you pretending
that the keys of heaven hang by their gir-
die, and that it is with them to let you in,
or shut you out at pleasure? No man can
be slave whilst his soul is free; nor can
any man bo free, whilst his soul is in bon
dage.
There is, Rev. sir, one confession which
freely make to you; my spirit wakes
warm when 1 think or write upon the alb
surdities of your church-upon its fragrant
perversions of the Scriptures-upon its
impositions upon the ignorant
and credulous--upon the unblushing Of