Litchfield enquirer., 1869-01-14
WHOLE NO. 23as
POETRY.

In Bavaria, as everywhere else, the Cath ! ollie clergy are trying to keep entire con- trol of the education of their members. How enormous the pretensions of that church still are, can be gathered from the following extract from letter printed in the Hartford Oourant: ,l'J 1.'A.l
 The pretensions of the ultramontane clergy are indeed remarkable enough to attract the attention of others besides the iberats of Bavaria. They assume an influence and an importance in the ecclesi- astical profession, or rather an authority, equal to that ever asserted by the church in it's strongest days. Perhaps you will get an idea of the height of this pretension if I translate passage which the liberal jour nal here takes from of a sermon preached
 in the parish church Ebersburg, in Ober- Dorfen. by a priest, Herr Kooperator An- ton Hering. no longer ago than August 16, 1868. It reads:-''With the power of ab- solution, Christ has endued the priesthood with might which is terrible to He'll, and against which Lucifer himself cannot stand, "a might which indeed reaches over into eternity, where all other earthly powers find their limit and nd,-a might, I say, which is able to break the letters which for an eternity, were forged through the commission of heavy sin. Yes, further, this power of the forgiveness of sins makes the priest, in a certain measure, a second God; for God alone naturally can forgive sins. And yet this is not the highest reach of the priestly might; his power reaches still higher; he compels God him. self to serve him. How so? When the priest approaches the altar in order to bring there the holy mass-ofering, there, at that moment lifts himself up Jesus Christ, who sits at the right hand of the Father upon his throne, in order to be ready for the beck of his priests upon earth. And scarcely does the priest. begin the words of conservation, than there Christ already hovers, surrounded by the heavenly host come down from heaven to earth and to the altar of sacrifice, and changes, upon the words of the priest, the bread and wine into his holy flesh and blood, and permits himself then to be ta- ken up and to lie in the hands of the priest even though the priest is the most sinful and the most unworthy. Further his pow and of the Queen of Heaven. Right did the holy Franciscans say:-'H Ishould meet priest and an angel at the same time, should salute the priest first and then the angel. because the priest is possessed of far higher might and holiness than the an gel. ,
 The radical journal calls this ultra montane blasphemy," and, the day after quoting it adds a charge that must be still more annoying to the Herr Kooporator Haring than that of blasphemy-it accuses him plagiarism; and to substantiate the charge quotes almost the very same lan- ing mightier than priest, except Uou, and, to be exact God himself must obey the priest in the mass" And then Tn words, which do not care to translate, the priest is made greater than the Virgin Ma ry. becanae Christ was only born of the the Virgin onoe, while the priest "with l five words, as and often .ad wherever he will" can 'sbring forth the Savlo.- ,nf. the world 9 So to day Rome keeps firm hold Q, the traditions of an hundred years ago. and ultramontanism wisely defends the last citadel where the Middle Age superstition makes staud-the popuar veneration for the clergy.