The Fremont weekly journal. [volume] (Fremont, Sandusky County, Ohio) 1867-1877, 1872-08-02
Was St. Peter Ever at Romeo

A public meeting was held in
Rome in February last, to discuss
the validity of the Papal assumption
that st. Peter was in that city in the
year of our Lord 42; that he held
the pontificate of Rome twenty-five
years, and in the year 66, under the
reign of Nero, died there, a martyr
to the faith.
Nothing that has happened, not
even the establishment of a Bible
Society in Rome, better illustrates
the marvellous change which the 20.
litical events of the past year have
wrought in the metropolis of Chris
tendon. The Pope showed his sense
of its significance by prohibiting
his clergy from continuing the dis.
cussion, in which he originally au.
thorized them to participate, and by
ordering a solemn Iridium to be
celebrated in st. Peters, with the
view Of making amends to the in.
jured apostle for the public expires
sion "of such outrageous doubts" in
the city where he had planted his
church.
The question Of st. Peters resi-
dence at Rome had often been raised
before, and however ably it may
have been treated by the respective
disputants in the recent discussions,
it is hardly possible that they could
have added much to the strength of
either position. The Importance of
their debate, however, at this time,
and in the city of Rome, is not to be
measured by the novelty or famili-
arity of the arguments employed. 1t
is probable the first time that the
Catholic public even dared to lend
its ears to the consideration of such
doubts. The secular arm, which in
the earlier days Of the papacy pre-
vented such controversies from
reaching its lay subjects,is now stay
ed; the thunders Of the Vatican, if
they do not sleep, are comparatively
innocuous; and there are very few or
no secular princes left who are will
ing and able to serve as Papal in
qulsitors. Hundreds and thousands
of Catholics will be led by this dis
cussion to look into a question so
vital to the Church in which they
have been reared, and to read and
weigh q class of arguments to which
their minds would have been quite
inaccessible even one short year ago.
But the whole fabric of the papacY
rests upon an unqualified faith in
the dogma here again put in contro-
versy; for, if st. Peter was never in
Rome, or was not there under such
conditions Of notoriety as must ne
cessarily have attached to his &C.
sovereignty, with all its
present pontifical prerOgatiYes, then
the apostolic chain by which the
papacy claims to descend from
Christ, and through which It's pres
ent spiritual authority is derived,
lacks the first link, and every sue
ceeding link, like the first, must be
spurious.
Next to the inspiration of the Bi-
BILE, there is probably no question in
controversy among men involving a
wider range Of consequences than
this which has suddenly come to
disturb the repOse of the venerable
of the Vatican. Have all
the nations of the earth for the last
eighteen centuries been the victims
of gigantic fraud? Has the Roman
Catholic world for that period been
ruled, and is it still ruled, by a sue
cession of conscious or unconscious
impostors? Is the whole theory of
papal supremacy a forgery and a
fraud? Has all the blood split in its
or in the wars and presecu-
tions of its provOcation, been vast
ed? These are questions the agita-
ton of which is no longer to be con
fined to the seclusiOn of the cloister
Dr to be "veiled in the obscurity of a
learned language" They present
living, practical, vital issues, and in
7olve consequences under the mere ,
of which the imagination
staggers. By the decision which is