The morning star and Catholic messenger. [volume] (New Orleans [La.]) 1868-1881, 1872-01-28

ish, and at the "head of navigation
through Lake Bistenow, in very high water.
This little town numbers about 1900 inhab-
itants, and does quite business, shipping
every season an average of 10000 bales Of
cotton. There are not more than twenty
five or thirty of its Inhabitants Catholic,
but Father Pierre. thinking them sufficient
both in ferYor and numbers to form a nu
cleus for . congregation, with that sacer-
dOtal zeal that knows NO waning, turned
himself to the task of raising means to
purchase grounds and q building for q
church. Success crowned his efforts dur
ing the short stay of two days there, he
obtained o sufficient sum, in subscriptions
and in cash, to purchase a beautiful lot of
ground 60 by 40 feet, fronting on the main
street of the town, and having building
upon it which, with some slight alterations
and repairs, will be converted into q neat
little church, sufficient for the Catholics of
Minden for the next FIVE or ten years, unless
the little congregation increases more rapid
~ than is at present anticipated. This
property is within forty feet of the Baptist
church of Minden, where but few weeks
ago that itinerant Baptist raider" one j.
r. Graves, of "Iron Wheel" and BrownlOw
notoriety, exhausted az he did here last
summer, his self inflated eloquence ON such
subjects as "The Pope" 'Infallibility,"
"Nuns," etc, ETC., but his raid on Minden
seems to have had no very baneful effect,
as the Protestants there generally sub
scribed and contributed very literally to-
wards the establishing of a Catholic church
there. The Professionals of Minden, as Of
Shreveport, seem to be of higher
divine supposed them, and, as q class,
even among the members of his own
church, be. it said to their credit, do not
endorse his "fre and Sword !" mode of
spreading Baptist doctrine. His TRADES
leave no more memorable effect than that
made upon the purses of his brother Bap-
fists, who assisted to pay him farther on.
It appears the gentleman wanted to take a
prospecting tour into Texas, and knew of
no better or easier mode of paying expenses,
than by vending sensational sermons on
his route, stopping with a comfortable
each stopping place. AS Baptist preacher
it is said he possesses some forensic attain
ments; bat when he grasps ut "Infalli-
bility," OF any other dogma of the Catholic
Church, he becomes lost in the, to him,
mystic mazes of theology, and his every
his thorough ignorance of the path he
treads. Rev. Father Tennessee. of Jeffer-
son, Texas, publicly challenged the evan
gelical raider to al open discussion of the
Catholic question forming the subject
matter of his sensationals mp there but
the poor iron wheelwright had not forgotten
the bruises he had received in the cogs of
Browniow's "wooden Wheel" and thought
it most prudent to bubble out of it.
The people of jefferson, of Shreveport,
and of our whole country are too we'll bred
in the fret place, and too well informed,
and too familiar with the converts of the
Catholic Church, in the second place, to
believe for moment OF endorse the coarse,
unrefned, ungentlemanly insults offered to,
and assaults made upon the nuns and their
converts from the Baptist pulpit by this
man Graves; such would be considered,
by intelligent and refined hearers, upbe-
coming in q elitieal-tleasaeegtse- still saere
80 in one who lays claim to and pre-
tends to wear the Samaritan mantle of
minister of Christ. 1 venture the assertion
that two fifChs of the pupils in our many
and well filled converts are the daughters
of Protestant parents, and of the better
class OF PTotestapts, the poorer class not
being able to send their children there. 1t
is not to be presumed that those parents
have not Informed themselves as to the
nature and character of the institutions and
teachers they are entrusting their daugh-
ters' training, education, morals and char
acter to. Were these converts and their
inmates such as Graves would have the
public believe they are, would these Pro-
testants send their daughters there7 This
fact alone shows his assertions patent
ISLANDERS.
This said j. R. Graves must certainly,
and those who have listened to him say he
oVluouby uOoSp Iuiuh anu USlioNo hinsoi
to be an extraordinarily able, eloquent and
learned man, else he would not have started
out as he did, to instruct this portion of
the globe. 1t is not at all surprising
that he should consider the Catholic
Church the only "foeman worthy of his
steel, and that she alone, of all the others,
can furnish him themes and subjects worthy
of his powers and eloquence; but for his
own sake and that of his denomination it is
a great pity-and fact to be by them
deeply depfored-thvt his own Church can
not furnish him with sufficient food for his
forensic cravings. He, certainly, can have
no call" to preach-he can be no apostle
divinely sent; for Christ sent his apostles
not to raid and rant-not to insult and
Islander, denounce and defame-not to rob