The morning star and Catholic messenger., 1877-11-25
The Church and the Civil Power.


on the Father Stack affair makes some
singular blnnders about Catholic matters.
Among other things! it says that the Pope
holds that the temporal power is essen
tial to the success of Romsuish as now
constituted" The Pope holds as the fan
damental truth of Catholicity that Roman
ism Is constituted now exactly as it al
ways was-thst 10 If our neighbor means
the Roman Catholic Church when it
says RomAnism. Then, again, the Pope
never dreamed of holding or hiDting that
| the temporal power was essential as our
neighbor says. How could hef Fer three
cen turies the Roman Church was an entire,
persistent, increasing success without any
temporal power, nay, in the face of the
most frightful persecution by the temporal
power. Thereafter, for several centuries
more, though still devoid of temporal SOW
ereignty, it continued to be a manifest sue
cess. How then can the Pope or any other
sane man dream that temporal power" is
essential to it's success. Our good neigh
Dor ought really to quit fabricating doc
trines for the Catholic Church. Such
dodges may be charitably attributed to ig-
norance if occurring on some far off from
tier among a lot of benighted Methodists
who have never seen priest or q cross, but
in a newspaper of four pages it doesn't look
we'll.
The Presbyterian thinks that the Stack
decision is bitterly resented" 1t is
heartily laughed at as a solemn stupidity
an attempt to persecute the clergy through
the laity. Judge Gamble and our neigh
Dor ought both to know that such decis.
ion is mere brutum 1ulnsen, a senseleas,
imperative piece Of impertinence.
But, says the Presbyterian, the tendency
of the Romish Church is to Capitalization.
The tendency! Why the Catholic Church
is OBSERVATION-DISCLOSURES in its most
concentrated form. 1t holds that all spiritu-
oil power is from above, not from below; from
God, not from man. 1t holds that God has
put all spiritual power is the hands of his
established hierarchy of whom the Pope is
absolute head 30 far IS discipline goes. Al
power of discipline is already with the
Pope and always has been so; how then
can there be tendency to more centraliza-
tionf 10 there more than all
Our neighbor says that sin France the
complaint is widespread that the tendency is
to destroy the individuality of the prests,
making them mere TOOLS" etc. Who makes
this complaint Any respectable priest
We say unhesitatingly, NO. Any practical
Catholic Equally certainly, no. The
Communist, the Free Mason, the CANT bet
tist 7 Perhaps 30. They are bound to
complain about something. But what i'm
pertinence in men who hate and scoff at
the priests to set themselves up as their
champions, and that, too, when the priests
themselves find no cause of disquiet!
Says the candid and truthful and light
giving Presbyterian
The object plainly is to make the govern
| ment of the Church en- absolute despotism, by
suppreseing the freedom and independence OF
tho lower ecolesiastics. This cannot be done ex.
oept by the connivance of the civil govern ment
But if the civil or secular power, as it is call
| ed, refuses to lend it's arm to carry out the
edicts Of the bishop, the power of absolute
despotism is broken. Whether Romanism car
subsist as voluntary society, then becomes
problem.
AS We have eeen the Papal power ove
discipline is already "absolute." 1t can
not be made more 30. But our intelligeu
neigGbor admits, in the very article fron
which we have just quoted, that the cano
law secures the partial independence of tn
lower clergy by fixing their right of "im
movability" in their parishes. 1t explain
farther that in this country the right of "im
movsbility" does not exist and that conse
quently priests may be removed and shift
ed around at the will of the bishops. An
why7 Because it is q missionary country
What deduction follows9 Simply that i
i, missionary countries the rule of hierarch
cal power holds in its primitive fulnes
l and that as country grows more Catholi
the canon law comes in and restricts tha
t power. The tendency then is to decentra
> cation as policy. Foolish man
But that is rOt the worst of the foil,
The extract goes on with the astoundin
assertion that if the secular power refuse
, to sustain the bishop he is helpless. n
bishop in this country has ever called q