The St. Johns herald., 1890-03-06
Church and State.

ial duties which Catholics owe to the state, reasserts his old claim that God has given him full pow CT over the whole world, both in ecclesiastical and civil affairs. He says:
 It is the chief duty of Christians to suffer themselves to be ruled and guided absolutely by the bishop ps, and particularly by the Pontiff.
 The Pope then defines the re-
 spective functions of church and state:
 The church is the mistress of the nations. The church must concern herself about the laws formulated in the states because of the well fare of the state itself, and because they sometimes encroach on the right of the church by passing their due bounds. And since the wei fare of the states is peculiarly de- pendent on the direction of it's gov ern0rs, the church can not give either patronage or favor to the men at whose hands she knows on- ly oppression, who i'll broad day re- fuse to respect her right, and who strive to tear asunder the civil and sacred polity, bound together as they are in their very essence.
 This is but an indirect and tor tuous method of asserting the right of the church to interfere with the affairs of state. We are furnished almost daily with renewed evidences of the nu merous increase of hier- archical power and pretension, and of blind submission on the part of the general Catholic public to the medieval doctrine of the en- cyelical and syllabus of Pope Plus the Ninth. In the, platform of the ] late Baltimore Catholic Congress, was a vehement protest against "the presumption of any govern ment that shall control the acts of the Holy Father" and a demand ''that no act of legislation shall be passed until 1t has first received the approbation of the Pope" If this is not bringing the Pope to Ameri- ca, it is certainly taking America to the Pope. This, however, has al- ways been the doctrine of the Ro- mish Church. Dr. O. A. Brownson, the Catholic author, in his Essays" page 279, says that "the Papacy possesses the only divine authority ever conferred upon an earthly tri- bunal to make laws for the govern ment of mankind." And that in submitting to the Papacy, we sub- init to God, "and are freed from all human authority" Again, he says: ."We wish this country to come un- der the Pope of Rome. As the visi- ble head oi the church, the spirit ual authority which God has insti- tuted to teach and govern the na- tions, we assert his supremacy, and tell our countrymen that we would have them submit to him." When Pope Gregory the Sixteenth said "Out of the Roman States, there is no country where I am Pope, ex- cept in the United Stetes," he un- doubtedly cherished the same idea which filled the mind of Dr. Brown son, when he penned the above eX- traordinary sentiments. The pres ent Pope, pressed much nearer to the wall than any of his predeces- sors, still indulges the hope that he 1 may yet regain his temporal power and supremacy by building up a hierarchicai system in America, with authority above both national and State governments-a politico- ecclesiastic system. with power suf- ncient to compel obedience to all Papal decrees, as he, with crown of the Caesars upon his brow, shall see fit to promulgate the m. The Pa pacy, staggering upon it's lastlegs in Europe, has transferred the scene of action to America, and is now endeavoring, by the most insidious and persistent efforts, to substitute an ecclesiastical government for this glorious government of the people.