The Intermountain Catholic. (Salt Lake City [Utah] ;) 1899-1920, 1899-10-28

/
exploration had linked their names i'm
mortally with the destinies of the west
| ern world before that great modern
myth. the AnSlo-SaXon race was ever
heard of. Yes, the Spaniaru, the
Portuguese. the F'renchman-au mad
done their part toward expIor-
ing and settling the Americas before
England made any serious movement
! in that direction. Even Hudson, the al
legged English navigator, about whose
/ early career so little is known, made
/ his greatest American discoveries
while in the pay of the Dutch.
At the beginning of this country
there was oniy one Catholic Bishop In
| the United States, he of Baltimore, the
) Right Rev John Carroll, kinsman of
! the intrepid patriot whose hand wrote.
| at the foot of the Declaration of indie
| pendence, Charles Carroll of Carroll
tom" Now they had lightweight
dicceses, including archdiocese and
from less than a hundred thou
/ sand communicates they had grown
to- be nearly ten millions strong
In 1893 Chicago had less than
a hundred Catholic worshlpers
and a single missionary priest. Now it
was an archdiocese with $50 priests, III
parish churches, 140 chapels, numerous
colleges, academies, schools. houses OF
refuge. hospitals. orphanages and other
| INSTITUTIONS,
bership of 10000 souls. lhey
hight WE'LL indeed, be proud OF
that record and of the noble church
men who had made it-from the Jealous
and indefatigable Bishop Quarter, cut
off in the pride of his manhood and the
fullness of his usefulness to God and
man, to their present patrtarchal Arch
bishop, w4lo scared among them like
some grand old pillar tower of Ireland,
! in hka
OF his people.
The growth of the Catholic church
more than kept pace with the growth OF
the republic. 1t had by far the largest
membership of any individual denomin-
alton. In American public affairs IL
had been patriot, not political,
church 1t had not advocated CONVEX
sion of the heather by force of arms.
neither did it convert the cross OF
| Christ, which was its symbol, into the
| hilt of conquerors sword. IL
preferred to rule by moral sua-
sion and charity for all man
kind-no matter what the color of their
skin. no matter at what altar they
knelt From tn daeys of B1snop
Carroll and Bishop England to
those of Archbishop Hughes-the cho-
sen friend and ambassador of Abraham
Lincoln-and from his day to the pres
! ent time of Bishop John Lancaster
Spalding and Archbishop Ireland, it had
ever been found on the side of Amert-
can independence, national unity and
the liberty of nankdnd. In the
days of the revolution and 1872
il was true to the cause CT the
patriots and the rights of American
citizens on the high seas. From this
state of Illinois during the war with
Mexico it sent forth that Catholic and
Irish hero, James Shields, at the head
of an Illinois brigade to do good bat
tie for America at Cerro-G and
Chapultepec. When disruption threat
ened the Union an almost ex-
! ctusively Catholic and Irish regiment,
under the brave James Mulligan
marched forth to defend the flag, and
the gallant leader lost his life through
! cihvalrouS fidelity to his trust.
| StiF another regiment, the Nine
tfeth composed of Catholics, raised
! by a Catholic clergyman, and headed
| by an Irish colonel supplemented the
noble Twenty-third. and Colonel
| O'Mara fell also ON the bloody heights
of Chattanooga, in defense of his great
! adopted country. In Ihe ldte
| Spanish war one fine Irish regi-
| ment volunteered and was accepted for
service. Several others were ready to
| follow it to the field, but their services
were not required. Thus by practical
example the Catholics of Illinois and
Chicago, like those of the rest of the
republic refuted the cowardly ISLANDERS
| leveled against their loyalty to Amer
/ lea by narrow bigots who were a dis
grace to the American name.
| He claimed for the old apostolic race
| of Ireland the premier place in the his
tory of CathOlicfty in America, while
gladly admitting the great services per-
| formed by the French Catholics, whose
country had been called 'the eldest
daughter of the church," the Spanish.
the Belgians and the Germans, who had
been Christianized in great measure by
Irish missionaries-the worthy success
sors of st. Patrick-and who had done
much that was vigorously aggressive in
advancing the cause of the old faith in
the United States.
! And of the newer elements in the life
of the Catholic church in America, he
might mention the Italians-those heirs
| of the conquerors of the ancient world
whose radiant gifts would, after
! brief experience of liberty, give to
| America that genius which had made
| Italy illustrious in arms, in art, in lit
erature-in all that tended to ennoble
| the human race. Nor could he forget
to pay tribute to the gallant kindred Of
! Kosciusko and Pulaski-Catholic cham
| pions of American independsnce-the
| devoted Poles. whose ancestors beat
! back from the threatened plains of un-
grateful Europe-from the very walls
of old Vienna-the thronging legions of
still ether and newer elements,
but those he had cited went
! to prove, the cosmopolitan, yet
patriotic, composition. of the Catholic
church of eago-plucking fresh flow
ers from every land of Europe to lay