The evening herald. [volume] (Shenandoah, Pa.) 1891-1966, 1899-04-20
WHAT CATHOLICS BELIEVE
A short Exposition of Their Faith by a
Distinguished Priest.

New York, April 2O.--The Rev p. A..
Baart, Of Michigan, distinguished among
Roman Catholics as an authority on canon
law, has published q short exposition Of
Of Roman Ca holic doctrine, Of which Is
given below the essential features
"All Catholics believe that there is one
God in three divine persons, Father Son and
Holy Ghost that God by His Word only
and out Of nothing created heaven and earth
and all things that angels and men are the
chief creatures of God that some of tie
angels snned and were punished. That
Adam and Eve. the first man aud woman
disObeyed the command el God and were
punished by the loss Of justice and innocence
and by sickness and death that this depriva-
tion Of justice is original sin and all men are
born with this defect of sin that through
the merits of her Divine Son and because she
was to be His Mother, the Blessed Virgin
Mary was preserved free from this original
sin which privilege is called her immaculate
Conception.
Thai God the Son, by the power of the
Holy Ghost, assumed human nature of the
Blessed Virgin Mary and is called the God
Man, Jesus Christ that for this reason the
Blessed Virgin Mary, although a creature,
is called the Mother of God and is deserving
of a very special but not divine honor
divine honor is paid to God alone
That Jesus Christ, by His suffering and
DEATH redeemed men and obtained for them
grace or supernatural help whereby they
may be saved that the chief channels of
grace are the seven sacraments all of which
we're instituted by Christ.
THAT Jesus Christ instituted church or
society, and that to certain ones, i. O., the
priesthood in this church. He intrusted the
administration of the sacraments and the
teaching of his doctrine; that the divinely
appointed visible head Of the church, the
Pope of Rome (the visible head is Jesus
Christi is. by the aid of the Holy Ghost, and
must be, iufalible, l. e., he cannot err when
officially teaching the whole church doc
trine regarding faith or morals This does
not imply that the Pope cannot sin or make
mistake in other matters
That all are bound to belong to the
church, and he who knows the church to be
the true church and wilfully remains out OF
it cannot be saved. While believing this in
regard to the church, they are not to be the
judges of their fellow men in regard to sal
vation which finally depends on their in.
terror disposition known only by God and
by themselves.
THAT as Jesus Christ is God, He can do ali
things, and particularly that He can forgive
| sins and that He can change the substance Of
bread and wine into the substance of His body
and blood; that He has given this power t
certain men, viz, to the priesthood Of tht
Church.
THAT all the doctrines of the Church ar
contained in the revelation of God; that thi
revelation is found in the unwritten and th
written Word of God or in tradition anC
Scripture; that tradition finds its infallibl
expression in the teaching Church; that botl
are of equal value in as far as they transmi
the divine evelatOn-Scripture because i
contains and is the Word of God inspired b!
the Holy Ghost to the sacred authors; tradi
tion, because it is preserved from error b!
the assistance Of the Holy Ghost. While
therefore, the members of the Catholi
Church revere and use the Bible, still the.
believe that the Scriptures alone do not con
tain all the revelation of God.
That the marriage of Christians is
sacrament and cannot be dissolved by an.
court, but only by the death of either tn
husband or wife.
They believe in heaven, state in whcl
the good are rewarded eternally; they be
lieYe in hell, a state in which the wicked ar
condemned eternally they believe in purgs
tory, a state in which those suffer for tim
who die guilty of venial sins or withou
having satisfied the temporal punishment du
to their sins they believe in general resul
rection of the dead followed by a genera
Judgment, after which purgatory will ceas
and the souls of the just reunited to thei
bodies will be rewarded forever, and tn
souls of the wicked also reunited to thei
bodies will be punished forever"