The Intermountain Catholic. (Salt Lake City [Utah] ;) 1899-1920, 1905-03-11
A SILENT SERMON.
IN Catholic Church Everything
That Greets the Eye is PREACHING
The SeripturaI Message.
-Trom the Sacred Heart Rev

The SeripturaI Message.
tFrom the Sacred Heart Reviewl
The prodigious use constantly made
ot Holy Scripture by the Catholic
church is a salient fact which in it's
:uluess few persons comprehend, even
Emun- those within her fold. tits like
a. vast landscape which lies before us
IL rs beauty day by day yet ever un-
folds new beauties from an apparentlv
eNlaustleSs store. 1t were vain to at
fanpt i'm one brief article a comnlete
p3ruayal of this fascinating subject
The ohurch's use of and reverent love
Jon The Inspired Word of God. a few
Instances must now suffice.
IT,, a man enter one of our churches
~ any hour-What does he see? Along
The walls runs the pathetic story. i'm
7fctured representation, of his Sayior's
suneriugs endured for him. There he
Uebolds the condemnation pronounced
10y Plate the cruel scourging endured
Jesus, the thorn-crowning, the nail
5u- 70 the cross, the dying on that hard
bed Of pain the taking down from the
cross, the burial in the garden tomb
Al the sanctuary he finds statues of
our Lords dear Mother and His faith
-uI fOsteT-father. If it is Christmas
time he finds there, too, the pretty rep
1eseuJation Of the crib, the infant Je-
fus the OK and ass, the shepherds. the
wise men, the star. Over the altar is
The crucifiX. always. Everything he has
sen is preaching silently, to the peo-
nle who throng those churches as their
special home and abiding place from
childhood to old age the Scriptural
message, St John iii, 16: For God
50 loved the world as to give His only
begotten Son; that whatsoever believeth
in Hi mmay not perish, but may have
life everlasting"
Let. US enter one of our Catholic city
churches to watch what is going on.
in the early morning mass is said: the
HOrshipers gather, few. or many as the
case may be. They have come to as
sist at that tremendous sacrifice of
which Malachias Il, ID, foretold in
Holy Writ: In every place there is
sacrifice, and there is offered to my
3ame a clean Oblation." But when all
services are done. is the church
closed locked. unyisited. till another
service" begins ? BY no means. Peo-
J'le linger, though the outward sight
nothing is going on
Keep up your watch through all the
long hours of the day. A child comes
sn. and making its toddling way to the
crib, studies the story of Bethlehem
silently with woldring eyes. An old
man comes in and kneels long at the
altar: an aged woman tells her beads:
q young girl makes the way Of the
cross; boy doffs his cap, bends his
knee and says something no one hears
10 Coda noisy, laughing, active boy,
subdued for the moment into absolute
silence. then off like dart to game and
jest and work. 1 laboring man leaves
ID he
close TO the altar rail some one in deep
mourning is sobOing softly: Sisters
come gently in. each one with her own
prayer, her own need. What does it
al mean?
1t means SIM, hat the real pres
tnce of Jesus Is on .E. altar II means |
simply the Cst10li. church's constant
J repetition to h ueople of the words
of her Lord. treas Ired by her in Holy
Scripture: This IS my body. This is
my blood. Behold | am with you all
days. even TO the colsummation of the |
world"
However poor and sad our dwellings, |
however noisy and troubled our sur
loundings, we have one peaceful, holy |
home where we may go unquestioned, |
and its dooYds stand ever open; we |
have one place where peace is perfect |
and where one friend waits for US al |
ways to hear our prayer.
our ShopgirlS, cur accountants. our |
school children. our old people, may not /
always be able 10 tell you just how |
many books there are in the Old Tes- |
lament, or how may epistles in the |
New Testament: but they do know that |
their church oenS her motherly arms |
wide to them, AMI how she tells them /
that the Lord they love, and of whom
10 Scriptures are full, is "in this |
place.
The discretion of the Catholic church |
IS marvellous factor in her marvel /
Gus makeup. She does not insist on her |
people knowing the Bible from cover !
TO cover. She perfectly agrees with St.
Peter. I'm his second epistle iii. 16, that
there are In the inspired writings, as
any one might easily surmise there
would be. certain things hard to be
which the unlearned and
unstable ,wrest to their own destruc-
7Iou.F With the aWed reverence that
Catholics treat the house of God they
I'll $50 treat the word of God, for there
is I'm either of them an indwelling
s.irit before whom the wise, strong an
gels veil their faces with their wings.
But the Jesus the redeemer. of whom !
1he Scriptures llainly tell, him the
HfhOlic church Keeps ever before her
S.jdrcus eyes and in their thoughts;
q that is one reason why her houses
oE worship are thTonged on Sunday
anI- are not left alone and unvisited
u week days. because the Lord of the
Scriptures is always I'm his holy place.