The Intermountain Catholic. (Salt Lake City [Utah] ;) 1899-1920, 1905-05-20

| TO treat of the Apostles Greed, the
| Sacraments, the Decalogue, the Lord $
Prayer and the Precepts of the Church.
This Venerable Brothers, we do pre-
scribe and command by virtue of the
| Apostolic authority. 1t now rests with
Won to put it into prompt and complete
execution in your diocess, and by all
| the force of your power see to it that
these prescriptions of ours be not neg
lected or what comes to the same
thing that they be not carried out
s1IperficiaIly. That this may be avoid
ed Won must not cease to recommend
and to require that your parish priests
do not impart this instruction care
Iessly. but that they diligently prepare
themselves for it; let them not speak
words of human wisdom, but with
simplicity of heart and in the sincerity
of God" cd. Cor. l., 12). who. though
He revealed mysteries hidden from
the beginning of the world Matt, xiii,
35). vet spoke always to the multi
tude i'm parallels, and without par
ables did not speak to them Qbid,
34) The same thing was done also by
the Apostles taught by our Lord. of
whom the Pontiff Gregory the Great
said: They took supreme care to
preach to the ignorant things easy and
Ineligible, not sublime and arduous"
Moral. ?. xvii, ch. 25) In matters of
religion the majority of men in our
times must be considered as ignorant"
We would not, however, have it sup
posed that this studied simplicity of
preaching does not require labor and
mediation-on the contrary. it requires
both more than does any other kind of
preaching 1t is much easier to find
preacher capable of delivering an elo-
quent and elaborate discourse than
catechist who is able to impart instruc-
ton entirely worthy of praise. 1t must,
therefore, be carefully borne in mind
that a person, whatever facility of
ideas and language he may have in
herited from nature, will never be able
to teach the catechism to the young
and the adult without preparing him
self thoughtfully for it. They are mis-
taken who suppose that in consequence
of the intellectual inferiority of the
common people they can perform this
office in careless manner. On the
contrary, the more uncultured the
hearers, the greater is the necessity
for study and diligence, in order to
bring home to their minds those most
sublime truths, which are so far be-
yond the natural understanding of the
multitude and which must yet be
known by all, the learned as well as
the unlettered, in order that they may
attain eternal salvation.
And now, Venerable Brothers, permit I
us to close this letter by addressing to
you these words of Moses: 'If any
man be on the Lords side let him join
with me" (EX. xxi. 26). We pray
and conjure you to reflect ON the ruin
of souls which is wrought solely by
ignorance of divine things. Doubtless
you have done many useful and GER I
tainly praiseworthy things in your
respective dioceses for the benefit of |
the flock entrusted to you. but before |
all else, and with all the diligence, all |
the zeal, all the assiduity that is poss-
sible for you to employ. see to it that |
the knowledge of Christian doctrine |
penetrate and peryade through and |
through the minds of all: Let every
one" these are words of the Apostle !
st. Peter), ''as he has received grace, |
good stewards of the manifold grace of
God" q Peter, w., 100.
Through the intercession of the Most
Blessed Immaculate Virgin. may your
diligence and your energy be fructified
by the apostolic blessing, which, in to-
ken of our affection and as an earnest
Of divine favors, we impart to you and l.
TO the clergy and the people entrusted
to each one of you.
=
Given at Rome, at st. Peters on the
18th day of April. 1905, in the second
year of our Pontificate
Plus X, POPE.