The Pacific commercial advertiser. [volume] (Honolulu, Hawaiian Islands) 1885-1921, 1907-01-21
REPLY Of A. LAYMAh
To JAMES c. BEISSEl

apparently militant gentleman am
champion of the cause Catholic. IN Sun
days Advertiser, although only lay
man, respectfully beg to submit the
following:
The reverend gentleman, after de-
scanning on the small consolation given
by the Advertiser TO the .'Poor Soul
in Doubt goes on saying that, in his
opinion, ''it is hardly possible TO con-
fess more truly, more logically, and
more eloquently the utmost bankrupt
ey of Protestant Christianity FROM
ITS FRUITS LEARN THE TREE. .
Il plead guilty to the capitals, and
shall revert 10 this sentence later on-l
He calls Luther, fhe father of Pro
testantism, a religious evolu1ionist, who
substituted private Judgment to the
''infaIlible teachings of the Church.
Since when has the Church with =
capital CO been infallible, Father Bets.
sell. 1t is only one of the assertions
of your cult, one of many. which are
in no wise sustained by the - Fathers,
the early Christian writer's. Even the
venerable Cyprian, the Bishop of Car
thage, in his prolific writings, shows
ka 49, So I'd he
Gus points of religion even at that early
date; and as he did suffer his martyr
dom In the year PSI A D., and as al
that time there were neither pope nor
even yet any metropolitans, Il is very
difficult TO see whence the Church
Catholic, as instituted at much
later date, could derive its infallibility,
when such a claim had never been adj
vanced by the 'sFathers, even when
assembled in conclave. They believed
in the infaIlibility of Christ, although
then, and even much earlier, some of
them had the temerity TO doubt His
Divinity. and the final determination
of the Arians, who did so believe, did
not take place until the year ISL,
A D. Many of those very Arians are
in the Catholic Calendar of Saints and
Martyrs today This Arian creed was
general in the Empire of the East
No, indeed, Father Beissel, the in
fallibility of the Church was later
~ Il
premacy of the Metropolitan of Rome
(now styled Pope, and is also coeval
and on par with the Donation of
Constantine and the s1False De-
eretals,'' two FORGERIES, Father
BeisseI, admitted to be forgeries by
every scholar of today. Catholics in
cluded. AND UPON THOSE TWO
FORGERIES RESTS THE PAPAL
SUPREMACY EVEN TO THIS DAY.
This is undisputed history, and true;
but II is. of course, forbidden reading
to the flock
Father Beissel then goes on: .sIt IS
this new, and therefore false principle, >
etc. So, therefore, If new, It is false
I should like TO know, If Father Bets
sci viii kindly tell me, If that principle
holds good within the Catholic Church
as well as outside its fold9 For, if so,
the Immaculate Conception Of the
Virgin comes within that scope, as it
was discovered only at comparatively
n
actly when this momentous discovery
was made, that the Virgin was born
from q mother also Virgin, but think
it was in the latter sixties, or early
seventies-as was also the rediscovery
of the infaIlibility of the Pope Well
do I remember the homeric laughter
that went up from the entire civilized
world when the bull was promulgated
Gin 1872, I think declaring the Pope
to be again "infallible,' "a claim
that was then resureeted after an in
nocuous desuetude'' of nearly 500
years.
1t comes hard on a workaday citizen
or the United states TO Dt1lcNt III ds-
sertions which have no better basis,
either IN sacred or profane history
This is particularly so as those things
are Just as Father Beissel SAYS, NEW,
and therefore false.
In following the simile of Father
Beissel about the captain throwing his
magnetic needle overheard, / just
would say that, if the needle had been
tempered with by designing pirates 50
that It did no longer point TO the true
North. I. for one, would rather stay
with that captain and take my chances,
steering BY the stars Of the heavens
on the open sea, than follow the point
ing OF that needle into the pirates
nest. As Father Beissel continues.
the vessel is perfect in every way,
safely built, richly equipped LsieI
manned with a devoted crew. com
ruan5a5 hx- a skilful master:' but as