The Montgomery advertiser., 1908-04-27

The following interesting article on di- vorce by Rev. Father H. c. semple' formerly of Montgomery. was written for The New York Times:
 By his proclamation of the law on the marriage tie for the whole church. pius x became the observed or many observers As Catholics awake around the globe on this Easter morning their eyes will be opened to his statue. now first in force, by which a marriage of a Catholic without the priest and two witnesses is no marriage; whereas the same marital consent of the same parties in the same place and CIT. cumstances. might have been valid marriage. a contract, and sacrament valid before God and the church, t if had been pronounced before the clock struck the hour of IF at mia night As he is the first Pope in all the centuries from the days Of St. Peter to have made this world wide canon. not only many Catnoiic observers of the times who love the Pope as the vicar of Christ. but others too. who hate the Pope as anti-Christ, are startled and puzzled. If not stun ned and angered by this aw with which they are now brought face to face.
 To Prevent Divorce.
 To stop the quickening onware strides of the divorce monster wnich Is knocking equally at the cottages of our poor and at the towers ot our financial kings, of late many spokes- men of sects and States have met ana talked and scattered and gone their ways and done nothing, or next 70 nothing. We Americans lead the worid in the divorce evil But to cure the evil we find ourselves the most ifn- potent for action. Apart from our ra- liRious discord and separation or church and State our most youthful and progressive of the great nations IS for this holy cause the most cramped bv constitutional technicalities, and our union of sovereign States ts tne least united of all States.
 And the well-meaning workers who could not find any leader to give strength to their efforts now saw one feeble old man, come forward on the cessor of the Fisherman of Galilee. who wears on his finger the Fisher mans ring He is former Italian peasant and a prisoner in his dwell ling among those of his own blood. who are a menace to his life. His See Is in old Rome amid ruins of the past grandeur He is the head of the least modern Christian creed, which boasts it is ever the same-semper eadem- like tha rock in the torrents or tune. He has been held up as butt Of hate, as the arch foe of progress, and as the worst of Popes to keep the worlo back And he is the anathematizer of modernism, as the system which so loves novelty as to hate the heritage of wisdom handed down by the human race. and which seeks growth or lie in faith which is the death of faith :: And now where all others have failed this one feeble old man comes for- ward as the modern champion of the purity and peace of the family and home, and he merely makes one stroke of his pen, and behold all the thousands of Catholic Bishops and the hundreds of thousands of Catholic pastors. and. the- hundreds of~ millions Of catholic people in all the .di6ceses and all the parish districts into which the map of the world is apportioned are one heart and one mind for act- lon and his word Is their law.
 This vast phenomenon, which IS at- most asnoiseless as the radiation oyer the earth of the suns light, warmth and life, arrests the attention of. all observers. Some feel that the ingeF sf God is here: that here is the frpls of Christs prayer that Ills chuEcn might be one that the world might nes Ileve that the Father had sent Him and that there could not be such sig nal unity in such vast variety withz out the omnipotence of the Holy Spirit which dwelIs in Christs One Holy Catholic Apostolic Church. as in it's own body .and inspires filial loyalty toward the Holy Father into hundreds of millions of heart. However other observers here see only the greatess of the worlds works of human policy But all wish to study this phenome- non in the worlds social history from the Catholic point of view and to scrutinize it from inside the Catholic Church and the Catholic mind.
 What, then, are the Pope's own -~..uAa af hta Q1atnna 0f TnVAF t0 make such a change in the law Of marriage? In answering this question we go back to the Son of Man. who ta true God, with all power in Heaven and on earth, and see Him before He visibly quits the earth, founding 2 visible society or church in which and through which all creatures of all na- tionsysof all ages, may have full meant to save their souls. This society iS not e geIf.created corporation which any one is free not to enter, but oncs in, is bound by fidelity to promises te all changed by the associatton's whim: The church's officials are not mere deputies, agents. ministers. made and unrnade by king or people to do the will or teach the views of man. but Pope Bishop and priest, while bound to be in their spirit the servants oi the servants of God. are anointed by God as pilots of His ship. shepherds oi His flock. fathers. of His household and rulers of His Kingdom AL though men, they have, through God men at their command, and they say to one, Go. and he goeth; and to AD- other. Come and he coH1eth, and to another Do this. and he doth it. They are to carry on the work started by Christ on earth, and for this they take His place in His authorized repres- entatiyes. They have power and heir from Him not only to teach and te