The Irish standard., 1910-02-19
INTERESTING ADDRESS TO CONVERTS BY
A PROFESSOR Of CATHOLIC UNIVERSITY
Judge William Robinson Describes Fruitful Method of Bringing
Honest Sarches for the Truth Into the One and Only Church
Of ChristLectu Was Received Into the Catholic Fold by
A Great Paulist Missionary.

The Washington correspondent Of the
Standard and Times gives the follow
ing report Of an address by Prof. Rob-
inson. Of the Catholic University. at
a meeting Of the Converts League,
which was organised about two months
ago in the nations capital:
! 1t is with no ordinary pleasure that
join with you this evening in this
meeting of the Converts League" be-
cause at the same time l celebrate the
forty-seventh anniversary of my own
reception into the Catholic church, in
the year 1863, by the great Paulist mis-
sionary, Rev. Father Deshon. In those
days such a step was not only mo-
mentous one to him who took it, but
an amazing one to all his associates
and friends; and scarcely any of them
could believe that it was the result OF
a deliberate Judgment based on long
continued study, and embraced only
when no alternative was possible.
/ Few indeed had been the American
converts before that day. Rarely
ever did layman cross the Rubicon,
and among the convert clergy nearly al,
were Episcopalian ministers whom the
j Oxford movement had fioated from
= their mornings, and driven. fortunately
, for thens-sinto the. safe harbor Of the
! Catholic, church. Yet Of even these
, the number was comparatively small
IN 1860 a careful search was made In
} the catalogues of the Episcopal church
; in this country for all the cases o.
such conversion, and it was found that
, from the settlement Of jamestown in
= 1908 to the year 1915 no such case oc-
: Cured: and that up to the year 1860,
! out of more than five thousand clergy
. only thirty eight conversions to the
Catholic church had taken place.
How vastly different Is the spectacle
3 that greets our eyes today! An indi-
: vidual conversion no longer disrupt.
friendship, divides brethren or ostra-
J cizes families. On the contrary, a new
2 convert at once becomes a center from
, which converting influences flow. And
| thus during these recent years we count
conversions not by scores or hundreds
but by thousands, while the Episcopal
> clergy still furnish n noble vanguard
J for the vast army which is marching
J onward into the Catholic fold.
! Under these circumstances we con.
. ver+s are confronted by tremendous
$ duty. 1t is inevitable, as Father Fable,
: says, that the true convert should be
: consumed by an Unsuitable zeal for the
/. conversion of his neighbors, ana lr
l proportion as their receptivity increases
: the question presses home more strong
: ly on each one Of us:
q ,"What can do to spread the knowl.
a edge OF the truth and lead my fellow
. men into the ark of Peter and the faitl
. Of Christi"
. To the divinely appointed priest ant
missionary the answer to this question
: Is clear and eminently practical GO
: We and preach my Gospel" says tn
9 Lord, "and am with YOU" and will
4 take care Of the rest; and in all per
Q iods Of the church the Lord has dom
= it. We need not look back to tn
e apostolic ages for the fulAllment Of thi
e promise. Seventy yearssago the Eng
,. lish-spaaking world lay in the dark
d ness of an apathy and error almost a.
h complete and hopeless as that Of tn
Il Gothic nations In the, days Of Attila
:: But when Gods time arrived the sun
n rise came. The iconoclasm of Wesle:
: and the Methodists, OF Emerson an
n the Unitarians, convulsed the feeling
j. and probed tho intellects Of Protestant
/. and compelled their earnest eyes t
+ look to other sources than the relig
d ions Of Luther, Henry the Eighth an
n Calvin for hope and help and consola
IL ton. To them the Lord sent Wisemar
70 Newman, Faber, Manning in England
II, and Hecker, Baker. .Walworth, Hewl
= and Deshon in America, who, with tn
N order which they founded, have. by di
n vine assistance, accomplished the won
/. derful results we. see today. The, caus
% of God and holy, church Is safe
hands like these. Their path Of du ut
~, &f.G5s 4 ~ 1s e ~ q. 5ts - IN