The Irish standard., 1910-11-12
PORTUGAL IN STATE
OF RELIGIOUS DECAY
Priests and Nuns of the Inflated
Country Suffering at
Swords Point.
Under the New Regime the Best
Benefactors of the Country
Are Outcasts.
The Secular Press in America Has
Little Comprehension of
the Situation.

the Situation.
Father EspinOuZe, q Vincentian
priest, who has escaped from Portu-
gal, gives sad story of what hap
pened in the house of his Congrega-
tion in Lisbon, after the proclamation
of the Republic. He went out COM
missioned to find retreat for the
Fathers and clerical students. The
rioters gathered around the house Il
little later, In such fashion that no
one else could get out Finally they
broke their way in, and called out for
the local superior, Father Barros-
comes, and Father Fragues, the visit
or. Before either Of these puor priests
could utter a word they We're shot
down says the Republic.
Another Order, which even the athe-
istic Republic of France has but little
molested, needing it's services, is the
Good Shepherd-one Of the first to be
expelled from Lisbon Here are some
details from the fugitives themselves:
when news reached us that our
convent was the next to be attacked
by the infuriated soldiery, we all re-
paired to the chapel and as there was
no priestly hand to remove the Blessed
Sacrament from the Tabernacle, all
tho joa%c ho ho4 81,
PEELED, rather than leave the Sacred
Hosts to be abused by these wretches,
to be trampled under foot, az had been
done elsewhere, Mother St. Anne dis
tributed the Sacred Particles among
the Sisters. Hardly had this solemn
act been finished, than the chapel door
was burst open, and in rushed the
soldiers, taking us as their prisoners,
and cast us into prison, where we re-
mained five days, expecting death ev-
cry moment. At the end of that time,
the German Consul demanded the nine
German Sisters, and sent them back
to Germany. The remaining fifteen
Portuguese and French Sisters
through the exertions of charitable
souls, obtained passage on an Eng
lish steamer, and in due time reached
the Mother House in Anglers, France,
disguised in all Kinds of costumes, 80
as to escape observation, and looking
more like gypsies than Religious.
"The inmates, whose friends claimed
them, we're allowed to go with them
the rest were cast into the common
prison."
Although the Nuns of the Good Shep-
i herd have wrought for Portugal a
work which it could never do for It,
self, there has been for some time
an intensate jealousy of these true re-
formers. It's active manifestations
were hindered by such influential per-
sons as, for example, the Duchess of
Pamela, who had opened number of
kitchens for the poor, and was spend
ing $4,000 francs year in that char
ity, and who went to the government
officials with this word: "If you close
the House of the Good Shepherd 7
shall stop my 10000 francs and let
you look after your poor"
| 1t was as Prioress Of the Good Shep-
herd at Oporto that Mother Mary Of
the Divine Heart MARY Droste du
+ Vischering) accomplished her wonder
full task as new Apostle of devotion
! to the Sacred Heart Of Our Lord
while leading the laborious life of
her Order in the service of the fallen
or endangered of her own sex. The
founder Of the Order of the Good
Shepherd, Blessed John Eudes, has al.
ready been raised to the honors Of
the altar; the beatihcation cause Of
Mother Mary Of ST. Euphrasia (Pelle-
tier) is proceeding; while the cause
Of Mother Mary Of the Divine Heart,
who was but thirty-six at the time
Of her lamented death eleven years
ago, has been opened.
Portugal Is certainly in a state Of
religious and civic decadence when
she casts of from her shores her best
benefactors. It Ia quite clear that
the daily press Of America has little
comprehension OF the situation; al
though the Boston Herald, not be.
J cause OF such outrages on personal lib