The Jeffersonian. [volume] (Atlanta, Ga.) 1907-1917, 1912-09-26
by Professor w. H. T. Dau i'm 81
Louis Theological Quarterly.

IL has linked Washington with
Rome. On the 9Th of jan
uary, 1895, there is issued at Rome
another encyclical letter, addressed
directly and exclusively to the
"Catholicity in the United States"
The aged Pope, tottering on the
brink of the grave, ''traverses in
spirit and thought the wide expanse
of ocean" He says to his beloved
sons in America: eve shall be,
God willing, Of some assistance to
the Catholic cause among you"
Was ''the Catholic cause" in danger?
Had Catholics become DISTINGUISHED?
Was the country entering upon an
anti-Catholic campaign? Had laws
been made that rendered the exis-
tence of the Catholic Church preca-
rious? Not in the least; we shall
hear that the Pope in this epistle
acknowledges that the flourishing
condition Of the Catholic Church in
our country is F'due to the equity of
the laws which obtain in America"
The assistance" then, which he
wishes to render cannot be for de-
fensive purposes. He goes on to
say:
We highly esteem and love ex-
ceedingly the young and vigorous
American nation, in which We plain
1y discern latent forces for the ad-
vancement alike of civilization and
of Christianity.
Not long ago, when your whole ma
ton, as was fitting, celebrated with
grateful recollection and every man
Hesitation of JOY the completion of
the fourth century since the discov-
cry of America, We, too, commem-
GRATED together with you that most
suspicious event, sharing in your re-
joicings with equal goodwin. Nor
were We on that occasion content
with offering prayers at a distance
for your welfare and greatness. It
was Our wish to be in some manner
present with you in your festivities.
Hence We cheerfully sent one who
should represent Our person. Not
without good reason did We take
part in your celebration. For when
America was, as yet, but a newborn
babe, uttering in it's cradle it's first
her bosom and motherly embrace.
OOIuulDuS, DIS w = nave SISSH mere CA
pressly shown, sought, as the pri-
mary fruit of his voyages and 1abors,
to open a pathway for the Christian
faith into new lands and new seas.
Keeping this thought constantly in
view, his first solicitude, when he
disembarked, was to plant upon the
shore the sacred emblem of the
cross. Wherefore, like the Ark of
Noe, surmounting the overlooking
waters, bore the seed Of Israel to-
gether with the remnants Of the hui
man race, even thus did the barks
launched by Columbus upon the
ocean carry into regions beyond the
seas as we'll the germs of mighty
States as the principles of the Cath
Ollie religion.
This is not the place to give de-
ensued. Very rapidly did the light
of the Gospel shine upon the savage
tribes discovered by the Ligurian.
For it is sufficiently we'll known how
many of the children of Francis, as
well as of Dominic and of Loyola,
were accustomed during the two fol-
lowing centuries to voyage thither
for this purpose; how they cared for
the colonies brought over from Eu
rope, but primarily and chiefly how
they converted the nations from SUI
perstition to Christianity, sealing
their labors in many instances with
the testimony of their blood. The
names newly given to so many of