The Catholic bulletin. [volume] (St. Paul, Minn.) 1911-1995, 1912-02-03
IN CATHOLIC IRELAND
THE GLoRIES OF IRELAND'S RE-
LleIoUs HISTORY PICTURED
BY AN ITALIAN WRITER.

| The Nuovo Antologia, the leading
Italian Review, says the London Tab
let, has a most inspiring article on
Ireland from the pen of Signor
Bonaiuti, a man of uncommon learning
and keen intellect. He deals with the
glorious religious history of ireland,
as he calls it, and gives an account of
the wonderous progress made by the
Gaelic League.
'Truly, in order to get an insight
into the profoundly religious spirit of
the Celts in Ireland, it is not neces-
sary to cross that country from east
to west, and reach, after passing
through the barren country of Done
gal, the islet of Derg Lake. 1t will
suffice to set ones foot on the Green
Isle, and to betake oneself in the morn
ing, after having landed at Kingstown,
to any of the Catholic Churches of
Dublin. At once you will feel that you
are in the true land of Faith, whatever
be the day of the week, the hour of
the morning, the church, whether it
be the aristocratic pro-Cathedral or
the Church of the Franciscans, along
the bank of the Liffey, or that of the
Dominicans, in one of the poorest
quarters of the city, you will find that
it is packed with people in the most
fervent attitude of prayer. The Cath
Ollie churches of Dublin are not
aesthetically the most beautiful, nor
are they the largest in the country.
Smaller towns in the provinces, like
Sligo, Armagh, Killarney, have finer
ones. But aesthetical considerations
are here out of the question. In fact,
the most attractive sight for the Wis
itor who has come from distant coun-
try are not the domes or the facades,
but the assembly of people absorbed
in prayer, on whom hovers, sensibly,
the living and permanent experience
of the divine. And if after Dublin, the
capital pretty well anglicized, you
cross green Erin and visit the western
and southern countries, if you stay in
the new cities of Cork, Limerick, Gal
way and Westport, and scrutinize
everywhere the manifestations of re-
ligious life, the Christian spirit which
breathes in the daily life of the peo-
pie, you will not be long in persuad-
ing yourself that you are in the midst
of the most Catholic nation of the
world; nay, perhaps, whilst today the
preoccupations of material life have
absorbed everywhere human energies
even to stif1e every value of spirit
the only Catholic nation in the world.
We of the Latin race are perchance
prone to believe that this profound
generation of the Gospel must be ac-
companied by the most fanantical
bigotry. Nothing of the kind! The
Irishman is not bigoted except in very
rare cases. He detests the studied
most cordial antipathy for every prac-
tice which may SAVIOUR of fetichism
and superstition-he feels instinctively
the superiority of the divine over
human laws, he displays the greatest
tolerance. Besides this, after CEN
turtles of terrible sufferings serenely
borne by the faith of their forefathers,
the Irish people see in the Christian
practice the most impellent, and at
one and the same time the sweetest
duty which collective life must obey.
In Gaelic the Church is called the
house of the people. Furthermore,
the dogmas of revelation, of ecclesias-
teal ministry, of the real presence of
God are not, for the Irish, cold intel
lectual formulas, but incarnated truths,
visible in the acts of daily life The
poor peasant of Donegal, who speaks
Gaelic and therefore addresses every.
body in the second person singular,
uses the second person plural in speak
ing to a priest because the priest is
not alone-God is with him. Such
prestige, easy to understand, consti-
tutes dangerous occasion for Cath
| Ole priests to abuse this confidence
| of popular piety. But whoever has had
familiarity with ecclesiastical life in
Ireland must recognize that the priest,
| ever ready to respond to the appeal
OF the people, does not take advantage
in the least of the veneration of which
he is the object