The Irish standard. [volume] (Minneapolis, Minn. ;) 1886-1920, 1915-02-06
EV|D[NC[SOF 'IAEANT|.
CATHOLIC FLAREBACKS"
Writer in Harpers Weekly Discus
ses Fever of Anti-Catholic
Suspicious
Writer Calls Agitators Unchurch
ed Group" and wild
Eyed Agitators'.
Analizeses the Causes Leading In
to Placing Bomb in St
Patricks Cathedral

Since this article Is to be about
the Catholic church it is only fair
to say at the outset that l do not.
from the inside, know anything about
the Catholic church. I was born in
a rough western frontier state when
religion was not yet known
there, and I have never become ac-
quainted with the meaning of spirit
ual significance of ritualism.
l hope I am without prejudice for
or against the Catholic church and
l am writing only because Harper's
Weekly has opened its columns to
the discussion of topics connected
with a Catholic-Protestant fever of
suspicious. so to speak. signs of
which DR.. Washington GLADDEN. has
seen upon his horizon.
But it is not with Catholic-Protest-
ant suspicious that l have to deal
here, but bitter hatred-stirring
against the Catholic church in a
group that we may call the un-
churched group. "Wild-eyed agita-
TORS" they are in part. Their bitter
hatred Of the Catholics they folded
up in newspaper clippings and in bits
of verse that cursed. and then set
them off as the inner contents of a
bomb in the chief Catholic edifice of
America.
A very little while after the bomb
went off in st. Patrick's, New York.
l called at the Cathedral to see Mon
signor Lavelle, one Of the most low
able and kind-hearted men it has
ever been my good fortune to know.
With kindness in every word. even
for those he might have suspected
with completely in the bombing busi-
ness. the good father spoke:
I'VE dwell here at peace with all
the world and so trusted in all the
world. We never feared this thing
because we hated no one and so did
not think anyone would hate u.s."
During the year before l stood on
the Cathedral steps holding this bit
OF conversation with the good Cath
olic father l had been constantly
among the anarchists. the agitators
OF no particular breed, and the So
cially disturbed who gathered in pub
lie squares. this in pursuit of my
trade as newspaper reporter. For
six months before the bomb explosion
l had been telling my friends 1t was
sure to come. And for a reason, I
had been giving the fact that, with
whatever merit or lack of reason.
these radicals had focused upon the
Catholic church as something to hate.
to personify as the heart and core
of all the opposition to them.
want to tell some of the incidents
that saw happen and afterwards
saw interpreted into cause for bitter
hatred of the Catholic church, and
for actions based upon that hatred.
wanted to tell good Monsignor La
velle about them as he stood, almost
in tears. by the marred column in
the cathedral; but that would have
been too hard task.
I tell them now in conformity
with Harper's Weekly's utterancecs
that If the people know all these
things, then they will know better
how to handle the issues that lie
around and about them. I give no
charge against the Catholic church
the Endorsement of my faith in its
accuracy. I know that those who
are on the inside Of any organization
know vastly better than those on the
outside what It's heart and purposes
are. write these things down as
suspicious that were taken for facts
by some people who put them into
public actions and my hope is that
someone within the Catholic church
may arise and show how in each in
stance the suspicion was ungrounded
and the action of the radicals based
upon an entirely false presumption.
To begin with. then. with trail
that leads up from the bottom of the
detective force to the Court Of Gen.
eral Sessions in several ceases where
anarchistic disturbers were involved.
There was meeting place in a
lower east side street in New York
where certain disturbers of the mem
tai peace Of the community gathered
on occasions to talk over imagined