Kentucky Irish American. (Louisville, Ky.) 1898-1968, 1917-03-17
IRISH FAITH
Nxtract From the Eloquent Father
Tom Burke's Boston
Lecture.
Grin Is as Catholic Today az When
She Bowed Before st.
Patrick.
Beautiful Light in the Character
and the Genius of Her
People.
NEVER YIELDED TO HEREsY.

In speaking to you, my friends.
On this subject, am forcfbly re-
minded that the character and
genius Of every people are formed
By their history. In going back to
the history of Ireland l am obliged
10 travel nearly two thousand years
In order to come to the cradle of my
race. l am obliged TO go back to
the day when Patrick, Ireland's
apostle, preached to the Irish race.
and In the Irish language. the name
and the glory of Jesus Christ and
of his Virgin Mother. And coming
down through that mournful and
eheckered history / find that our
people have been formed in their
national character and genius. first
Of all by the faith which Patrick
taught them. and secondly by the
form of government under which
they live.
What is the first grand feature
Of the Irish genius and the Irish
character? 1t is thiB-that having
once received the Catholic faith
from st. Patrick, Ireland has chung
20 it with fidelity SURPRISING that
~ GA VtACA HV0PASot 0hc AN@
known how to suffer and how TO
learned to relinquish or to abandon
the faith OF their fathers. They
received the faith from the glorious
apostle whom God and Rome sent to
them early in the fifth century;
they struggled for that faith during
three hundred years, against all the
power OF the North-unconquered
and Observation-Disclosures the
Danes endeavored to wrest from
ireland her Christian faith and to
force her back into the darkness
of pagan infidelity. They have
struggled during three hundred
.,csa-s OF English tyranny and Eng
bal law. They have suffered
Not that faith loss of property, loss
of friends, loss of nationality, loss
Of life. But Ireland, glorious Ire
land. has never relinquished the
faith which she received, and she is
rs Catholic today as in the days
when she bowed her virgin head be-
fore st. Patrick TO receive from him
she regenerating waters of baptism.
This say is the first beautiful
tight in the character and genius
OF the people of ireland. Every
other nation OF whom we read re-
ceived that faith slowly and re-
Mctantly. Every other nation of
whom we read demanded of their
apostle the seal of his blood to
ratify the truth which he taught
them.
Ireland alone among all the ma
lions of the earth received the faith
willingly. took 1t ioyfully, put II
into the hearts and into the blood
OF their children, and never caused
her apostle one tear of sorrow nor
one drop of his blood. More than
this, every nation on the face OF
the earth has. at some time or
other, been inhaled into some form
Of heresy. Some doctrine was dis
puted, some discipline was denied,
some antelope set up his unholy
pretensions to be head OF the Cath
Dlic church. l claim for my nation.
for my race. that with a divine in
stinct they never yielded to any
form of heresy: they were never yet
deceived in the instinct which drew
them to the true head of the Cath
Ollie church--the real Pope OF Rome.
In the fourteenth century there
was a protracted schism In the.
Catholic church. An antelope
raised himself up. France was de-
eeived, Germany was deceived, Italy
was deceived, England was de-
ceived, but Ireland, glorious Ire
land, with the true instinct OF a
divinely inspired and guided peo-
ole. chung to the true Pontiff and
4 80 IN
Catholic church. Whence came this
hght7 Whence came the fidelity
that neither bloodshed nor death
could destroy? 1t came from God;
Il came from that high heart and
Ahigh mind In heaven that inspired
1atrick to preach the gospel to the
\ple of Ireland. and inspired the
people to receive the message
Sjstian peace and love from his
ext great point in the genius
pcter of the Irish people Is
" and valor and courage
been tried upon a thou
and glory TO you. o Ire
courage has never been
ing-never! They fought
sand years on their own
cause was a good ones
e of the cause was bad.
) defeated and overpow-
hundred, yea. a thou
s.: but never--from the
Ireland's sword sprang
scabbard to meet the first
wn to the day that the last
5ldier persisted on Vinegar
ever has ireland been dis
"a or defeated by the cow
of her children. Why?
Zee comes this light of our peo-
answer that 1t comes from
that Ireland as nation and
shmen as q people have never yet
fawn the nations sword in a bad,
treacherous or dIshonorable
cause. We have fought on thou
1and fields. ct homo and abroad: