The Irish standard. [volume] (Minneapolis, Minn. ;) 1886-1920, 1918-03-02
SOLDIERS NOT ONLY FIGHTING.
BUT THINKING.
Wage Farmers Becoming a Proletariat
Glass Under Present Con-
ditions.
Church to Cooperate in Work of
Remedying Un-Christian Social
Conditions.

|
The times, through which we are
passing, are fraught with anxiety of
every kind" says the Cardinal 1T
is not necessary to gaze upon the con-
| fict of nations which affiicts the world
to find matter of serious concern. At
home, in our midst, there are signs of
trouble and disturbance, which are
| only very partially revealed in the
public press, but are we'll known to
those in authority, and which portend
the possibility Of a grave social up
! heaval in the future. 1t is admitted
on all hands that new order of
things, new social conditions new re-
lations between the different sections,
| in which society is divided, will arise
as a consequence of the destruction
of the formerly existing situation"
Catholics Must Be Interested.
The Cardinal asks what part the
Catholic Church can play in this trans
formation and replies to the question
by indicating that Catholics must not
remain apathetic and stand aside from
the social movements of the day.
Cardinal Bourne traces the causes
of the present conflict far beyond the
events of the summer of 1914
ga new relation of society had come
into being" he says. Men and wom-
ell of high aim and avowedly Chris
ton belief came to be dominated by
| ideas which had no ground in Chris
ton principle. The desire of gain at
all cost, without reference to the con-
sequences thereby entailed, seized
upon vast numbers of the nation and
became ruling principle. Other ma
lions had been learning the lesson,
notably the confederation of nations
which is now our chief enemy.
with the thoroughness of purpose
and scientific determination that char
.acterizes her, Germany has sought
worldwide performance by setting
boldly and consistently before herself
those materialistic aims which for too
long have deluded and misled our
English people. She desires her place
in the sun, and as might was only too
often right in the Industrial struggles
within the limits of our own peoples
false principles which, happily to an
increasing extent are now being dis
carded among us-she claims that
might is right in the world domination
for which she is now struggling to
her doom. Happily, do we say, are
those false principles being discarded
among us, for were it not so the future
of our peoples would be as overcast
as is the future which the economic
lusts of our enemies are bringing rap
idly upon them.
Concerned About the Future.
What is the future to be? How is
the social and political order to be
reconstructed among us? There are
some, small minority as yet, but
with increasing influence, who are
proclaiming policy of despair. They
have looked, they will tell us, in vari.
GUS directions for solution of the
problem in vain. Those who in this
country are the official representatives
of religious teaching have failed, so
these despairing voices assure us, to
give any coherent answer to their
questions. Thus they are driven
again it is their voice that speaks-to
the unwelcome conclusion that the
existing relations of society are in
capable Of being remedied and that
things cannot be worse than they are
at the present time.
'They proclaim that the existing
| cI,o 4
stroyed in the hope that out of the
chaos and destruction some better ar
rangement of mems lives may grow
up. 1t is policy of which we see the
realization and first fruits at the pres
ent time IN Russia. The vast majority
of our people are held back, if not by
religious motives, at least by their
Unborn practical sense, from suicidal
projects of this kind"
The new sense of the reality of re.
ligion with which hundreds of thou
sands of Englishmen have been i'm
pressed during the war, the Cardinal
thinks, will be one safeguard The
dangers, however, are very real, he
says.
"The effect of competition uncon.
trolled by morals has been to segre.
gate more and more the capitalist
from the wage-earning classes" he
says, land to form the latter into a
proletariat, a people owning nothing
but their labor power and tending to
shrink more and more from the re.
sponsibilities of both ownership and
freedom. Hence the increasing lack
of self-reliance and the tendency to
look to the State for the performance
of the ordinary family duties. While
the Constitution had increasingly tax.
en- on democratic forms the reality
underlying those forms had been in.
creasingly plutocratic. Legislation un,
der the guise of social reform tended
to mark off all wage earners as a
definitely servile class, and the result
even before the war was feeling
among the workers Of irritation and