The Catholic bulletin. [volume] (St. Paul, Minn.) 1911-1995, 1918-09-28

| towards all, in equity to the country.
/ as one nation, to its people as one
people, but solemnly decree, as they
did, as they continue to do, equal
rights to all. privileges to none? Nee
essarily religious freedom is the basic
/ life of America, the cement running
| through all its walls and battlements.
the safeguard of its peace and pros
perity. Violate religious freedom
once unsheathed. Violate it in favor
of Catholics, against nome Catholics: no
less readily do they leap from the
/ scabbard
| Does Catholicism in America suffer
/ from religious freedom, allowed equal
ly to Catholics and to n-Catholics?
Compare the lot of Catholicism in
| America to that of Catholicism in so
many Transatlantic lands. where the
tenets of pagan Caesarism, as to the
| supremacy of the state over the con-
science of its subjects, do still pre-
vail. There manacles bind hand and
limb the Bride of Christ: here she
| walks, in queenly mien, free and un-
fettered, putting forth, without let or
hindrance, the full exuberance of her
/ native force and beauty, proving at
every stepping that her life is all her
/ own, since she lives it without out
ward help or prop; that her blossom
/ and fruit are all her own, since they
i spring, exclusively from her bosom
and of their own vigor defy trium-
I, phantly darkening clouds and battling
tempests.
Had the Catholic Church not lived
and thriven in freedom, truth were not
its armor, grace from Heaven were
not the comeliness of its countenance.
| They know us little who accuse us
of eoveting civil and political power,
that we may dim the splendor of the
fairest flower in the garden of Amer
icanisnl. Our combats, if combats
there be. are never against the lib
critics of America, but in defense of
them: never against Amerieanism, but
against such of its sons, whose souls
never yet have thrilled in full response
to its teachings and inspirations.
Is Catholicism in America an Alien In
1 stitution?
The charge is made: if not anti
American, the Catholic Church is un-
American-it is in America an alien
institution. More definitely the charge
is this: The Catholic Church does not
bear the stamp-"Made in America. -
1t is un-American to go across the
Atlantic or the Pacific for ought that
America uses or needs-even for it's
religion. Now the head of the Cath
Ollie Church is the Bishop of Rome, a
foreigner: its general Councils, COM
posed of men of all nations-foreign-
ers in the majority, Europeans, Asia
tics, Africans-legislate in faith and
morals for America. Why not a Pope
strictly American? Why not councils,
as those of other religious bodies, ex-
clusively made up of Americans-cap-
able, as only Americans may be sup.
posed to be, of interpreting the Amer
lean mind and guiding the American
! aspiration?
Argue that the Almighty God is not
the Supreme Author and Norma of an
eternal righteousness, that Jesus
i Christ is not the proven revealer of
the thoughts and the love of the AL
mighty God, that the Bishop of Rome
is not the historic successor of Christ s
Apostolate-then, counsel, perhaps,
you may an American-made Church
for Americans, an American-made
code of faith and morals. But religion
is not product of the mind of the
individual man, or of the environment
within which he lives: it is not a hu-
man growth, changeable as the sea.
) sons of the year, fitful and capricious
as the likes and dislikes of men and
of peoples. Religion is the mind and
), the will of God, existing as God exists
effectively outside of men and of PEG.
pies, superior to all in man, exaeting
: from man the obedience due by the
creature to the Creator. The question
: is neYer-what is it that suits man.
or a speople? But-what is it that
: God has imposed upon men by the
2 eternal laws of His supreme right.
: eousness, or by the teachings of His
historic revelations? What America
: requires is, not an American-made, but
a God-made religion And so, at the
f bar of American common sense Itself
D the proposals of the writer in the At
: lantic' Monthly must only be-as he
S himself inclines despairingly to tern,
0 them-"dreams that are the shadows
f of hopes hopes that are the shad
IL ows of dreams"
The Catholic Church is extra-Amer
lean, supernatural, begotten for al
nations, not for America alone: its
. Supreme Pontiff is tra-American, su
: pra-national-a foreigner on no spoi
of earth's surface, everywhere al
! home, as the spiritual Father of al
? tribes and of all peoples who seek di
vine truth from universal God ant
e universal Saviour.
l.. And this, the beauty: this, the gran
: deur of the Catholic Church-that is
= Catholic. as eternal truth is Catholic
). as the eternal God is Catholic. as the
salvation given by Jesus Christ is
Catholic. Narrowness, provincialisn
:, in religion, in faith and morals, OF
the first face of things. is perversior
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