The Northwest enterprise. [volume] (Seattle, Wash.) 1931-1952, 1939-12-01
Timely Topics

BISHOPS Negro and White press
heralded the news that the Pope
had anointed the first colored BIZ
shops, but, according to students
of religion and the remarkable
trend of the Catholic Church, these
were not the first coolred bishops.
That there have been others is
proven in a letter to the New
York Times written by Mr.. Tho
mas F. Meehan. Mr.. Meehan
wrote:
mot only were there African
bishops in the Ages of Faith, but
it is of special interest to note
that Francis Xavier de Luna Vic
toria y Castro, who was conse-
Grated Bishop of Panama in 1851,
Archbishop of Chuquieaca, was a
Negro and the first native of the
Western Hemisphere to become a
bishop. He was born in Panama
in 1895. His Negro mother sent
him to the Jesuit college, of which
he was brilliant graduate. He
founded the st. Francis Xavier at
Panama.
1.-THE late Arthur Schomburg of
New York Public Library, in his
research work in the official ar
chives of Seville, discovered docu-
ments relating to Bishop Victoria's
career, and contributed a very in
teresting memoir of him in the In
ter-racial Review of August, 1887.
Nearer home, and later, the Sc
cond Bishop of Portland, Me. 1875,
James A. Healy, scholar, a mas
ter of oratory and man of sane
tity, according to his biographer,
was born in Macon, Ca, April 6,
1880, and had mulatto mother.
He was graduate of Holy Cross
College, and had distinguished
career as a priest of the Diocese
of Boston before he was appointed
Bishop of Portland. His brother,
the Rev. Patrick F. Healy, was a
Jesuit (1s34-1910), named presi-
dent of Georgetown University in
1873 and who during his incum-
bency, modernized most of the
buildings of that institution"
Mr.. Meehan has undoubtedly re-
vealed information of historical
value that was not known to even
the most learned Race educators.
REFUSED For two success
TO PREACH sive weeks our ma
tional contemporaries have herald
ed the news of ministers who re-
fused to preach the funerals of
members of their flock who had in
Cured the wrath of the pastor or
the community in which they lived
and died. At Mound Bayou,
Miss, an Episcopalian minister re-
fused to attend the last rites of
staunch church member upon
whose shoulders the responsibility
for the murder of a daughter of
the city's founder had been placed.
The man was murdered by I'M
known assailants, climaxing
month of tenseness in the little
AH-Negro town. Because the man
had been accused of fomenting a
row that eventually led to the
murder of the woman by deputy
sheriffs, the minister disgraced the
cloth he wore by conveniently re-
naming out of town for the dura-
ton of the funeral services.
The man may or may not have
been responsible for the woman's
death, but even though he had
been, that responsibility is no ex-
cuse for a minister to shirk his
duty.
In the second case, a Michigan
minister refused to officiate at fu-
neral services on the flimsy and
disgraceful excuse that the deceas-
eds family had patronized an I'M
dertaker with whom he (the mini
ster) was on unfriendly terms.
No minister who sets himself up
as preacher of the Word of God
may himself elect to whom he
shall preach, or arbitrarily refuse
to administer the sacriment. When
he does, he takes the judgment in
his own hands, in violation of his
specific instructions which tell him
that this power belongs only to the
One he serves, and is not designat-
ed to earthly beings.
The worst criminal has a chance
for forgiveness by God, according
to the MINISTER'S teachings. No
minister who refuses to accept the
obligation of ministering the be-
nefits of the Gospel to the dying
can be justly looked upon as mi
mister advised by the God whom
uyo -