250,000 ATTEND MASS

Sun (Auckland), Volume III, Issue 697, 24 June 1929, Page 9

250,000 ATTEND MASS

CATHOLIC EMANCIPATION CELEBRATIONS VAST, SPLENDID SPECTACLE (Australian and N.Z. Press Association) Reed. 11 a.m . LONDON, Sunday. A quarter of a million people from all parts of Ireland and England attended the celebration of Pontifical High Mass in Phoenix Park, Dublin, as the crowning event of the Catholic emancipation centenary celebrations. Dublin has never witnessed religious demonstrations on such a vast and splendid scale. An altar fifty feet high had been erected in an open space. On either side were ranged classical columns linked with evergreen festoons. The clergy present included the whole Irish hierarchy, and a special envoy from the Pope. The arrangement of the vast assemblage was a marvel of organisation. The Governor-General, Mr. James Mac Neill, and the Irish Free State President, Mr. W. T. Cosgrave, were present. Until a century ago there were various Acts which laid disabilities on Roman Catholics, such as the Test Act) 1673. In 1791 a bill was passed relieving from the more vexatious disabilities those Catholics who rejected the temporal authority of the Pope. In 1829, when the Duke of Wellington was Prime Minister, the Catholic Relief Act was passed. This removed practically all the disabilities, except as concerned certain offices of State, such as Regent and Lord Chancellor’ and it debarred priests from sitting in the House of Commons.