THE CHURCH IN TURKEY.

New Zealand Tablet, Volume IV, Issue 201, 9 February 1877, Page 16

THE CHURCH IN TURKEY.

Roman Catholics, writes a correspondent of the 'Morning Post,' now enjoy more freedom of worship and are less interfered with in the Turkish Empire than they could ever hope for in the dominions of the Czar, or is actually allowed to them in the constitutional kingdom of Italy. The Unita Cattolica of Turin publishes a letter from Father Cambiasa, Superior of the Dominican Mission at Gtalara, describing the solemn celebration in that suburb of the Turkish capital of the Santissimo Rosario with a street procession of parish girls dressed in white, scholars of the Christian schools, the Confraternity of the Rosary with fifteen Standards of Mysteries, the regular and secular clergy, two archbishops in Pontifical vestments, with their assistants, And, finally, the grandiose image of the Madonna of the Rosario triumphantly borne aloft through the streets crowded with spectators of various creeds, some reverential and some merely astonished at the solemn display, which was escorted and made way for by a sufficient force of Turkish cavassers. If such a procession as that described by Father Cambiasso, so frequent in occurrence here a few years ago, were to be attempted now-a-davs in Catholic Rome, or in any town or village in Italy, without due permission from the secular authorities, for which the clergy prefer not to apply, the Prefetto, and the Pretore, and the Questore, with a whole posse comitatus of police, would soon be down upon the school girls and boys, the confraternity and their standards, the archbishops and their assistants and even the sacred Macchina della Vergine Santissima, for breaking the peace and creating confusion in the public streets. It is evidently on account of the recent law against public processions that the Unita Cattolica concludes its account of the Festival of the Rosary in Galata with the following inquiry : — " Have our brethren in Italy enjoyed a similar satisfaction ! To this question we Turinese, with a blush on our faces, are obliged to answer, ' No." There is more religious liberty enjoyed on the shores of the Boßphorus than on the banks', of the Po and the Dora, or in the whole of our Catholic Italy." Roman Catholics had best make the most of the privileges they now enjoy on the Bosphorus under the shield of Turkish tolerance, for their position will be less supportable if their fellow-Christians but religious rivals of the Greek Church get the upper hand in the contested regions of the East.

The Home Ru!e campaign in the English towns has gone on well, and when the full returns of the recent elections are received- the results will be most cheering. In Bolton the vice-president- of the local branch of the Home Rule Association was not only re-elected, but was returned at the head of the poll. In one of the wards of Bristol, although the Irish vote is unable to return a Home Ruler, an important victory was gained, for both candidates were compelled to pledge themselves in favor of self-government and amnesty. In Leeds the election was secured in all six wards of gentlemen who promised to support both those objects as well as the introduction of Irish papers to the public libraries. In two wards in Liverpool, as already reported briefly, anti-Home Rule Irishmen were defeated by Home Rulers. In Nottingham two gentlemen pledged to Home Rule weaa A returned by the largest majority ever known in the town. In Preston, Stafford, and Warringtou there was also a triumphant exhibition of the power of the Irish vote, and the above list is very far from complete. — ' Freeman.'