THE NECESSITY OF A CHRISTIAN REVIVAL.

New Zealand Tablet, Volume XXIV, Issue 2, 10 January 1901, Page 27

THE NECESSITY OF A CHRISTIAN REVIVAL.

ENCYCLICAL LETTER OF THE HOLY FATHER. The following summary of the Encyolical Letter of his Holinen the Pope on 'Jesus Christ the Redeemer,' is taken from the Liverpool Catholic Timet .-—Although it is not possible to look to the future without anxiety and the dangers to be feared are neither light nor few (says the Holy Father), the sources of evil, private and public, beinar bo many and so inveterate ; still, through God'a goodness, the end of the century seems to afford SOME GROTTND FOR HOPR AND OOMFOBT. Despite all the attractions of the world and so many obstacles to piety, at a single sign from the Roman Pontiff a great multitude of pilgrims thronged ad limina tanctorum Apoitolorum. Who could fail to be moved by this spectacle of extraordinary devotion towards the Saviour ? This fervor of so many thousands of men joining with one mind and one heart from the rising to the Betting of the sun in acclaiming and exalting the name and the glories of Jesus Christ would readily be deemed worthy of the noblest days of Christianity. Would that those flames of the old Catholic piety which had; as it were, been bursting forth developed into a great fire, and that the excellent example set by many pilgrims might move the rest of the world. For, what was so neoessary to this age as the restoration to States, far and wide, of the Christian spirit and the ancient virtues? The misfortune was that others— and thej were numerous—cloßed their ears and did not listen to the admonitions which arose from this renewal of the religious spirit. If ' they had known the gift of God,' if they recognised that nothing could be more wretched than to have left the Redeemer of the world and abandoned CHRISTIAN CUSTOMS AND TEACHINGS, surely they too woald arise and, changing their course, seek to escape certain ruin. To preserve and extend the Kingdom of God on earth was the office of the Church, and now that special opportunities were offered during the Holy Year the knowledge and the love of Jesus Christ Bhould be more largely diffused by teaching, persuasion and exhortation directed not so much to those who listened attentively as to all those unhappy people who, whilst retaining the Christian name, spend their lives without faith and without the love of Christ. He Who once restored nature, fallen through sin, preserves it and will preserve it for ever. •He gave Himself a redemption for all ' (I. Tim., ii., 6) : 'in Christ all shall be made alive ' (I. Cor., iv,, 22) ; ' And of His Kingdom there shall no end ' (Luke, 1., 33). Therefore, according to the eternal design of God, the entire salvation of individuals and of society as a whole depend* on Jesus Christ, and they who desert Him, by this fact blindly and and madly determine upon their own destruction, and at the same time, as far as they can effect it, cause human society, tossed about by a great Btorm, to fall back beneath the burden of evils and calamities from which the Redeemer in His mercy relieved it. Now, He desired that the mission confided to Him by the Father should

be perpetuated through the ministry of the Churoh established by Him in the most conspicuous way. Whilst on the one hand He made her the depositary of all the means of man's salvation, on the other He solemnly ordained that men should render obedience to her ac to Himself and should earnestly follow her guidance throughout life. 'He that heareth you heareth Me ; and he that deepiseth you despiseth Me ' (Luke x., 16). THE LAW Or CHRIST must then be sought absolutely from the Churoh ; and accordingly, a« Christ i« the way for man, so also is the Church — He of Himself and by His nature ; she by the office conferred on her and the communioatiou of power. Therefore, whosoever look for salvation outside the Church have gone astray and are laboring in vain. And the case is almost the same with States as with individuals ; they too must end disastrously, if they depart from the way. The Son of God, the Creator and Redeemer of human nature, is King and Lord of the world and has supreme poww over men singly and collectively, and the public weal is ill provided for whenever its due place is not assigned to Christian institutions. Christ being abandoned, human reason is left to itself and deprived of the strongest support and the brightest light. Then men easily lose tight of the end intended by God in the establishment of human society which consists chiefly in the citizens being enabled through civil intercourse to secure their natural well-being, but in entire harmony with the attainment of that highest, most perfect and eternal good which is beyond nature. By a confusion of ideas both rulers and subjects were led away from the true path, for they needed what was wanting — a sure guide and support. And did we not every day see States which labored hard to ensure and increase public prosperity DIBTBE3BED AND BUFFERING in many respects, and these of the highest importance ? True, it is asserted that civil society suffices for itself, that it can get on well enough without the aid of Christian institutions and attain its end by its own efforts alone. Henoe it is sought to laicise the work of public administration, so that the traces of the ancient religion are daily becoming fewer in civil affairs and public life. But those who are responsible for this do not perceive well enough the effects of what they are doing. For, the idea of God judging what is good and what is evil being given up, the laws must lose their chief authority and justice collapse — two bonds of the strongest kind which are essentially necessary to human society. In like manner, when the hope and expectation of eternal happiness has disappeared, there is a disposition to thirst eagerly for earthly goods, and everyone endeavors by all the means in his power to get hold of as much of them as he can for himself. Hence arises jealous rivalry, envy, hatred ; then horrible schemes, the desire to abolish all power, the design to oreate and ruin everywhere. No tranquility abroad, no security at home ; civil society dii-fijfured by crime. Chrittt the Lord must be restored to human uociety as to His possession ; all the members and parts of the sou.al organisation must draw and drink from thk fountain of life which proceeds from Hru — the legal enactments, the national institutions, the universities and schools, the marriage laws and the family, the palaces of the wealthy and the workshops of the toilers. And let it be borne in mind that upon this largely depends that civilisation of the nations whioh is so much desired, for it is nourished and promoted not so much by those comforts and resources which affect the body as by those things whioh concern the soul — praiseworthy morals and the cultivation of virtue. His Holiness begs of ail Christians to do what they can to know their Redeemer as He is, and the Pontiff specially appeals to the clergy to exert their seal for this purpose as far as possible in the pulpit and the schools, and wherever opportunity offers. In conduction he says : But as We are writing of that which We can hope to obtain only through Divine grace, united in fervor and in earnest prayer, let Us beg of God to show His mercy, not to allow those whom He has redeemed by the shedding of His BLod to perish, to look favorably upon this age which has greatly sinned but has also suffered greatly in expiation of its faults, and, lovingly embracing men of every race and nation to remember ,His own words, ' I, if I be lifted up from he earth, will draw all things to Myself ' (John, xii, 32).