Encyclical Letter OF HIS HOLINESS POPE LEO. XIII.

New Zealand Tablet, Volume XXX, Issue 26, 26 June 1902, Page 2

Encyclical Letter OF HIS HOLINESS POPE LEO. XIII.

(Continued from last issue.) LEO XIII., POPE. To All the Patriauchs, Primates, Archbishops, and Bishops of the Catholic Wobld. Venerable Brethren, Health and Apostolic Benediotion. But this is not all. The return to Christianity will not be an efficacious and complete remedy if it does not imply the return in sincere love to the 'one Holy, Catholic, and Apostolic Church. Christianity is, in truth, incarnate in the Catholic Church ; it is identified with the spiritual and perfect society which, supreme in its own order, is the Mystical Body of Jesus Christ, and has for iti visible bead the Roman Pontiff, the successor to the Prince of the Apostles. The Church is the perpetuation of the mission of the Saviour, the daughter aDd the heir 0! the Redemption. She has propagated the Gospel, and she has defended it at the price of her blood ; and strong- in the divine assistance and the immortality that have been promised her, never making compact with error, she remains faithful to the mandate laid upon her to proalaim the doctrine of Christ throughout the world to the end of the ages, and to preserve its integr.ty inviolable. The Lawful Dispenser of the Teachings of the Gospel, she does not manifest herself to ns merely as the coui-oier anl redeemer of 6ouls ; she is also the everJastiug souice of justice and charity, the propagator as well as the guardian of true liberty and of the enly equality that is pos-t-ible h.'ie below. While applying the doctrine of her divine Foamier, she maintains a just balance, and traces the just limits between all the rights and all the privileges of society. The equality which hhe proclaims does nut destroy the distinction of the different social classes ; the wishes to preserve that intact, because nature itself cvi lently requires it. To prevent the anarchy of reason emancipated Irom iaith and abandoned to ittelf, the liberty she gives injures neither the rights of truth, bociuse they are superior to thuse of liberty, nor the rights of justice, because they are superior to those of number and force, nor the rights of G.d, because they aie buperior to tiiote of humanity. In the domestic circle the Church is no less fruitful in good results. For not only does she resibt the perverse arts which unbelief employs to attack the lite of the family, but she provides for and eafeguaids the bond of marriage and its stability, while she pro. eels and promotes the honor of married life, its fidelity and b<WioUty. At the a&'iie t.me she sustains and cfmentfc tbe oivil and poluiejl order, bunging on the one hand efficacious assistance to authority, and, ou the other, showing favorable countenance to wise reforms and to the jubt aspirations of subjtcts : never wearying in her efforts to exact respect for princes, and the obedience that in their due, while bhe defends the imprescriptible ri/hts of human conscience. Hence in is owing to her that peoples submitted to htr influence have had nothing to fear from slavery, for she has kept princes above the inclination to tyranny. Perfectly con-cious of this divide efficiency, We hnve carefully oideavored cinco the beginning of Our Pontificate to set forth in the cl. ares, .light the beneficent designs of the Church, and to extend in ihc utii.or., with the treasure or her doctrines, the field of her sa!u*ary action. Such has be-^n the aim of the principal acts of Our Pontificate, notably of the En ycheals on Christian Philosophy, on Human Liberty, on Chrihtiau Marriage, en Freemasonry, on Public Powers,

on the Christian Constitution of States, on Socialism, on the Labor question, on the Duties of Christian Citizens, and on other kindred subjects. But the ardent desire of Our soul haß not been merely to illuminate minds. We have wished also to influenoe and to purify hearts ; for we directed all Our efforts to the revival of Christian virtues amidst the nations. Therefore, We continue to lavish encouragement and counsels with the view to raise souls towards the goods that do not perish, to enable them to subordinate the body to the soul, their earthly pilgrimage to the heavenly life, and man to God. Through the Blessing of the Saviour, Our word has contributed to strengthen the convictions of a large number of men, to enlighten them moreover in the midst of the difficulties of actual questions, to stimulate their zeal, and to promote good works of the most varied character, It is especially for the good of the poorer classes that these works have arisen, and continue to arise still in every oountry ; because that Christian charity has been revived which has always found its favorite field of action in the midst of the people. If the harvest has not been more abundant, venerable brethren, let us adore God in the mysterious justice of His dispensations, and, at the same time, beseech Him to have pity on the blindness of so many boulp, to whom, unhappily, the terrible words of the apostle may be applied : ' The God of this world hath blinded the minds of unbelievers, that the light of the Gospel of the glory of Christ should not shine unto them ' (11. Cor. iv. 4). The more scope the Catholic Church gives to her zeal for the moral and material welfare of the people, the more do the children of darkness rise up in their hatred against her and employ every weapon to tarnish her divine beauty, and to paralyse the efforts she is making to revive and restore. What fallacies and calumnies do they not propagate 1 One of their most perfidious artifices lies in incessantly repeating to the ignorant masses, and to jealous governments, that the Churoh is opposed to the progress of science, that she is the enemy of liberty, that she is an usurper of the rights of the State, and that politics is a field that ehe encroaches upon for every purpose. Foolish accusations a thousand times repeated, that have been a thousand times refuted by sound reason, history, and by all whose minds are honest and friendly to truth ! Is the Church hostile to science and to education ? Undoubtedly she is the vigilant guardian of revealed dogma ; but it is this very vigilance that inclines her to protect science and to favor the healthy cultivation of the mind ! No ! in opening his intelligence to the revelations of the Word, the Supreme Truth from Whom all truths originally emanate, man will never, in any way, compromise his rational requirements. On the contrary, the lights which will come to it from the divine world, will always give more power and clearness to the human mind, because they will preserve it in the most important questions from agonising uncertainties and from a thousand errors. For the rest, nineteen centuries of glory achieved by Catholicism in all branches of knowledge amply Buffice to refute this calumny. To the Catholic Church the credit must redound of having propagated and defended Christian knowledge, without which the world would still be lying in the night of pagan superstitions and in a wretohed state of barbarism. To her belongs the credit of having preserved and transmitted to the generations the precious treasures of literature and of ancient learning : hers is the credit of having openel the first schools for the people, and of having created universities still existing, whose fame is perpetuated to our days. Heis, in fine, is the credit of having inspired the highest, purest, most glorious literature, at the same time that she fostered under her protecting wings artists of the most sublime genius. The Church the enemy of liberty 1 Ah ! what a travesty they make of the idea of liberty, that most precious gift of God, when they employ its name to justify abuse and excess 1 What are We to Understand by Liberty ? Is it exemption from every law, freedom from all restraint, and a* a consequence, the right to take whim and inclination as our guide in all our actions 1 This liberty the Church repudiates for a certainty, and all upright hearte repudiate it with her. But if by liberty ia meant the rational faculty of doing good, freely and without restraint, in accordance with the rules laid down by eternal justice, then from no source does this, the only liberty worthy of man and of use to society, receive encouragement and protection more than from the Church. It is the Church, in truth, through her teaching and efficient action that has freed mankind from the yoke of slavery, in preaching through the world the great law of equality and human brotherhood. In all the centuries she has assumed to herself the defence of the weak and oppressed against the insolent tyranny of the strong ; she has vindicated the freedom of Christian conscience by the blood of her martyrs poured forth in streams ; she has restored to infancy and womanhood the dignity and prerogatives of their noble nature, by making them in the name of right itself participators in respect *nd justice, and she has largely assisted in the introduction and maintenance of civil and political freedom in the heart of nations. The Church an usurper of the rights of the State, an encroacher in the domain of politics ? The Church well knows and teaches that her Divine Founder has commanded to render to Ccesar the things that are Cassar's, and to God the things that are God's, and that Ha has thus sanctioned aa an immutable principle the perpetual distinction of the two powers, each supreme in its own sphere— a fruitful principle which has largely contributed to the development of Christian civilisation. A stranger, therefore, to all thought of envious hostility, the Church, in her spirit of charity, aims only at working in parallel lineß with the public authority ; acting undoubtedly on the same subject, man, and on the same eooiety, but in the manner and according to the lofty design which her Divine mission points out to her. Would to God that her action was received without distrust and suspicion ! for the count-

less benefits of which We have spoken already would then be multiplied. To accuse the Church of ambitious aims is merely to repeat a very old calumny ; a calumny, too, whioh her powerful enemies have more than once employed to disguise their own tyranny. Far from beinpr an oppressor, the Church, as history, when btudied without prejudice, clearly teaohes, has been on the contrary, like her Divine Founder, most often the victim of oppresBion and injustice. Her power resided not in the force of arms, but in the power of thought and of truth. Assuredly, then, it is with perverse intentions that Buch accuBations are hurled against the Church. In furtherance of these pernicious and dishonest efforts, there is more prominent than all others one secret Beet which society has borne in its womb for many years, and which, like a fatal germ, poisons its well-being, its fertility, and its life. The abiding personification of revolution, thin sect constitutes a kind of reactionary society, whose object is to exercise an occult suzerainty over external society ; the sole parpose of its existence is To Wage War Against God and His Churoh. There is no need to name it, for in these lines everybody recognises Freemasonry. In Our Encyclical ' Humanum Genuß ' of the 20th April, 1884, we have already spoken of this sect. We there denounoe it 9 pernicious tendencies, its erroneous teachings, and its nefarious work Enveloping in its immense net almost all nations, binding itself to other sects, which it moves as puppets by its hidden springs of action, drawing its members to it at first and then retaining them by the allurement of .the advantages which it procures for them, making governments pliable to its designs, sometimes by its promises, sometimes by its threats, this sect has begun to infiltrate all classes of society. It forms, as it were, an invisible and irresponsible state in the State proper. Full of the spirit of Batan, who, according to the Apostle, knows how to transform himself at need into an angel of light (11. Cor. xi. 14), it puts in the foreground a humanitarian project ; but it sacrifices everything to its sectarian purposes ; it protests that it has no political aims, but it exercises m reality the most profound influence on the legislative and administrative life of states ; and whilst it professes in words respect for authority and even for religion, its supreme aim and object (as its own statutes testify) is the extermination of sovereignty and of the priesthood, in which it sees the enemies of liberty. Now, it is becoming daily more manifest that it is to the inBpiration and to the artifices of this sect that the continual annoyances by which the Church is harassed, as well as the recent renewal of attacks upon her, must, in great part, be attributed ; for the simultaneousness of the assaults in the persecution which has suddenly come upon her in these latter times, like a tempest in a clear Bky— that is to say, without cause proportioned to the effect —the uniformity of the means employed to bring about this persecution, the campaign in the Press, public meetings, theatrioal prodnctions, the employment in every country of the same weapons calumnies, and popular passions— all these clearly indicate the identity of design and the word of order issued from one and the same centre of direction. Yet it is but a single episode in the plan determined on beforehand, which is brought into play in a theatre that grows wider and wider in order to multiply the ruins that we have before enumerated. Thus it is its special desire first to restrict, then to completely exclude, religious instruction, and thus to make the generations unbelievers or indifferent • to combat through the daily Press the moral teaching of the Church ; in fine to ridicule its practices and to profane its sacred festivals. Hence there is nothing more natural than that The Catholic Priesthood, whose mwsion precisely it is to preach religion and to administer its Sacraments, should be attacked with particular fury. By making it the object of attack the sect wishes to lessen its influential character and its authority in the eyes of the people. Already with hourly-increasing boldness, with audacity proportioned to its assured impunity, thi3 sect malignantly interprets all the actions of the clergy, urges the people to buspect them on the slightest pretence, and overwhelms them with the vilest accusations. Thus new injuries are added to those from which the clergy suffer already. They are harassed now by the tribute they must pay through military service— that great impediment to the training for the priesthood— and again by the confiscation of the ecclesiastical patrimony which the faithful, in their pious generosity, had freely established. ' The religious Orders and religious Congregations, whom the practice of the evangelical counsels had made the glory of society as well as of religion, have, thereby only earned for themselves more blame from the enemies of the Church, who have denounced them with implacable hostility, and invoked upon them the contempt and hatred of the world. It is for us a grievous sorrow to be obliged to recall the odious (and undeserved) measures, loudly coddemned as they are by all upright hearts, of which, quite recently religious have again been the victims. Nothing could Fave them neither the integrity of their lives, in which even their enemies could find no grounds for attack, nor the natural right which authorises association entered into for an upright end, nor the constitutional right which loudly proclaims their liberty, nor the favor of the people, who are filled with gratitude for the precious services rendered by them to the arts, to the sciences and to agriculture and for their charity which overflowed upon the most populous and the poorest classes of society. And it is thus that men and women the offspring of the peoplo, who Lad, of their own accord, renounced the joys of family life to conseciate in peaceful associations their youth, their talents, their powers, their life itself to the good of all have been treated as evildoers, as if they had formed criminal combinations, and have been shut out from common justice and proBoribed— at a time too when liberty is the watchword in the mouth of everybody I

And yet it is not astonishing that the best beloved children are etrack at, since the Father himself, the Head of Catholicity, the Roman Pontiff is treated no better. The facts are well known. Despoiled of temporal sovereignty, and deprived by that very fact of the independence that is necessary for him to accomplish his universal and divine mission, compelled in this city of Rome itself, which belongs to him, to shut himself up in his own dwelling, because a hostile power besets him there on all sides, he has been reduced, in spite of derisive assurances of respect and precarious promises of liberty, to a condition that is abnormal, unjust and unworthy of his high ministry. Wp Ourselves know only too well the difficulties which they raise up for him each moment, while they misrepresent his intentions and outrage his dignity. This is the faot that experience makes day by day more evident— it is the (spiritual power itself of the Head of the Church that they have attempted little by little to destroy when they have laid violent hands on the temporal power of the Papacy. Those who were the true authors of this robbery have, indeed, not hesitated to admit it. To judge by its consequences this deed is not only impolitic, but a kind of anti-social outrage : for the blows infl cted on religion are so many blows struck at the very heart of society. Whilßt making man a being destined to live with his fellow-men. God, in His Providence has also Founded the Church, and, according to the expression of the Bible, has established it on the mountain of Sion in order that it might serve as a guiding light to humanity, and that its fertilising raya might bear with them the principle of life even iuto the dark places and recesses of society, making to germinate and flouiish everywhere those seeds of heavenly wisdom from which order and happim ss result. Therefore the more society cuts itself off from the Church, whence it derives so great a share of its strength, the more it decays or crumbles into ruin, since it separates what God wished to be united. We Ourselveß have never wearied of inculcating these great truths whenever an opportunity has offered itself to Us ; and We desired to do it now once more on this extraordinary occasion. God grant that the faithful may be thereby encouraged and inetructed to make their efforts converge more efficaciously towards the common good, and Our adversaries be led to see what an injustice they commit in persecuting a mother so loving, the most faithful benefactress of humanity. Nor should We wish that the thought of present afflictions Bhould banish from the souls of the faithful the full and absolute confidence they ought to hare in the divine assistance. God will bring about in His own time and by His mysterious ways the final triumph. As for Us, uo matter what sadness may fill Our heart, We feel no misgivings about the immortal def-tinies of the Church. As We said at the beginning, persecution is her inheritance ; for God purifies His children by subjecting them to trials and draws from their sufferings higher and more precious results. In delivering over His Church to vexations and struggles He more clearly manifests His Divine assistance, ever furnishing her with new and unforeseen proofs of His protection, which give a permanent guarantee that her work can be developed and maintained, and that the forces that conspire against her are powerless to accomplish her ruin. Nineteen centuries of life spent on the flow and ebb of human vicissitudes teach us that tempests come and go, but never reach the depths. We can remain all the more unshaken in our confidence as the present time shows symptoms well calculated to calm our fears. The difficulties are exir^oidma'-y and formidable, it is true, bat other fact* which untold themselves before our view testily notwithstanding that God fulfils His promir-es with admirable wisdom and goodness. For whilst so many powers contend against the Church and whilst she is deprived of e\ery human support does she not continue to pursue her gigantic labors throughout the woild, and does not her action extend to all the races ot tiie globe and make itself felt under every climate? '1 he ancient prince of this world, who has been driven off by Jesus Christ, can no longer exercise his domination, as in former diys ; and although the efforts of Satan may place dangers and perils in our path, they will uot attain their object. Already

A Supernatural Pea c,

due to the Holy Spirit, Who extends His wings over the Church and lives in her bosom, reigns not only in the sjuls of the faithful, but throughout the whole Catholic world — a peacj which is fostered in all ai renity by that union, which was never elo-er and more devoted, between the Episcopate and this Holy hoe,' presenting such a wonderlul contrast with the 6tnfe and dimensions and continual unrest of the seers that trouble the peace of society. Fruitful in innumerable works of Zealand ofchnnty, the same beneficent harmony prevails between the clergy and the laity. Lay Catholics more united and ruore free from human respect than ever, are more alive to the duty of defending the holy cause of religion, and are better organised for the- purpose than in thves past. Oh ! that is the union We ha\e recommended bo often, and that We now recommend once more ; and We ble^s it, so that it may develop more and more, and be able to oppose an impregnable wall to the turious violence of God's enemies. There is nothing more natural than that, in such circumstances, We should see innumerable associations spring up an i multiply and flourish in the heart ot the Church like sprouts that take rooo at the foot of the tree. If, may indeed bo said that no form of Christian piety has been neglected, whether it lelates to Jtsas Christ Himbtlt and His adorable mysteries, or to His (iivire mother, or to the saints whone virtues havo shone most brilliantly. No detail of charity has been overlooked. On all hid, s there ha^'b'oen a rivalry in zeal to give Christian education to youth, to ie!ieve the sick, to improve the morality of the people, ami to a-^ist tlu< poor. With wtiat rapidity would this movement not he txtui.ed, with

how much greater advantages would it not be followed if it did not come so often into collision with unjust and hostile laws that impede its liberty. The same Lord Who gives the Church its vitality in countries where it has been long established, is willing also to console Us by other hopes. These hopes arise instinctively every time We dwell on the zeal of Our missionaries. Never discouraged by the perils they have encountered, nor by the privations and sacrifices they have borne, they go on increasing in numbers, annexing new countries every day to the Gospei and to civilisation. Nothing can overcome their fidelity to the ta»k they have undertaken, although like their Divine Master, they are often repaid for their indefatigable labors by accusations aud calumnies. Afflictions are, therefore, Tempered by Consolations, and amidst the struggles and difficulties We have to face there ara many things that refresh Our soul and invite Us to look to the future with confidence. This is a fact whioh ought to suggest useful and wise reflections to anyone who observes the world with intelligence and without allowing himself to be blinded by passion : for it proves that as God has not made man his own master in relation to the ultimate end of life ; and as He Bpoke to him once, bo He speaks to him again in His Churoh, visibly sustained by this divine assistance and clearly Bhowa him the way to salvation and truth. This unfailing assistance will fill Our hearts with an invincible hope ; it will make clear to Ua that at the hour marked out by Providence, and at a time that cannot be far distant, truth breaking through the clouds under which man's perverse ingenuity haR endeavored to obscure it, will shine more brilliantly, and that the spirit of the Gospel will infuse new life into our corrupt society and its exhausted members. For Our part, venerable brethren, in order to hasten the advent of Divine mercy, We shall not fail in Our duty to defend and propagate the kingdom of God on earth. Aa for you, your pastoral solicitude is too well known to Us to send Our exhortation. May the ardent flame that burns in your hearts be communicated to the hearts of all your priests. They are in immediate contact with the people. They know their aapirations, their needs, their suffering*, as well as the snares and the seductions by which they are beset. If, full of the spirit of Jeaua Christ, and standing in an atmosphere that is not contaminated by political passions, they make their actions correspond to yours, they will succeed, under the blessing of God, in accomplishing wonders. By their words they will enlighten the people: by the suavity of their manners they will gain all hearts ; and in aiding by their charity those who auffer they will help little by little to improve their condition. The clergy will be firmly sustained by the active and intelligent co-operation of the faithful. Thus, the children who have shared in the maternal tenderness of the Churoh will know how to Bhow their gratitude by coming to her assistance and defending her honor and her glory. All can contribute to this meritorious homage ; men of letters and of learning by taking up her defenoe in books and in the daily Press, a department of which our adversaries make such an abuse ; fathers of families and teaohere of sohools by giving a Christian education to children ; magistrates and representative! of the people by the firmness of their principles and the integrity of their character, professing their faith openly and without human respect. Our time requires elevation of sentiment, generosity of purpose, and exact observance of discipline. It is above all by perfect and confiding submission to the directions of the Holy See that this discipline will be affirmed. By such compliance it is alone pot-sible to prevent or diminish the injury caused by division, and to make all efforts combine towards the higher ead — viz.,

The Triumph of Jesuß Chiist in His Churoh.

Such is the duty of Catholics. Ultimate sucoese depends entirely on Him Who watches with wisdom aDd love over Hia immaculate Spouse, and of whom it is written :— ' Jetui Christ ijtsterday, to-day, and the samt forever.' — (Heb. xiii. 8.) It is, therefore, towards Him that we direot our humble and ardent prayer ; towards Him Who, iv His love for erring humanity, connent'-d to become the expiatory victim for its crimes in the sublimity of martyrdom ; towards Him Who, seated, although invisible, in the mystic barque of His Church, can alone culm the t*mpest and issue His commands to winds and waves. Beyond all doubt, Venerable Brethren, you will pray to this divine Master with Us that the evils which weigh down upon Bociety ma/ be lessened, that the splendor of heavenly light maj shine on tho^e who, perhaps more through ignorance than malice, hate aud persecute the religion of Jeeus Christ, and that all men of good will may be bound together in a close and holy union for common action. May the triumph of truth and justice be thua hastened in this world, and may the dawn of a better future, of days of tranquility and peace, soon shed its hopeful raya oyer the great human family. Meanwhile, as a pledge of the most precious favors of heaven, We lovingly impart to you and to the faithful confided to your care Our Apostolic Benediction. (hven at Rome, near St. Peter's, this 19th day of March in the year 11)02, the 25th of Our Pontificate. LEO. XIII. POPB.