Catholics and Non-Catholic Worship.

New Zealand Tablet, Volume XXX, Issue 29, 17 July 1902, Page 2

Catholics and Non-Catholic Worship.

In view of the then approaching Cororation and of the religious services to be held in connection therewith a correspondent in a recent number of the London Tablet raised the question of the attitude of Catholics to such services and wished to be enlightened as to their exact position in the matter. He himself argued that it was the internal and not the external act that was of importance in such cases. If, for instance, hesaid, I sit down to a banquet with Protestants on a Friday, and if, moreover, meat is put upon my plate, and I even raise it to my lips, but do not taste it, I have not broken the law of abstinence, however much appearances may be against me. If, again, I go to Mass, but have no intention of assisting thereat, but merely go for the purpose of listening to the music, or from some other motive, 1 do not hear that Mass, even though I appear to my neighbor to do so. Applying these principles to specific cases of non-Catholic worship lie contended that if he went to a Coronation service merely to see the show, or to a funeral merely to express sympathy, or to a marriage merely to honor t'le bride I c was not to be condemned as joining in the worship provided h .' t xcluded from his mind the intention of taking part in the nli^ic-us bide of the a_t.

The letter evoked from a Tablet contributor a clear and ful statement of the teaching of Catholic tl.eology on the question and as the matter is one of geneinl interest we reproduce the substance of his remarks With tegatd to the example first quoted by the correspondent tt-e Tablet wriiir points out that an individual would certainly commit the sin ot '-candil if by 'appearing' to eat meat on Friday he gave hi-. Protestant friends to understand that he was breaking the law ot the Church. The writer then disposes of the main question as follows :—: — 'There are cases in which Catholics may be present at Protestant services-, as spectators (v jr., at funerals or marriages), or as officials or attendants (v $ , soldieis in attendance on a prince), but never as partakers, in the sense of joining formally and outwardly in non Catholic worship. Hence it is not, as " Inqurer" s»ems to impl , a mere distinction o! internal and external. A Catholic, \<y Diune Law, cannot join ev(n outwaidly in an\ thing ulmli in itself 01 in the common estimation of the public, implies profession, approval, or sanction of a false ttligion. In tlie early Church, the outward offering of a mere of incense bc'ore a pa^an alti' was rightly held 10 be apostn^ , , evtn though inwardly the oiLrer had no inuntion ct vu rihij ping and h.id m tlm-g but abhorrence for the lrtlst worship. '1 he natural and noimd way mi which men outwaidly proics-, th< tr adhesion to a si ct is by ing to lib plai cs ot uor hip „nd a sis mjr at v-, >-ci vices. A Catholic canrot do these things wiiho n ,h ifing it 1 such outward professions, unites he h llcuicu lit in bui.li imputation by

the fact that there is some circumstance publicly known, which makes it sufficiently plain that his presence is due to civil or social and not to religious reasons. Such circumstance is, at a funeral, the presence of the remains of a deid friend" to whom he desires to pay respect; or at a wedding, the presence of the bride or bridegroom, whom he desires to congratulate ; or at a coronation, the presence of a sovereign to whom he wishes to pay civil honor. In all such cases, it is the outward publicly known circumstance which relieves the assistance of a Catholic of all note of religious participation, and gives to it the character of purely civil or social courtesy. Of course, as " Inquirer" states, even then there must be no inward assent to false worship. I have merely wished to point out what, indeed, all Catholics know, that we cannot deny our faith outwardly, even though we keep it inwardly; that we cannot do things which, in the ordinary acceptance of mankind, imply profession of false religion, though inwardly we may not conform to it, and that the distinction to be kept in view is not merely that of external and internal, but that which separates religious from mere civil honor. To determine the latter, as marked off from the former, a public external circumstance — the burial of the corpse, the marriage of a bride and bridegroom, the coronation of the King, suffices.'