Current .Topics

New Zealand Tablet, Volume XXXII, Issue 32, 11 August 1904, Page 1

Current Topics

' I\lore swords and shi^|is Than sin hath snaies, or hell hath darts.'

' \ Catholic paper in a parish,' says the ' Columbian ' in a lecefnt issue, ' is, as an aid to religion, next in iinnoi ( ance to the parochial school. Look at I Jie people m a congregation who subscribe for a Catholic papei As ;i nile, they are practical Catholic9 — they fiequent the Sacraments, they send their children to c lunch schools, they belong to pious societies, and ■'.hey co-opciate with the priest in his pastoral labors. They know their religion, they can e,iv r e reasons for it, and they can deiend the Church against its traducers. But look at the folk who do not have a Catholic paper enter their homes. They are not interested in'the, news of the Church. They cannot reply to objections made against Iheir religion. They are inclined to criticise the pastor for this and to find fault with the Church for that. The} do not perceive the harm in mixed marriages, or in a non-religious education, or in societies that are under ecclesiastical ban The daUy journals have all the news they want. They are Jpsposed to think that one religion is as good as another, and that it docs not matter what a person believes so long as he " acts on the square." They cannot understand why

the Church objects so to divorce, to cremation, etc , and, for the life of them, they cannot see what the Pope wants any temporal power for The Catholic paper is a frequent force for instruction, correction, edification, and encouragement in the Christian life, and the parish in which it has a laige circulation is sure tr have a large number of members who pri/c the gift of faith and who In c up to its requirements '

Incidentally the Chairman of the Bible-in-seh ">ols Conference hosed ' the Roman bishops ' of New Zealand with a dash of the same mixtuie that he had brewed for the editor It. so happens that not a solitary bishop, Catholic oi Piotestant, in New Zealand is a 'Roman,' and that no member of our Hierarchy was born in the Eternal City, oi even in any part of the Italian peninsula Ilovvevei, lei that pass , for the Conference Chairman is not 1o be trammelled m controversy with such tiifhng considerations a- auuiacv <»[ statement The sole interest of his reiYicme to the bishops centres m his angiv denial that the exclusion ol tihe stoiy of the \iigin-Birth of the Savioi ol the woild f i om Wieir proposed Scripture lesson-book v\,is ' for dodiinal reasons ' 'We now say,' aveis t.he Rev Dr. Ciibb, ' thai if they (the bishops) atrain repeat this charge, it will be a " malicious falsehood," and so it s-urely will be in the judgment of even the most mealymouthed of men or newspapers.'

All tbis sounds very valiant, to be sure, and comes with comical inconsistency from one who protests against the use of 'invective' in controversy Uo^veveir,*a glance at the history of this ' malicious falsehood ' will reveal some interesting points which the Bible-in-s^hools Conference would do well to mark, Jearn, and inwardly digest.

1. In their first manifesto the Bishops stated that the Conference's proposed Scriptuie lessons, ' except for " slight modifications," are identical with the Scripture lesson-books drawn up four years ago by the Victorian Royal Commission on Religious Instruction in State Schools ' ; (b) that the Victorian scheme of Biblical instruction was 'drawn up as a * ompiomise by a heterogeneous assembly of representatives of various Reformed denominations, who, while unanimous in rejecting Catholic principles of interpretation, differed nrofoun'dly among themselves upon the most fundamental truths of the Christian religion ' ; and (c) that in the book which they compiled ' the basic dogma of Christianity—that of the Incarnation and Virgin-Birth— is out-

lawed from the New Testament narrative, and the Christ that is presented to the mental eye of the little ones is not the Clod-Man of Holy Writ, but the Christ of the I nitanan ' In their latest pronouncement the Bishops accuse the Victorian Protestant Commissioners of having ' Hung aside even thing — even the story of the \ ngin-Birth of the Savior of the world— that might seem to contradict their lcspcctne conflicting beliefs or disbeliefs.'

In all these four statements of the Bishops there is not so much as the trace of a ' falsehood,' whether malicious or otherwise. The authority for the first asset t ion (a) is no less a personage than the Rev. Dr. (iibb, Chaimian ot the Bible-m-sc hools Conference. The other three statements are so nol onously true that neither the Victorian Commissioneis nor the Itev, Dr. (iibb have \entured either to deny them or to call them into question The acute leligious differences that U,ie the breasts of the thirteen Protestant Commissioners — Iv\el\e clergymen and one lone layman— were matters ol public nol'oricty and public comment. The situation was lendeied keener by resignations and scarcely improved by replacements. The woid 'compromise' is wiiilcn large acioss the rcsulls of then delibewiLions. \n agreement was finally ai lived at (as the members oh tally intimate in their report) onl\ by a number of the members of the Commission sailing their preferences and objections m respect to certain ' Scripture teachings ' and ' lessons ' And within a short period alter the publication ot the lesson-books at least two out of the thirteen commissioneis were out in open and public- opposition to the whole scheme to which they weie ,ignalones.

2 No direct reference was made by the Bishops to the exclusion of the narrative of the Incarnation and Virgin-Birth from the book of Scripture lessons adopted by the Bible-in-sc hools Conference The Conference loaders, however, saved trouble by admitting that they too, had thing aside this most vital fact of the whole inspired lfcord But they plead that, (nevertheless, ' piobably ' e\eiv membei of Ihe Conference believes in ' Hie piopoi deity ot oui I. on, and ' that the omission is ad\ isable in a book to be lead by (hildren in the publu st loo's ' ' The reader will note with a merry sadness the studied vagueness and sweet indefimteness and yes-iio inde( lsion of this double-barielled state. nie-nt "But one thins; it does not do' it docs not dun Hut the exclusion of the hrsie fact of the Chrisluui i.uth was dictated b\ doMnnal considerations; for il is obvious thai this might tal-e plate without the actual sui render ol ' tiho proper deity of our Lord ' by e\eiy, or even by any, member of the Conference. In their latest document the Biblc-in-schools Executive commit themsehes with angry and enthusiastic positiveness to the declaration that this scandalous ' omission ' was \O'I dictated by ' doctrinal reasons ' But they aie moving just a little too fast — earned away, no doubt, by an exuberant impetuosity that clogs the w he-el-* of the thinking gear. A moment's consideration would have shown them that the question as to whether that outiageous mutilation of the sacred nariative was perpetrated ' for doctrinal reasons,' is a sheer matter of inference. When we know what reasons, in point of fact, dictated the rejection of the story of the Incarnation, tihcn we •-hall be in just as good a position as the Bible-in-schools Executive to infer whether or not. this out i age was dictated by considerations of doctrine

But this is a question that cannot be settled l.y mere negations, even if they fall from the Conference's joint mouth as hot as the shot that rained from the old smooth bores of Gibraltar in 1782 The rejection of the Incarnation narrative must, in its last resort, have been based on positive, not negative, motives. And these

sihouia be capable of statement in positive terms. But thus far the Conference leaders have declined to hint, even in the vag,ucst way, what these motives were The most they have condescended to say is this : ' that the omission is advisable in a book to be lead by children in the public schools ' But this is obviously a mere negative proposition, Ihe logical equivalent of this that the insertion of the stoiy of the Incarnation and \n-gin-Birth is not advisable, etc We invite the Confeience ieaders to oveicome iheir coy reluctance and inform a curious and expectant public on what direct and positive Kiouutls the> deeiiu'd the nauativc of '.he Nativity ' inadv isanle ' for the perusal of public school children * We have a strict light to put this /question and to get a sufficient answer, too , for the Conference proposes to compel us to pay a part of the cost of printing, publishing, and supplying at cheap latcs this ' emasculated caricature ' o f the Sacied Scriptures And if (on Conference principles) it is "inadvisable to place in the hands of children in public schools the wondrous and beautiful story of the coming ot then Lord and Savior, on what grounds is it 'advisable' to place that very same narrative in the hands of the very same children— as the Conference clergy do— in the Sunday schools g > And again on what mounds of consistency or principle does the Conference propose to make them read— and listen to ' historical, hteiary, and ethical explanations ' of— the birth of Moses and ' the story of Uriah the Iltttite 9

There are a few other things, likewise, that we aie pinimo; (.0 know bef o ie this matter of ' doctrinal reasons ' can be determined But, for the present, let us conclude with the following slashing remaiks on the butchery of the Sacred \ olume fiom the pen of the 'lolrd \ictonan Piesb> tenan Univeisitv professor and di\ine, the Rev. Dr. Rentoul —

' What is presented to us and to the children of the State in the narrative of these " lesson-books," and what asl-s the authoritative sanction of our educational system, is an Elnonite Jesus of Xa7aieth, born, appaienilv— and, as far as these lessons tell— of a human father, .Joseph, and his wife, Mary , with a Messianic name, indeed, but with no reason apparent that it should belong to Him . Men are at liberty, as mdnidi.al men, to take whate\er views they choose of this or that historical i coord They take that liberty abundantly But a Commission of representatives of ihe Victorian Churches called upen to appioach m honest good faith the New Testament nanative, and setting, itself to tell our children the story of our Loid's birth and infancy, has no light 1o act thus 11 is a wanton and a deadly wrong to the bona fides of the story and to the central faith of the Protestant Chuuhes themselves. It is, I need scarcely say, a dim-t blow to all that is most sacred and most reverently cherished m the faith and the religion of all Catholics '