Pin-pricks

New Zealand Tablet, Volume XXXIII, Issue 25, 22 June 1905, Page 18

Pin -pricks

We have before us a sample of a wild bit of printed No-Popery that was reoently hawked around throuigh one of our State Departments to the annoyance and insult of the Catholic public servants there employed. We referred to this mat/ter a short time ago. When sucn methods 1 of offence are practised to rake the feelings'of any section of our Government employees, it is high time for somebody to speak, and to raise his voice laud enough to be heard. In the sample of light and sweetness before us, it is laid down as a sneer matter of known fact that lying, thieving, secret assassination, and sucn-like crimes are considered by Catholics perfectly lawful and godly forms of ' divarshun.' There follows « sweetly vague legend— several times 4j?namited in our columns— as to ' movements ' among the Catholic clergy ' away from Rome ' in various lands. The authors of such tales (as we have shown- full many a time ana oft) do not waste time in advancing evidence in support of their statements. They simply volley the false assertion witih varying degrees of violence. Then they stop. Stopping is their strong point. The more they stoy the better they look. If they would only stop altogether, the friends of truth and of charity and pea.ee could well vote them a statue— at the expense of our No-Popery friends.

The No-Popery fire-cracker before us furnishes fresh evidence of the vitality of an untruth. It trots out serenely the good old story of the ' los von Rom ' (' away from Rome ') movement in Austria, that has long since fizzled out so ingforiously. An esteemed lay correspondent requests us to briefly restate the facts- of the ' movement.' It was (as we showed from time to time in 1897-1900) a treasonable political conspiracy to bring under the German flag those portions of Austria in which German is the spoken tongue. In any other country but Austria, the leaders of such a movement would have bden hanged as high as Aman or ma3e to feel : ' A short, sharp shock On a big, black block ' Tor treason felony. Evangelicalism (it was urged) was equivalent to Germanism, and an effort was therefore made to turn the conspiracy into a movement ' away from Rome.' It was supported by large money contributions from the German Evangelical party, till, som/e time ago, this was by law decided to be a misappropriation of funWs. Then the payments ceased, and what remained of the movement collapsed like a house of cards. Throughout, there was much more smoke than fire in it. It resulted in the' secession of a small number of bad or indifferent Austrian Catholics. Dr. Jonanny, who is one of the most respected Evangelical clergymen in Vienna, voiced the sentiments of all respectable Protestantism when he s>aid of the ' los- von Rom' : ' The Evangelical Church can have no share in efforts which, under the motto of " emancipation from Rome," converts apostacy into a political demonstration.' 'It is impossible,' said he again, ' that an Austrian can look in a sympathetic manner upon a movement so unpatriotic and irreligious in its origin.' We are glad to add that Monsdgnor Taliani, the Papal Nuncio at Vienna, stated that many of the political or (as we might, using an Eastern figure, call them) ' rice ' converts long ago returned to the Church of their baptism.