The Catholic World

New Zealand Tablet, 30 March 1911, Page 591

The Catholic World

_____ ♦ : ENGLAND—Charitable Bequests The late Monsignor Tylee bequeathed £IOO each to. the Poor Clares, Edinburgh, and the rector of Our Lady of Victories, Kensington. The residue (£9045), subject to life interests, is left equally between the Prior of Woolhampton and the Provincials of the Jesuits, Passionists, and Carmelites. Westminister Cathedral The Westminster Cathedral Chronicle says that the monument of Cardinal Vaughan in the Chapel of St. Thomas of Canterbury in the will shortly be completed by the addition of four massive bronze candlesticks, the gift of the Dowager Duchess of Newcastle, which have been specially designed by the architects of the Cathedral. Lady Alice Fitzwilliam has presented a crucifix for the altar of the Vaughan Chantry Chapel, and four Benediction candlesticks designed for the altar of the Blessed Sacrament Chapel have been presented by Mr. F. B. Taylor. New Accession Oath His Majesty King George on February 6 took the new Accession Oath (says the Glasgow Observer). This is it: ' I, George, do solemnly and sincerely, in the presence of God, profess, testify, and declare that I am a faithful Protestant, and will, according to the true intent of the enactments which secure the Protestant succession to the Throne of my realms, uphold and maintain the said enactments to the best of my power according to law.' All the old insulting references to idolaters and the 'superstition' of the Mass have gone to the limbo of things that were. One of the daily papers, commenting on the new form of oath, says that the impassive countenance of the Duke of Norfolk, who stood close by King George in the House of Lords on Monday, showed signs of satisfaction that the faith of his Grace was no longer outraged by hostile slander . in the Monarch's declaration. Death of a Canon The death occurred at Carlisle on February 3 of Canon Waterton, who for 28 years, from 1879 to 1907, was Rector of the Catholic Church of Our Lady and St. Joseph, Carlisle, a position which he was obliged to resign in the latter year owing to continued ill-health. Canon Waterton (says a Manchester Guardian account) was born at "Winford Lodge, Cheshire, on April 25, 1842. His father, Henry Waterton, .was a brother of the naturalist, Charles Waterton, and belonged to Northumberland. When he was a boy his parents removed to-France, and it was in that country that he received his early education. After ordination as a priest in 1866 he was sent as assistant priest to Provost Piatt, of Durham. Later he had charge of the mission at South Shields—where he was a member of the School Board —and it was while he was there that the new church in Westoe Lane was built. When he moved to Carlisle in 1879 to succeed Canon Curry, he also took Canon Curry's place on the School Board, on which he sat till January, 901, being for "a considerable time vice-chairman. He was one of the English pilgrims who were received in audience by the late Pope at the time of his jubilee, and the attention of his Holiness was specially directed to him on the ground that he was a lineal descendant of Sir Thomas More, the Chancellor of Henry VIII. During his ministry at Carlisle he saw erected a handsome new church at a cost of £12,000, a convent at Stanwix, now used as an industrial school, and the Home for the Little Sisters of the Poor at Botcherby. He became a member of the Carlisle Board of Guardians in 1880, and was chairman of that body from 1896 to March, 1909, when the state of his health compelled his retirement. In 1902 the Catholic Young Men's Society built a hall as a memorial of his incumbency. FRANCE—A Gloomy Outlook The French Republic (remarks the Catholic. Weekly) is having brought home to it the inevitable fruits of education without God. So frightful is the increase in France of juvenile criminality that a scheme is being devised for creating special courts of justice for children! At the same moment, be it observed, the anti-Christian Government is busy preparing measures for bringing to justice the parents of children who attempt to hinder the perversion • of their children's. faith and morality by anti-religious teaching in the State schools. Could there be a more glaring sample of the mad inconsistency and utter blindness of anti-clerical hate! The alarming multiplication of child-crime is distinctly traceable to the exclusion of Chrisj. tian teaching from the schools, and to the substitution of * irreligious scoffing at everything sacred. And yet parents \ are to be punished for seeking to arrest a system of edu- ' cation which leads to criminality and creates the need of new courts for dealing with the same! GERMANY—Relations with the Holy See The reports which have been so widely spread abroad, especially in Germany, regarding the speech delivered by Dr. Otto Von Muhlberg, Prussian Minister to the Holy See, are inexact, and no doubt have been circulated for political purposes (says the Rome correspondent of the Catholic Times). Just now the elections in the Reichstag are approaching, and every effort is being made to stir up anti-Catholic prejudices in Germany with a view to

causing a split between the Catholic and Protestant supporters of the Centre Party, which has been so powerful for good these many years. The attempt is somewhat similar to that set on foot by the Orangemen of Ireland in the matter of the decree 'Ne Temere.' What' really happened was this: Dr. Von Muhlberg, having referred to some difficulty that had arisen during the year between Germany and the Holy See, added that everything had been satisfactorily arranged because of the fact that the broad mind of the Pope and the strong hand of the Emperor had conspired to bring about a settlement. The words are quite different from those attributed to the speaker by the telegraphic agencies, which credit him with indulging in terms of reproof and menace against the Holy See. Indeed, the report stands -condemned for it is utterly improbable, if not impossible, that a diplomatist who is noted for his courtesy and tact would take advantage of such an occasion as the Emperor's birthday and the presence of several ecclesiastics at a social function to declare that ' the attitude of the Curia had caused extreme exasperation among German Protestants, was a grave menace for the religious peace of Germany, and if-to-day good relations existed between Berlin and Rome, that was due wholly and solely to the strong will of the Emperor.' PORTUGAL—Obeying Their Masters The revolution in Portugal, as the Dictators have openly avowed, was the secret work of the Freemasons. The Grand Orient gave orders and they were obeyed bv its pliant tools the members of the lodges. This is why'from the first the revolution was converted into a crusade against the Church, why the priests and nuns were ill-treated 5 , and why tho Jesuits were banished (says the Catholic Times). Now that a measure of success has attended its plottings, the Masonic organisation casts off disguise. A telegram from Portugal to the Journal of Paris announces that the members of the Lisbon Lodge have held a plenary meeting to examine the conduct of the Government and make a pronouncement upon it. They decided that the Dictators must be reprimanded. Senhor Braga and his friends have not reported to them as to their acts and intentions with sufficient frequency. For the future they must, it was intimated, give the Masonic body notice beforehand -of every decree they propose to publish, and the persecution of the ministers of religion, especially in the Portuguese colonies, is to be carried on more actively. These commands the members of the Provisional Government must humbly receive. Portugal is ruled by an occult force, whose main object is to lessen the honor paid to God in public worship. But there are signs which indicate that the majority of the Portuguese are growing weary of servitude to Freemasonry. A Difference of Opinion The Lisbon correspondent of the London Times has apparently revolted against his bondage. Not long since he painted everything in Portugal coleur de rose in accordance with the will of Alfonso Costa, Minister of Justice. The situation has evidently become so bad (says the Catholic Times) that he feels compelled in the interests of his paper to change his attitude and to afford a glimpse of what is taking place in Portuguese Ministerial circles. He now confesses that protestations of unity on their part are mere pretence, and says that everything points to a definite and widening line of cleavage between the advanced Socialist group led by Costa and the Moderates or Conservative Republicans represented by Brito Camacho, Minister of Public Works, and d'Almeida 0 Minister of the Interior. Moreover, there is a reaction against bureaucratic despotism or the policy of provisional .and personal authority. A proverb declares that when rogues fall out, honest men come by their own. It is to be hoped that an end will soon be put to the domination of the petty tyrants who thought for a time that they would succeed in stamping out Christianity in Portugal. The vast majority of the Portuguese people are Christian at heart and believers in the doctrines of the Church, and the day when, by their votes at the elections, they will express their views on the conduct of the Dictators cannot be much longer deferred. ROME —An Interesting Ceremony . There is a unique and very interesting ceremony connected with the feast of St. Agnes (writes the Rome correspondent of the Universe). In most of the paintings of the child martyr will be seen a lamb, either in her arms, on her knees, or beside her. The lamb is symbolic of her virginal purity. On the day of the feast, the Chapter of St. John Lateran's, the mother Basilica of the Universal Church, presents two lambs, which are brought to the Church of St. Agnes, lying on damask cushions, their legs tied and ornamented with silk ribbons. These are laid on the altar after the termination of the sacred function, and are blessed by a special rite by the officiating prelate. They are then borne to the Vatican, and are offered to the Pope and blessed by him; and are immediately transferred to the Sisters of St. Cecilia in Trastevere, who care and tend them till near Easter, when they are shorn of their fleece. From this wool are made the palliums which are worn by Archbishops, and which they receive on their elevation to a Metropolitan See as the insignia of their jurisdiction. The palliums are made by the same Sisters who tended the lambs, and they are blessed by the Pontiff on the feast of Sts. Peter and Paul, and placed on the tomb of the Apostles, to a newly-elected Archbishop.