‘STAND FAST IN THE FAITH'

New Zealand Tablet, 13 May 1915, Page 11

‘STAND FAST IN THE FAITH'

(A Weekly Instruction specially written for the N.Z.. Tablet by Ghimel.) THE NEUTRALITY OF THE POPE. • • 4 (Continued.) ' "*" The only role that a Pope of the present day can play is that of charity and peace. -The cables have told of Benedict's efforts to mitigate the hardships of military prisoners, and, in some cases, to obtain an exchange of those captured and it is some consolation in the never-ending tale of horrors to learn that these efforts have been happily successful. We may rest assured, also, that if counsels of peace are not yet heard above the din, it is not the fault of the Father of Christendom. But obviously in order to carry out this beneficent work of charity, the Pope must keep in touch with all the Powers at war. Controversy is not as a rule a successful method for winning men to your side —the heart has reasons that the intellect cannot know; and condemnation, especially on the part of one holding the Pope's position,,would at once alienate the sympathetic respect and confidence of the nations condemned. If the Supreme Pontiff were in a position at the present moment to pronounce judgment on the war its justice in one case, its injustice in anotherand all its accompanying horrors, it would be an easy thing to speak and to condemn. But even supposing it were possible to get at the full truth, motives of prudence would still counsel silence. In the first place, such a condemnation would place the Pope in a difficult, impossible position with the belligerent nation condemned. Such a country would turn a deaf ear to any proposals coming from such a source. Yet it would have in its- power many whose lot the Pope's words might otherwise have relieved. The end of the war, we are constantly told, will see a remaking of the map of Europe. It is quite certain that the position of Catholics in the old and the new nations will be one of the most important and most thorny of the questions to be settled. The Pope's representative took part in the rearrangement of Europe after the Napoleonic wars ; Catholic interests have not grown less since then. The bishops of the different nations will use the influence of their high office for the benefit of their flocks ; the Prince of bishops will have much to say and to do. But does not all this make it imperative that the Pope should keep on good terms with all ? We must always remember that the successor of Peter is ruler not of a national but of a Catholic Church. No doubt, too, the present Head of the Church remembers that his Master, when on earth, refused more than once, for motives which lie did not choose to make known, to condemn publicly grave crimes about the existence of which there was no possible doubt. The woman taken in adultery is a case in point. There was no doubt about the crime, and the Jews were justified in asking that she should be stoned to death according to the provisions of the Mosaic Law. But the only reply of the merciful Saviour was : ' He that is without sin amongst you, let him cast the first stone.' Then turning to the woman He added: ' Hath no man condemned thee ? Then neither will I condemn thee. Go thy way and sin no more.' He would even write the sins of the woman on the ground where the winds and the rain would soon blow away and the busy feet of men trample out the very record of them, as if to show that in His eyes sin repented is sin forgotten. The Pope is not only the appointed guardian of justice and morality, he is also " the Shepherd of the flock. His chief care is to feed Christ's lambs and sheep, not to redress wrongs.