ROMAN CATHOLIC CHURCH. 



701 



the fidelity and in the love of your clergy and 

 of your people, aa well us in the cheerfulness 

 with which they endure persecutions, and pre- 

 fer the purity of their faith and the preserva- 

 tion of its unity to everything else. We see an 

 mliiiirnUc <'viilonce of this in the solicitude 

 which yiiur clergy shares with you for the edu- 

 cation of youth, and in the plan they have 

 adopted, and which you have approved, ac- 

 cording to which teachers appointed exclusive- 

 ly hy the secular authorities shall be required 

 to prove their submission to the Church, and 

 that they will teach her saving doctrines by 

 word and example. The carrying out of this 

 will necessarily require a supernatural force, 

 together with a degree of firmness no less great 

 to surmount the difficulties that will rise up in 

 it- u ;iy ; but God, who inspired this plan, will 

 also supply the means for realizing this end." 

 The Archbishop of Cologne also protested 

 against the substitution of a catechism com- 

 piled by a Government official in the place of 

 the regular catechism of his diocese. To en- 

 courage the Catholics of Germany in their 

 dillirult position, the Pope addressed a brief 

 (August 14th) to the congress about to as- 

 semble. 



Another curious episode in the Kulturkampf 

 was the course of the Government in making 

 numerous arrests at Marpingen, a small village 

 in one of the Rhenish provinces, where the 

 Blessed Virgin was believed by many to have 

 appeared to some children near a fountain. No 

 convictions followed, and the Government only 

 intensified the resentment of the Catholics. 

 The trial of Bishop Janiszewski, one of the 

 coadjutors of Cardinal Ledochowski, resulted, 

 October 7th, in an acquittal, but his proceedings 

 were carefully watched to insure subsequent 

 conviction. The whole course of Government 

 during the year had gained little for the Old 

 Catholic movement, and strengthened the 

 Catholic party. 



In France the Catholic hierarchy inaugurated 

 (January 10th) a Free Catholic University at 

 Paris, the Cardinal-Archbishop of Paris de- 

 livering the opening address. Waddington, 

 Minister of Public Instruction, attempted to 

 thwart this movement of the Catholic body, 

 and to check the schools of the Christian 

 Brothers. This led to agitation. A conven- 

 tion of Catholic committees was held in May, 

 and the attempt to prevent the university from 

 granting degrees excited such warm debates in 

 the French Chambers that the Catholic party 

 secured liberty of education. The whole hier- 

 archy of France assembled to consecrate with 

 imposing rites the Basilica of Lourdes (July 1st), 

 surrounded by thousands of pilgrims. They 

 transmitted a letter to the Pope, who replied 

 by a brief (July 22d). 



In Spain the question of a modification of 

 the Concordat in regard to liberty of worship 

 led to warm debates. The Bishop of Salamanca, 

 in a speech of remarkable power, induced the 

 Cortes to maintain the actual position. A brief 

 VOL. xvi. 15 A 



of I 'ope Pins IX. (March 4th), to the Spanish 

 bishops, says: 



since the time when, in deference to the oft-re- 

 peated requests made to us by the Spanish Govern- 

 ment, we sent our nuncio to Madrid, we instructed 

 him to use every effort with tin; ministers of the 

 nation, and with the most Hcretie Catholic sovereign, 

 to prevent the attempt* made upon the Church in 

 troublous and revolutionary times from being fully 

 carried out, and for the taithful execution of the 

 Concordat of 1851 and the treaties tnude (subsequent 

 to it. And as in the Constitution of 1869 a grave 

 innovation was made in that kingdom upon the 

 Church and upon the aforesaid Concordat, which 

 had the force of law, by the public promulgation of 

 the freedom of worship, our nuncio, from the time 

 of the arrival at his post, directed all his cures and 

 endeavors, in conformity with the instructions lie 

 had received, to restore in their full force all the 

 rigor of this Concordat, rejecting, as to mutters con- 

 nected with it, every innovation of a nature calcu- 

 lated to endanger religious unity. In the mean time 

 we have deemed it our duty to address a letter to 

 the Catholic sovereign, to acquaint him with our 

 sentiments on this subject. When the Spanish 

 journals published the plan of the new Constitution 

 submitted to the examination of the Superior Coun- 

 cils of the nation, and the eleventh chapter of which 

 relates to the legal sanction of the freedom or tolera- 

 tion of non-Catholic worship, we immediately de- 

 sired our Cardinal-Secretary of State to confer about 

 it with the representative of the Spanish nation, and 

 show him, in remitting to him the document in 

 question, anted August 13, 1875, the just demands 

 whicli right and duty exacted from us against the 

 aforesaid chapter. The declarations put forth on 

 tin's occasion were subsequently renewed by the 

 Holy See, in the reply it felt called upon to make to 

 several observations "made by the Spanish Govern- 

 ment on this point ; and our nuncio at Madrid did 

 not cease to ask the Ministers of State, ut his inter- 

 views with them, that these protests should be in- 

 serted in the public acts of the ministry. But we 

 have the extreme sorrow of seeing that everything 

 we have done, either personally or through our Cnr- 

 dinal-Seeretary of State and the nuncio at Madrid, 

 has not yet had the desired result. Already, how- 

 ever, to divert from your country the misfortune of 

 a false toleration, you, beloved son, and venerable 

 brethren, have very justly and very properly ex- 

 pended your zeal and presented your protests and 

 your petitions. To these protests, and to those of all 

 the bishops and of the greater part of the faithful 

 of Spain, we atrain upon this occasion unite ours, 

 and we dec'are that the aforesaid chapter of the 

 constitutional project of law which tends to give 

 the weight and force of a public law to the toleration 

 of all non-Catholic worship, under what form so- 

 ever it may be presented, absolutely conflicts with 

 the rights of truth and of the Catholic religion, 

 abrogates, in violation of all right, the Concordat 

 concluded between the Holy See and the Spanish 

 Government on this most important and cherished 

 point, burdens the state itself with a great crime, 

 and, in opening the way to error, paves the road to 

 persecution of the Catholic religion ; moreover, it 

 prepares an accumulation of evils for the downfall 

 of this illustrious nation, which, in rejecting this 

 false liberty or toleration in question, requires with 

 all its means and with all its strength that the reli- 

 gious unity which it has inherited from its ances- 

 tors, and which is intimatelv allied with its histori- 

 cal monuments, with its morals, and ita national 

 glory, be maintained sound and unimpaired. 



In Russia the severities against the United 

 or Catholic Greeks were maintained, and rep- 

 resentations made palliating the course of GOT- 



