ROMAN CATHOLIC CHURCH. 



The question of undenominational Christian- 

 ity for tin- London schools was raised by the re- 

 port of the Board Committee in Norember, and 

 the Catholics decided to vote with the opp.-M- 

 tion to such a system in the elections :i \>ur 

 lience, when the question will be submitted for 

 ..ii. The hierarchy of England circulated 

 pet it ions at the church doors in November in 

 accordance with the decision to ask Parliament, 

 in the name of the whole Catholic body, to settle 

 the twenty years' agitation by granting Catholic 

 schools their share of the education rate. 



The Isle of Man, in October, passed a Catholic 

 emancipation act. 



Ireland celebrated the completion of St. Pat- 

 lick's Ecclesiastical College, Maynooth, one of 

 the finest structures in the world, this year, and 

 substantial progress was made toward abolish- 

 ing Protestant monopoly of university education. 

 The amendation of the National School Board 

 rules so as to admit the Christian Brothers' 

 schools to the benefits of the state grants for 

 Irish education, which was one of the conditions 

 imposed by the Irish party to the passage of the 

 Compulsory Education act, was postponed by 

 Secretary Morley, and aroused a strong protest, 

 which took the form of legislative obstruction, 

 on the part of Mr. Sexton, M. P., with favorable 

 result to the Brothers' institutions. Rt. Rev. 

 Dr. Fitzpatrick, Lord Abbot of the Trappist 

 Monastery of Mount Melleray, a position which 

 he held for forty-five years, died Dec. 5, at the 

 age of eightv-one. Among the other institutions 

 founded by him was the monastery at Dubuque, 

 Iowa. 



British America. The Catholic appeal to 

 the Dominion Cabinet and the Supreme Court 

 in favor of the disallowance of the Manitoba 

 School act was pushed, on the ground that, apart 

 from the provincial Constitution, the educational 

 clause in the British North America act, guaran- 

 tees the inviolability of the Catholic separate 

 schools. The Manitoba majority government 

 sets up that the clause does not apply to the 

 province. A misunderstanding occurred in On- 

 tario, in March, between the Irish and French 

 population, the former claiming that presence 

 of French children in their schools interfered 

 with grading and efficiency. A compromise 

 was effected, by which French children will not 

 be excluded from the Catholic English-speaking 

 schools unless the teachers so request. An in- 

 vestigation in the counties of Prescott and Rus- 

 sell, where there was much trouble, in 1889, over 

 the language question, revealed the fact that a 

 complete change had taken place in the French 

 Catholic schools of the 3,640 children 3,581 be- 

 ing taught English. In January M. Tarte was 

 elected member for I/Islet on the educational 

 issue, and on March moved a resolution cen- 

 suring the Cabinet for refusing to summarily 

 disallow the Manitoba act of 1890 abolishing the 

 separate schools. After a three days' debate the 

 resolution was rejected 120 to 71. The school 

 question developed in New Brunswick, the Prot- 

 estants claiming that, through the action of the 

 Catholic majority on the Board of Education in 

 Bathurst, they are compelled to pay rates for the 

 support of religious teachers in institutions 

 which were formerly public schools. An inves- 

 tigation with a view to a proper adjustment of 



taxes Is under way. In Quebec a movement for 

 the lay control of Catholic schools 4,015 out of 

 the whole 5,618 in the province developed. 



lion, lloiiore Mercier, ex-Premier of Quebec, 

 on April 4 placed himself at the head of the 

 movement fur Canadian independence in a 

 speech in which he declared either that or an- 

 nexation to the United States was necessary to 

 the preservation of the religious equality, lan- 

 guage, and influence of French nationality. On 

 June 25, the celebration of the two hundred and 

 fifteenth year of the founding of Montreal, M. 

 Mercier, in his French monument dedicatory 

 speech, appealed for a union of French and 

 other Catholics as a necessity to preserve their 

 liberty and existence from English encroachment. 



The sisters of Notre Dame suffered a severe 

 loss June 8 by the destruction of their great 

 educational convent of Ville Marie. It took 

 four years to build the institution, of which 

 only the boarding school was saved. Loss, 

 $1,500,000; insurance, but $100,000. 



Two law cases affecting Catholics came up in 

 the Quebec courts, the first resulting in a deci- 

 sion early in the year that marriages between 

 Catholics unsanctioned by the Church are in- 

 valid, the second being a judgment against 

 Archbishop Fabre, of Montreal, in the action 

 brought by the " Canada Revue," Sept. 25, for 

 damaging its business interests through a pas- 

 toral boycott because the paj>er criticised the 

 ecclesiastical tax exemption and tithe system. 



Mayor Desjardines, July 30, refused to preside 

 at a dinner to Italian war-ship officers in Mont- 

 real lest it might be taken as a countenance of 

 the acts of the Government which has deprived 

 the Pope of his temporal power. Leo XIII 

 decorated him for his protest. 



(jJermany exhibits a Catholic advance in every 

 direction. The Center party manifested its pow- 

 er by defeating the Army bill and compelling an 

 appeal by Emperor William and Capri vi to the 

 country although in so doing a division was 

 caused resolving the party into aristocratic and 

 democratic elements. The democratic Catholic 

 contingent made the most numerous showing in 

 the subsequent June elections of any single party, 

 and taken all together Centerists, Government 

 Centerists, Poles, Guelphs, Alsatians, etc. the 

 Catholics have the balance of power in the new 

 chosen Reichstag. Cardinal Ledochowski ad- 

 vised the 19 Poles to throw in their lot with the 

 Government in return for concessions, although 

 all overtures to the Pope direct failed to secure 

 any word of encouragement for the Emperor. 

 Cardinals Hohenlohe and Koppboth favored the 

 Government, but their exhortations proved futile 

 with the pcojne. The visit of Emperor William 

 to the Pope in April helped on the cause of con- 

 ciliation, but gained nothing for the support of 

 the triple alliance. In December the Catholic 

 part y made a decided effort to secure the repeal of 

 the last vestiges of the penal laws enacted under 

 the Cultur-Kumpf of 1872. Count Hompesch, as 

 spokesman, made an able and conciliatory speech 

 in favor of the return of the religious orders. 

 "Socialists and anarchists," said he. "are free to 

 preach the destruction of even' social institu- 

 tion, and a Jesuit alone is expelled for teaching 

 the word of God." The Opposition was weak, 

 the ministry refraining from debate, and on mo- 



