IT is quite apparent, as time proceeds, that the Papacy is waxing bolder and bolder in its efforts to bring this Protestant nation under its yoke. The past month has witnessed a new and conspicuous attempt to accomplish this purpose in the “International Eucharistic Congress,” held in the Roman Cathedral, Westminster. This is the nineteenth Congress of the kind that has been held by Papists in various parts of the world during the last thirty-five years, but it is the first that has taken place within the bounds of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland. The Congress was also presided over by a Cardinal Legate from the Pope, an official ambassador of the Papacy that has not been seen in this country for more than two hundred years. These circumstances prove that Papal encroachments are gradually increasing upon our country, and that the emissaries of Rome are becoming more courageous and hopeful in regard to the conquest of Great Britain. And although they did not get everything their own way on the present occasion—notably in the matter of the public procession of “the Host”—yet they are by no means despondent of winning over our country to the allegiance of the Pope. To all appearance they are only more determined than ever to overthrow, if they can, the Protestant Constitution of the realm. We shall notice more particularly some of the special features of the present Congress.
The first thing to be observed is that this Congress had as its main object the advancement of the great Popish doctrines of Transubstantiation and the Mass. The Church of Rome maintains that, in the Sacrament of the Lord’s Supper, there is a real change of the bread and wine into the body and blood, soul and divinity, of the Lord Jesus Christ, and that, although to the senses there is nothing but bread and wine, Christ is really and bodily present on the altar—a doctrine so absolutely absurd and unscriptural that it has been an astonishment that any rational or intelligent being ever accepted it. Rome also holds, as a monstrous consequence of this doctrine, that in the offering up of the bread and wine as a sacrifice for the sins of the living and the dead, there is a repetition of the sacrifice of the Cross, and that Christ is offered again and again as a propitiatory sacrifice for sin on the altar. How entirely contrary to God’s Word are these
extraordinary opinions we need not show at any great length. Suffice it to say that it is the plain testimony of the Scriptures that “Christ hath once suffered for sins, the just for the unjust,” that “by one offering he hath perfected for ever them that are sanctified,” and that any idea of a repetition of His sacrifice is expressly repudiated in Hebrews ix. 25, 26, “Nor yet that he should offer himself often, . . . for then must he often have suffered, . . . but now once in the end of the world hath he appeared to put away sin by the sacrifice of himself.” And as for transubstantiation, it is clear that no such thing is implied in the words of Christ. “This is my body,” according to a common use of language in Scripture, plainly means, “This represents my body,” while the bread and wine are spoken of as such after the words, “This is my body,” and “This is my blood,” were pronounced, which clearly indicates that there was no transubstantiation. (1 Cor. xi. 26-28.) But it is just in these extraordinary dogmas of transubstantiation and the sacrifice of the Mass that the unhallowed strength of Rome lies. She presumptuously professes ability to endow her priests with the power of creating the Divine Redeemer upon her altars, and by the imaginary performance of this lying wonder, she dazzles and overawes the benighted imaginations of all who come under her influence. It is for the purpose of throwing the spell of this blasphemy over the British people, and of thus drawing them within her pale, that the present Congress was started and carried through. Dignitaries of various ranks delivered papers and addresses on the “Real Presence” of Christ in the Sacrament.
The second thing to be noted in connection with this Congress is that, under the cover of what professed to be a devotional gathering, certain noblemen of the Roman Catholic communion took occasion to attack the Protestant constitution of this realm, as that is expressed in the King’s declaration. Viscount Landaff and the Duke of Norfolk delivered very strong and bitter speeches against the declaration, and did not hide their intention to do all in their power to get it removed altogether. The political ambition of the Papacy clearly revealed itself. It has lost Italy and France, and would fain have our highly-favoured country under its despotic heel. What of degradation and misery that would mean we shall not attempt to describe. The day was that such disloyal and treasonable speeches as these noblemen delivered would bring as a consequence a heavy penalty, but the reign of false charity is almost at its height in our backsliding nation. We trust, however, that some among all classes of society may be awakened by present events to realise the appalling danger to which we are exposed as a people.
A third feature of this Congress was the attempt to have a grand public procession of “the Host” as a triumphant conclusion to the whole proceedings on Sabbath, 13th September. The attempt was well nigh successful. All preparations were made. The protection of the London police was secured, the Chief
Commissioner of which is, by the way, a Roman Catholic. The Home Secretary was pliant in the matter, and all was in readiness for the concluding triumph of the Congress. Meanwhile, however, Protestants were stirred to activity. Representations were made to the King and the Prime Minister that such proceedings were illegal according to Act, 1829—the very Act by which, in the judgment of many, the Papists got too much political power in this country. The result was, that at the last moment Mr. Asquith, the Prime Minister, prohibited the carrying of “the Host” and other offensive symbols in procession. This was a staggering blow to the Papists in Congress, and a just cause of rejoicing to all Protestants whose prayers had gone up for the interposing hand of God in the matter. The procession took place, largely shorn of its ceremonial, but not, we understand, to the full extent promised by Archbishop Bourne of Westminster. There cannot be the slightest doubt that if the carrying of “the Host” (that is, the wafer in a box held aloft, and accorded divine worship as the veritable Son of God) had been proceeded with, zealous Protestants, with the law on their side, would have forcibly laid hands on the idol, and it would have never reached the Cathedral. This would no doubt have occasioned a tremendous riot on the part of the Romanists, and there is no saying what scenes of disorder and bloodshed would have taken place on the Lord’s Day. We shall not say that no good would have arisen even out of such an event as this; but better it is, we think, that the chiefly offensive part of the procession was stopped. The good hand of God is to be acknowledged in this answer to the earnest desires of His people. The time for bloodshed may come sooner than any of us desire.
In conclusion, we cannot help remarking on the pernicious attitude of the newspapers towards the Congress and the question of the public display of “the Host.” Some of them advocated the fullest licence, and denounced the opposition of Protestants as bigotry and so forth, while others, though they admitted the illegality of any such display, were extremely mild and tolerant. Hardly a single paper took up a thorough Protestant attitude. Indeed, the reports of the Congress and its affairs that appeared in some of them could not be more sympathetic than if the writers of said reports were themselves Papists, which in all probability they were. Truly, things are in a very serious state when the press of this country is being captured by the Pope, and when those papers which profess to stand for liberty and freedom are prepared to help on the return of this nation to that despicable bondage from which we were delivered at the Reformation. Newspaper editors may scorn the possibility of such a climax, but if anything better shall happen, the people of this country will not have them to thank for it. They are doing their best under the plea of a delusive charity to open the gates for floods of superstition and cruelty to overrun our nation and to bring it to dire misery and ruin. May the Lord, in His infinite mercy, arise and deliver us!