Cardinal Bourne’s Message to the Nation.—Romanism has not been particularly successful of late in the political world, but that has not made its advocates less zealous. The other week Cardinal Bourne had the audacity to address a Message to the Nation, in which he arraigns Protestantism for the many evils that have fallen upon the world. This Message was widely circulated, appearing as an advertisement in The Times, Daily Telegraph, Glasgow Herald, Scotsman, and other leading dailies. The Cardinal appears never to have read history, or, if he has, it must have been with his eyes shut. Romanism is on its trial in these days, and its advocates are determined to reap as much benefit as they can from the turbulent state of the world. The political cry to-day is “Democracy,” and though the Church of Rome is one of the most autocratic institutions the world has ever known, the Cardinal, ranging himself on the popular side, makes his appeal to the democracy of Britain, informing the masses that “the Roman Catholic principles of social reform cannot fail to commend themselves to the millions of men and women in this country, in whom a passion for social righteousness has been stirred.” A cursory perusal of Purcell’s Life of Cardinal Manning might have saved the Cardinal from so far misrepresenting the attitude of his Church to democracy and the movement for social reform. But it is when the Cardinal reads history through Romish heavily-coloured spectacles, that one begins to realise how blurred is the vision of this English “Prince of the Church.” But as we are pleased to observe that two of the leading Scottish dailies, the Glasgow Herald and the Dundee Advertiser, the organs of the two great political parties in the country, have dealt with this matter in a pungent way, we leave them to deal with the Cardinal’s history.
“Glasgow Herald” and Cardinal Bourne’s Message.
—“Cardinal Bourne’s Lenten pastoral,” says the Glasgow Herald, “delivered in partibus infidelium and scattered by [Roman] Catholic propagandists throughout the country, has been read, we believe, with some interest and a great deal of natural resentment. . . . One is really almost ashamed to have to remind a Roman prelate that the liberty he enjoys in the pulpit and press of this country is solely due to the Protestantism he misrepresents. Tolerance is nothing to boast about, perhaps, if ‘the true lineaments of Christianity’ are those described by Cardinal Bourne—‘Its passion for fair treatment and liberty; its resentment at bureaucratic interference with family life; its desire for self-realisation and opportunities of education; above all, its conviction that persons are of more value than property.’ These ideals, in past times, have had to be pursued under the kind of illumination furnished by Smithfield’s fires and the auto-da-fés of the Inquisition, by Ignatius Loyola and his particular bureaucracy, by the enthusiasm for education which has characterised, for example, the Clerical system of Spain, and by the passionate defence of human rights which accounted for the atrocities of Philip II. in Holland and for the St. Bartholomew massacres. . . . We agree with the Cardinal—it is almost the single point on which we do agree—that the world has need of religion and religious ideals. Back to religion? Yes. Back to Rome? Never.”
Another Press Criticism.—“In a pastoral letter which,” says the Dundee Advertiser, “has been distributed broadcast, Cardinal Bourne has traced all the troubles of Europe back to the Reformation; and in harmony with this view of history he prophesies that there can be no social, industrial, and political happiness till we have bowed the stubborn neck to the unifying and authoritative power of Rome. Carping critics have suggested that the theory, interesting and comforting as it is to those who can accept it, does not explain all the facts. In the miseries of the time countries which have remained faithful and submissive to the Church are involved. Belgium, for example, has been a dutiful daughter, and it has not saved her. Austria is almost the most intensely [Roman] Catholic land in Europe, and she has her full share in the miseries of the period, and much more than an average share of responsibility for them. Poland, [Roman] Catholic to the core, has been despoiled by [Roman] Catholic and Lutheran alike. And then there is Spain. It is true Spain has managed to keep out of the war, but in every other kind of unrestful soil—social, industrial, and political, she has the most copious provision.”
Scottish Churchmen Advocate Prayers for the Dead.
—The Bulwark has done praiseworthy service in calling attention to the dangerous teaching in the recently issued book, “God and the Soldier,” which is the joint production of the Rev. Dr. Norman MacLean, St. Cuthbert’s, Edinburgh, and the Rev. Dr. J. R. P. Sclater, United Free Church minister, of the same city. The section quoted by The Bulwark occurs in the chapter on “The Last Issue,” and is supposed to be the work of Dr. Maclean. It is as follows:—”God is also in hell, and wherever He is, He can only be doing one thing—trying to win His children to Himself. . . . And in the long, long end, God will win. . . . If prayer be the mightiest weapon placed in our hands, we dare not restrict its power merely to the aid of the living. For the dead are still on the same great stream of life as we are. And they, too, need the shepherding and the shielding of God. . . . Multitudes to-day pray for their dead in an agony of supplication who never before prayed even for the living; and the Church must give expression to this yearning of their souls. Whatever the theorizings of theologians may say, the heart of man settles this matter.” The writer, whether he be Dr. MacLean or Dr. Sclater, gives abundant evidence of the very theorizings of theologians which he condemns. He begins badly by accepting the Universal Fatherhood as if it were a truth of Scripture, and then goes deeper and deeper into the mire, fulfilling another New Testament Scripture that, if the blind lead the blind both shall fall into the ditch. It is a new thing for Scottish theologians to appeal to the feelings of the heart to settle matters of vast importance in the realm of God’s truth. We are not forgetful of what a higher authority has told us that “the heart is deceitful above all things and desperately wicked,” and it would be well that the new school of theologians, or rather theological theorizers, who have arisen in Scotland, would make less of the feelings of man’s depraved heart, and more of the one sure, infallible, standard that God has given us.
The Heart of Man Settling Prayers for the Dead.
—The Bulwark, in criticising the foregoing sentence in which the author maintains that the heart of man settles the matter of prayers for the dead, goes on to say:—”We are as unwilling as Dr. MacLean is to appeal to the theorizings of theologians on this matter. We trust that he, being only a theorizing theologian himself, is willing to appeal, as we are about to do, to the fountain of all Christian theology. We, then, strongly demur to his statement—’The heart of man settles this matter.’ Is the heart of God to have nothing to do with it? Is the heart of Him who so loved sinning and sorrowing men and women that He died upon the tree for them—is that heart not to be consulted in the settling of this matter? We are of opinion that it is just Christ, and no other—Christ’s heart and no other—that must settle this matter. For He is our Lord. He is the Revealer of all that we know for sure about the world which lies beyond the grave. He has abolished death and brought light and immortality to light. He has the keys of the world of the dead. And His consideration for broken hearts and bereaved ones is such as can be allowed to none of the sons of men. Here is the strange situation: Dr. MacLean insists that the Church must have prayers for the dead or else be guilty of ‘continuing to do violence to one of the noblest instincts of the heart;’ but our Lord Jesus Christ has not said one word about prayers for the dead. The New Testament is searched in vain for one prayer of Christ for the dead, for one command from Him to pray for the dead, for one utterance either of His or His Apostles’ in the direction of prayer for the dead. What, then, is the conclusion to which Dr. MacLean’s method of argument leads him? It is nothing less than this—that our Lord has ‘done violence to one of the noblest instincts of the heart.’”