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THE BULLETIN OF THE CATHOLIC LAYMEN’S ASSOCIATION OF GEORGIA
1ULY 24, 1926
THE BULLETIN
The Official Organ of the Catholic Laymen’s Association
of Georgia.
RICHARD UEID, Editor.
I’ublislml Semi-Monthly by the Publicity Department with
the Approbation of the lit. Rev. Bishops, of Raleigh, Char
leston, Savannah, St Augustine, Mobile anti Natchez.
1109 Lamar Building. Augusta, Georgia.
Subscription Price, $2.00 Per Year.
' FOREIGN ADVERTISING REPRESENTATIVE
S. T. Mattingly, Walton Bldg. Atlanta, Go.
ASSOCIATION OFFICERS FOR 1924-25.
P. H. RICE, K. C. S C.. Augusta President
COL. P. H. CALLAHAN. K.S.G., Louisville, Ky., and ADMI
RAL WM. S. BENSON, K.C.S.G., Washington, D. C.
Honorary Vice-Presidents
J. .1. IIAVEBTY, Atlanta First Vice-President
■L B. McCALLUM. Atlanta Secretary
THOMAS S. GBAY, Augusta Treasurer
RICHARD REID, Augusta Publicity Director
MISS CECILE C. FERRY, Augusta. .Asst, Publicity Director
VOL. VII. JULY 24, 1926. No. 14
Member of N. C. W. C. News Service and of the Catholic
Press Association of the United Slates and Canada.
Entered as second class matter June 15, 1921, at the Post
Office at Augusta, Ga., under Act of March, 1879. Accepted
for mailing at special rate of postage provided for in Sec
tion 1103, Oct of October 3, 1917, authorized Sept 1, 1921.
The Sesquicentennial
The Republic is observing the one hundred and
fiftieth anniversary of its Declaration of Independence.
We have pointed out on numerous occasions the debt
the United States owes to the Catholic Church, whose
sons have shed their blood in her defense on every
battlefield from the Revolution to the present day
and whose members have been no less valiant in the
promotion of her welfare in times of peace.
It is appropriate at this time that we acknowledge
the debt that the Catholic Church owes to America.
Here she has been allowed to enjoy her God-given
rights not only unmolested by the government hut
protected by it, and although here and there she has
suffered persecution, such incidents have been ex
ceptional and in violation of the fundamental law of
the land which soon asserted its power. The growth of
the Catholic Church in the United States is a demon-
itration of the fact that the soil of a republic is well
uiapted to its needs, and that the Church which the
night of the Roman Empire could not crush certainly
aeeds no special favor in order to flourish and prosper.
The Catholics of the nation in filling an important
part in the life of the country today are playing no
new role, as the following letter from George Washing
ton to their co-religionists of the eighteenth century
in reply to congratulations before his inauguration
indicates:
“To the Roman Caiholics of the United States:
I hope ever to see America among the foremost nations
in examples of justice and liberty; and I presume that
your fellow-citizens will not forget the patriotic part
which 3ou took in the accomplishment of their re
volution, and the establishment of their government,
or the important assistance they received from a na
tion in which the Roman Catholic faith is professed/’
On Common- Ground
The Bulletin some time ago, commenting on action
of the grand master of the Masons of the State of
New York in warning them that the organization
should refrain from politics and of that of Cardinal
O’Connell in cautioning the Knights of Columbus to
avoid the same evil, declared: “The Editor of The
Cordele Dispatch in a recent editorial apparently
condoned the participation in politics of Masons, as
an organization, in Latin-America.” Editor Brown
of The Dispatch in an editorial declares that this
paragraph does him an injustice, saying: “We have
led hy scheming demagogues whose day of success
has long since passed its zenith. They know also that
Georgia has no monopoly on intolerance.
Unfortunately m'any in other parts of the country
who undertake to discuss Georgia’s shortcomings go
about the task with the zeal of a public prosecutor
rather than with the poise of the judical mind such
an undertaking deserves. They find intolerance in
Georgia; they conclude therefore that all Georgians
are intolerant. They find ignorance here and de
cide that all Georgians are ignorant. They argue from
the particular to the general with an abandon of one
who has thrown logic to the winds and gone on an
illogical intellectual debauch.
Speaking of a Georgia newspaper which has de
nounced the Iflan intolerance, lynching and other evils
of that nature day in and day out, a writer in The
Forum recently said: “You consider this kind of
civilization (the alleged Georgia variety) and in your
most optimistic m'ood you give a straight-thinking,
outspoken newspaper one year to lose its circulation
and its advertisements.” There are at least as many
straight-thinking, outspoken newspapers in Georgia
as there are in the average slate, in our opinion. Many
of these papers have been frank in their denuncia
tion of intolerance and of organizations fostering
intolerance while The Bulletin has been in existence,
and they still have healthy subscription lists and
advertising patronage. One country weekly in a small
Georgia city in which there are practically no Catho
lics, edited by a young man who has ceaselessly de
nounced intolerance and intolerant organizations by
name, paid incom'e tax on over §8,000 last year, we
are advised by newspapermen.
Georgia should not resent helpful criticism and
the thinking people within her borders do not. But
she has a right to object to criticism that makes no
distinction between the prejudiced and the tolerant,
between the class of Georgians that gave to the Catho
lic Church two of her distinguished American converts
of the last generation, Joel Chandler Harris and Tho
mas W. Loyless, and some of our Georgia priests, and
those who for their own selfish purposes seek to set
the people of the state at enmity because of their
religious convictions. It is significant that practically
all the writers of intolerant articles about “intolerant
Georgia” are non-Catholics, and the records of many
of them make it appear logical for us to assume that
their attacks on the state are not prompted because
they love the victims of prejudice more but because
they love Georgia less.
A Boomerang
Bigotry is harmful, but it is seldom those against
whom it is directed who suffer most. Despite the
recurring waves of prejudice against Catholics in
Georgia in recent years—perhaps we should say be
cause of them—this diocese has year after year re
ported a greater per centage of increase through non-
Catholics embracing the Catholic faith that at least
ninety-five per cent of the other dioceses of America.
A distinguished Georgia editor a few days ago said that
in his opinion the anti-Catholie movement was res
ponsible for the late Thomas TV. Loyless becoming a
Catholic. Georgia has a Catholic newspaper; the
anti-Catholic movement is responsible for that. Geor-
ria lias as loyal a band of Catholics as can be found
anywhere. It perhaps has more and finer Catholic
schools, Churches and institutions than any state or
other political division in the world where Catholics
are so few. For all of these the Catholics of the
state can thank unjust opposition.
At the very dawn of the Republic we find a con-
Diocese of Savannah
Official
July, 21, 19t26.
Bishop’s House, 222 East Harris Stieet, Savannah, Ga.
Reverend dear Father:
In accordance with the wishes of Our Holy Father, Pius XI, you
will haYe your people pray on August 1, the Feast of St. Peter in.
Chains, for our persecuted fellow-Catholics in Mexico, so that relief
may come to them from the despicable tyranny under which they suf
fer.
On Sunday, August 1, you will add ten Our Fathers, ten Hail
Marys and ten Glorias to the usual prayers at the end of all masses in
your church. At the principal Mass you will recite the Litany of the
saints with the usual prayer. You will moreover announce these
prayers and their object, at all the Masses on July 25 and August 1,
so that our people may join their supplications to those of the Uni
versal Church for the granting of freedom to the sorely tried Cathol
ics of Mexico.
Faithfully yours in Christ,
MICHAEL .1. KEYES,
Bishop of Savannah.
Text of Letter Requesting Prayers
of Faithful For Mexican Catholics
Apostolic Delegation
United States of America,
Washington, D. C.,
July 8, 1926.
The Rt. Rev. Michael J. Keyes, D.D.,
222 East Harris Street,
Savannah, Ga.
Your Lordship:
His Eminence, the Cardinal Sec
retary of State, has sent the follow
ing letter, which I communicate to
you to the end that the faithful of
your diocese may join in the uni
versal prayer of the Feast of St.
Peter in Chains for the relief of our
persecuted brethren in Mexico and
for the pardon of the persecutors,
as our Holy Father requests.
Deplorable news continues to reach
us concerning the sad vicissitudes
of the Church in the Republic of
Mexico, where, under a hypocritical
form of pretended legality, . those
who hold the reins of government
are carrying out a true and real per
secution against the Catholic relig
ion in that unhappy nation. It is
not necessary for us to review the
serious, painful facts, now daily
multiplied in the republic. While
amplest liberty is allowed by the
present Mexican government to rep
resentatives of other religions, that
same liberty is denied to all Cathol
ics in a manner which would dis
honor any civilized people. The
Mexican government not only per
sists in refusing to allow the papal
representative to remain in Mexico,
hut has gone so far as to expel the
Apostolic Delegate, Archbishop Ca-
ruana, alleging, in justification of
such action, false and calumnious
charges.
The Mexican government, more
over, continues to drive from the
republic foreign-born priests and re
ligious and sisters in such an in
human way as would scarcely be
used against the worst of. criminals.
The Mexican government has pro
ceeded to limit arbitrarily the num
ber of even the native-born priests of
Mexico, and the number of dioceses.
The Mexican government has closed
colleges and seminaries and impos
ed upon priests who venture to ex
ercise their ministry such conditions
as are intolerable to conscience.
Churches from which priests were
driven by violence ->r» being taken
over by civil authorities, under the
pretext that such churches were
abandoned.
His Holiness is deeply grieved
that so beloved a portion of his
flock is subjected to such a perse
cution. In his consistorial allocu
tion of December 14, 1925, His Holi
ness manifested his great sorrow
and declared that in the present
hour of tribulation for the Church
in Mexico he placed his every con
fidence in the Divine Goodness to
which lie daily addressed fervent
prayers. Lately His Holiness wrote
with his own hand a letter to the
Cardinal Vicar charging him to ask
the faithful of Rome to unite with
him in these prayers for our suffer
ing Mexican brothers.
In the letter His Holiness also
expressed the wish that the entire
Catholic world would follow the ex
ample of the Catholics of Rome, and
a far-reaching response was the re
sult. Now that the suffering of our
Mexican brothers is increased, it is
the more necessary that we increase
our prayers for them.
The August Pontiff has directed
me to convey to you this grave
charge, that with all solicitude you
inform the episcopate of His Holiness’
desire, so that, in turn, all the faith
ful be invited to unite their prayers
to those of the Holy Father. His Ho
liness desires that these prayers be
offered on the first of August, the
Feast of St. Peter in Chains. The
date is most opportune since it re
calls how the prayers of the faithful
in the first persecution of the
Church secured such miraculous in
tervention from God. Another hap- ,
py coincidence is that the prayers
thus offered will begin on the day of,,
the great portiuncula indulgence
of more solemn import this year be
cause it marks the seventh cente
nary of the death of St. Francis.
All these circumstances will no
doubt render more fervent and
more acceptable to God the prayers
of all the faithful for the ending of
the persecution in Mexico, and for
the pardon of those guiltv of it.
Finally, the Holy Father decrees
that these same intentions be add
ed to those others already recom
mended in the bull .extending the
holy year to the entire world.
P. CARD. GASPARRI.
Rome, July 2, 1926.
In communicating this to you I
take the occasion to renew the ex
pression of my deep esteem and de
votion.
Sincerely yours in Christ.
P. FUMASONI-BIONDI,
Archbishop of Dioclea, Apostolic
Delegate.
never agitated such and at this moment think it
would be unwise and unlike the spirit of Masonry.”
The editorial continent upon which The Bulletin’s re
mark was based seemed to us to have the significance
attributed to it; we are pleased to have the Cordele
Editor say we misunderstood him and that he stands
with us against participation of any secret organiza
tion in politics.
Judging Georgia
Not even the most optimistic Chamber of Com
merce can truthfully deny the existence of religious
prejudice in Georgia. Honest Georgians make no at
tempt to do so as Judge Hines, Julian Harris and
Major Swift have demonstrated in recent weeks.
There is intolerance in Georgia; there are too many
people within the confines of the state who swear
their undying allegiance to the Constitution of the
United States in one breath and then violate it in the
jext by making a man’s religious convictions a test
/or public office. Religious prejudice in Georgia is
hot only a m'oral but an economic evil.
The intolerance in Georgia is evident not only to
Georgians hut to our neighbors in other states, par
ticularly outside the South. Sons and daughters of
die Empire State of the South do not lose their sense
&f proportion when deploring the prejudice afflict
ing the state. They know that this evil is much' less
prevalent than it was ten or five years ago. They
Idealize that the intelligent people here are as a whole
Set against the movement and that those among whom
the campaign of hatred has made progress are for
tbe most part good-hearted people deceived and mis-
spicious example of the expensiveness of bigotry.
After England had defeated France and secured Cana
da, she granted religious freedom to the French Cath
olic Canadians. An unparalleled explosion of bigotry
shook the colonies. Then the Revolution came. It
required an official order from General Washington
to prevent evidences of extreme prejudice in Cam
bridge. It is natural to assume that Canada, recently
passing under the yoke of Britain, would side with ths
colonies. But a recently issued work by an Oxford
man, R. Coupland, “The Quebec Act: A Study in
Statesmanship,” records that the Canadians remeirt-
bered the blind burst of fury in the colonies at the
guarantee of religious liberty, and refused to join us
because they feared the narrowness that prompted
the anti-Catholic display. Nor would they be moved
by the assurances of Father John Carroll and his
delegation, sent to Canada by Congress, that the re
ligious freedom England guaranteed them would be
granted them by the colonies.
Thus Canada today, from the Atlantic to the Pa
cific, from the Great Lakes to the Artie, is not a part
of the United States because of bigotry. It was the
first great loss our country sustained on that ac
count; it was by no means the last. Even today there
are in the United States many who do not realize
that prejudice and injustice do not pay even from a
material standpoint. Fortunately they are in the
minority, and the American people ican be depended
upon to choose leaders who as a rule have economic
sense enough to know that bigotry from a material
standpoint is a liability, and moral sense enough to
shun it as an eviL ,
..‘uii S’v U.Sl&ri , Ki-.U'4tuJi • L' n*y.S
DIXIE MUSIhGS—
Catholic Press
Convention
After searching our memory, sev
eral subscription sets of popular
classical authors and the sage col
umns of our contemporaries for a
simile or metaphor that would bring
home to our readers the magnitude
of the Eucharistic Congress, we find
it not in what our contemporaries
published but in what they did not.
The Eucharistic Congress was so
stupendous that the Catholic Press
convention, held in Detroit just be
fore the Congress, received only
passing notice in the papers even
of many of the editors who were
in attendance. We can imagine
nothing else which would so rele
gate any kind of a press convention
to the publicity background.
But Catholic press conventions,
like the Catholic press itself and like
a good man, cannot be kept down.
In point of attendance and especial
ly from the standpoint of helpful
ness, the 1926 convention stands at
least in the very first rank of those
gatherings of the Association with
which we are familiar. The papers
read were rich with valuable sug
gestions; the discussions were no
les effective; optimism prevailed.
The Catholic press has in most
places, it seems, passed the pioneer
ing stage.
Monsignor Doyle, Chancellor of
the Diocese of Detroit, in the ab
sence of Bishop Gallagher,, who had
left for the Eucharistic Congress,
welcomed the convention' in the
name of the Diocese, and Mayor
John W. Smith, whose election last
fall was regarded throughout the
country as a triumph of tolerance
over prejudice, greeted the newspa
permen in the name of the city.
President Patrick Scanlon, manag
ing editor of the Brooklyn Tablet,
presided and delivered an address
in which he emphasized the value
and the necessity of the Catholic
press “to perpetuate, preserve and
propagate those things which are
for the best interests of our coun
try.” Referring to the situation in
Mexico, Mr. Scanlon declared: “If
Mexico had had a sturdy, vigilant
and vigorous Catholic press, the
present condition of persecution in
that country might never have come
to exist.’
Monsignor Doyle and Mayor Smith
both iinprescd upon the editors a
few facts about the greatnesss of
Detroit, which now claims, and no
doubt not without warrant, the dis
tinction of being the third largest
city in the United Staes. They and
Editor Anthony Beck of the Michi
gan Catholic are so enthusiastic
about Detroit that a storv in the
other direction can do no harm.
Editor Benedict Elder of the Louis
ville Record, his brother, Father
Elder of Toledo, and another friend
were driving from Toledo to De
troit. The speedometer told them
they should have reached Detroit if
(Continued on page 7)