Letters From Rome on the Council

Antonelli says that no ambassadors can be admitted, for if it were conceded to the French, it could not be refused to other powers, Austria, Bavaria, or even Prussia. He is quite right there. It has been a main object from the first with this Council to give a striking example of the entire exclusion of the lay element in ecclesiastical deliberations. It is just because the Governments and States are so deeply concerned in the projected decrees, because their rights and laws and their whole future are affected, that they are not to be heard or admitted. In presence of the representative of his Government, many a Bishop would think twice before assenting to a decree flatly contradicting the laws and political principles of his country. And then the admission of ambassadors would break through the mystery, and make the strict silence imposed on the Bishops almost useless. A large number of them, and above all the entire Opposition, would be very glad of this, but for that very reason the ruling powers detest it the more. As a foretaste and practical illustration of what the maxims of the Schema de Ecclesiâ will lead to, when made into dogmas, it is worth while to notice the decision issued by the Pope and his Penitentiary in September 1869, when this Schema had just been drawn up, on the question whether a priest could swear to observe the Austrian Constitution. To take the oath absolutely was forbidden; he can only take it with an express reservation of the laws of the Church, and – which is very significant – he must state publicly that he only takes the oath, even with this reservation, by virtue of papal permission. That is a new and very important step on the road to be trodden with the aid of the Council. Every clergyman is to be reminded, and to remind others, in merely discharging a simple civil obligation, that he is dependent on the Pope in the matter, and may not properly speaking swear civil fealty and obedience to the laws without papal permission, not even in the conditional form which makes the oath itself illusory. This is quite after the mind of the Jesuits, who have always shown a special predilection for the doctrine that every cleric is not a subject and citizen with corresponding rights, but simply a subaltern and servant of the Pope. This is a prologue to the twenty-one Canons of the Schema de Ecclesiâ.

I have just learnt from the Kölner Volkszeitung that the chaplain of a prelate here charges me with a gross falsehood in reference to the words of the Pope. He appeals to the Paris Union, which has the words used by the Pope, “Je suis la voie, la vérité, et la vie,” with the passage inserted by the editor. I had cited the words from the Observateur Catholique of 1866 (p. 357), where they are authenticated by the signature of an ear-witness, MacSheeby, and correspond entirely with the statement of the Union. But in the Monde, which was not in my reach, a totally different version is given, which has no similarity to that authenticated by Roman correspondents in the Union and Observateur, and does not connect the words, “I am the way,” etc., with the Pope at all. It must remain uncertain after this whether the version of the Monde or of the two other journals is the genuine one.

Thirty-Second Letter

Rome, March 28, 1870.– The Bishops who have attacked the new order of business, because it brought into view the possibility of a dogmatic definition being carried without the consensus moraliter unanimis, received the desired answer in no doubtful form at the sitting of Tuesday, the 22d. The measures of the Curia for a month past have been unmistakably contributing more and more to produce a worthy and loyal-hearted attitude among the minority. After long dallying, Rome has brought the secrets of her policy a little too boldly and conspicuously into view. Hardly was the domination of the majority in matters of faith fixed by the stricter regolamento, when the Pope had the proclamation of his own infallibility proposed in the most arrogant form. On this followed the attempt to press it to an immediate decision, and then the determination to admit no ambassadors of the Governments. If these proceedings were not enough to lay bare the perilous nature of the whole situation, the Pope and the zealots of his party supplied the remaining proof, – the former, by his conduct about Falloux, about Montalembert on the day the news of his death arrived, about the Munich theologians in secret consistory, and about the so-called Liberal or “half-Catholics” on every occasion; the latter by their growing impatience about the infallibility definition, and their assurances that there is no real opposition to this dogma, and that, if there was, it could not hold its ground after the promulgation had taken place. And so the opponents of the decree must know at last that they have to deal with a blind and unscrupulous zeal, not with a theological system carefully thought out and placed on an intellectual basis; that the contest has to be carried on against the whole power and influence of the Pope, and not, as had been maintained with transparent hypocrisy, only against the wishes of the noisy and independent party of the Civiltà and its allied journalists. They begin to use more earnest and manlier language, the language of clear apprehension and conscientious conviction. If the comments handed in last week on the Schema de Ecclesiâ, and the protests against any hurrying of the discussion on it, were known to the world, the Catholic Episcopate and the strong reflux current here would appear in a very different light from what might be gathered from the previous course of things. Not a few of these opinions drawn up by the Bishops breathe a truly apostolic spirit, and deal with the Roman proposals in the tone of genuine theology. An influential theologian of a Religious Order has pronounced of one of them, that it exceeds in force and weight the treatise which appeared in Germany last year, Reform of the Church in Her Head and Her Members.69 It has been urged by English prelates that it concerns their honour to resist the promulgation of a dogma, the explicit repudiation of which by the Irish Bishops was an efficacious condition of Catholic Emancipation. The American Protest contains a more threatening warning than the German, and the German is stronger than the French.

After these declarations the attitude of the minority was clearly defined, and invincible by any foe from without. Their contention is, that no right exists in the Church to sanction a dogma against the will and belief of an important portion of the Episcopate, and that only by abandoning any claim to such a right can the Council be regarded as really Œcumenical. To be quite consistent, the minority ought to take no further part in the Council till this point, on the decision of which they rightly hold its authority to depend, is settled; for their protest implied the doubt whether they were taking part in a true or only a seeming Council, whether they were acting in union with the Holy Ghost or co-operating to carry out a gigantic and sacrilegious deception. Yet the words expressly stating this doubt, and making the distinct withdrawal of the theory of voting dogmas by majorities a condition of any further participation in the proceedings, were not adopted into any of the Protests. This implied that the signataries would appear in the next General Congregation, that they refrained from a suspicious attitude, and were unwilling to interpret the ambiguous order of business in malam partem, until facts compelled them to do so. A conflict which might have such incalculable results was to be avoided, till necessity made it a positive duty; and that was not the case as long as a favourable interpretation of the regolamento continued possible.

Thus the minority committed the strategical blunder of postponing a conflict which they saw to be inevitable, and when they could not know whether any more favourable opportunity for entering on it for the benefit of the Church would occur in the future. There is hardly anything doubtful or open to double interpretation in the order of business, when more closely examined. Every Bishop sees quite clearly that it is specially arranged for overcoming the opposition of the minority, and will be used without scruple for that end.70 And who knows how many members of the present Opposition, if once the Curia applies its last lever, will have strength to resist to extremities? how many are ready, by humble submission or by resigning their Sees, to quiet their consciences and sacrifice their flocks to error? There are men among them better fitted for the contest against the principle formally enounced in the revised order of business, than for the contest against infallibility. The Bishop of Mayence, e. g., passes for one of the strongest and most decided opponents of the regolamento, which I mention as a point of great importance at this moment. The resolve of the protesting Bishops, to avoid the threatened conflict at present, can only be justified if another and better opportunity for defending the cause of the Church occurs in the future course of the Council and before any decision is arrived at. Had they been willing, after handing in their protests, to go on quietly joining in the proceedings, without doing anything to give emphasis to the step they had taken, they would in fact have bent under the yoke of the majority. They only needed to keep silent: that implied everything. For it would necessarily be assumed that they had withdrawn or forgotten their protests, and to continue to act upon and submit to the new order of business themselves would imply that they had renounced their resistance to any of its particular details. It was therefore all the more essential for them to let it be clearly known how far their concessions would extend, and what was their final limit. Unless they did this, they would either seem not quite sincere, or would have really accepted the regolamento with its obvious consequences. The Council, the Presidents, the Pope, the expectant Catholic world without, had a right to know their real intentions, and whether they meant to adhere to their declarations. The first voting on the propositions of the Schema de Fide could not fail to decide this point. Thus it became a necessity to put this question of principle in the front at the reopening of the deliberations of the Council.

Meanwhile the concessions of the Presidents and the majority on some points had elicited a more friendly feeling in the Opposition. The discussion on infallibility was postponed, and the first Schema was returned from the Commission with important modifications. Even the shameful treatment of Montalembert could not altogether destroy this conciliatory state of feeling. Ginoulhiac, the learned Bishop of Grenoble, who was to be preconised as Archbishop of Lyons on Monday the 21st, undertook on the 22d to meet the discreet concessions of the infallibilists in a kindred spirit. He was indeed obliged to make his speech on the Tuesday, though he had not been preconised on the day before. The French, who have no Cardinal – for Mathieu's custom is to go away at any critical moment, and he was not then returned – had gladly left to one of the Austrian Cardinals the less pleasing duty of declaring their attitude towards the regolamento. Schwarzenberg did but slightly glance at it in his speech and yet was called to order. Archbishop Kenrick of St. Louis, one of the most imposing figures in the Council, touched on the theme more closely, and dwelt on the office of Bishops as witnesses and judges of faith, in the sense which forms the basis of the opposition of the minority. Lastly, Strossmayer ascended the tribune, and then followed a scene which, for dramatic force and theological significance, almost exceeded anything in the past history of Councils. He began by referring to that passage at the opening of the Schema, where Protestantism is made responsible for modern unbelief – “systematum monstra, mythismi, rationalismi, indifferentismi nomine designata.” He blamed the perversity and injustice of these words, referring to the religious indifference among Catholics which preceded the Reformation, and the horrors of the Revolution, which were caused by godlessness among Catholics, not among Protestants. He added that the able champions of Christian doctrine among the Protestants ought not to be forgotten, to many of whom St. Augustine's words applied, “errant, sed bonâ fide errant;” Catholics had produced no better refutations of the errors enumerated in the Schema than had been written by Protestants, and all Christians were indebted to such men as Leibnitz and Guizot.

Each one of these statements, and the two names, were received with loud murmurs, which at last broke out into a storm of indignation. The President, De Angelis, cried out, “Hicce non est locus laudandi Protestantes.” And he was right, for the Palace of the Inquisition is hardly a hundred paces from the place where he was speaking. Strossmayer exclaimed, in the midst of a great uproar, “That alone can be imposed on the faithful as a dogma, which has a moral unanimity of the Bishops of the Church in its favour.” At these words a frightful tumult arose. Several Bishops sprang from their seats, rushed to the tribune, and shook their fists in the speaker's face. Place, Bishop of Marseilles, one of the boldest of the minority and the first to give in his public adhesion to Dupanloup's Pastoral, cried out, “Ego illum non damno.” Thereupon a shout resounded from all sides, “Omnes, omnes illum damnamus.” The President called Strossmayer to order, but he did not leave the tribune till he had solemnly protested against the violence to which he had been subjected. There was hardly less excitement in the church outside than in the Council Hall. Some thought the Garibaldians had broken in: others, with more presence of mind, thought infallibility had been proclaimed, and these last began shouting “Long live the infallible Pope!” A Bishop of the United States said afterwards, not without a sense of patriotic pride, that he knew now of one assembly still rougher than the Congress of his own country.

This memorable day has already become the subject of myths, and so it is no longer possible to define with certainty how many prelates were hurried into these passionate outbreaks. Some speak of 400, some of 200; others again say that the majority disapproved of the interruption. The excitement was followed next day by a profound stillness, which was not broken even when Haynald and the North American Bishop Whelan said very strong things. It seemed as if a sense of what they owed to the dignity of the Council and a feeling of shame had got the better of those turbulent spirits. But enough has occurred to show the world what spirit prevails here, and what sort of men they are who support infallibilism. That up to this time this Council does not deserve the respect of the Catholic world, is the least point; it is of more importance, that an internal split in the Church is more and more revealing itself. Henceforth it will no longer be possible to throw in the teeth of genuine Catholics their compromising or dishonourable solidarity with error and lies, for this has given place to an open and avowed opposition. On one side stands the small but morally powerful band of those who accept Strossmayer's noble words with head and heart, on the other a crowd of “abject”71 fanatics and sycophants. This division is of supreme significance for the future course of the Council, because it strengthens and consolidates the minority in their harmony and determination, and obliges them to take a further step, as soon as the majority have made it unmistakably clear that they will not acknowledge and respect their claim to prevent a dogmatic definition.

The Presidents, by denouncing Strossmayer's speech but not the interruption of it, as it was their duty to do, gave evidence of an undisguised partiality, and justly incurred the suspicion of sympathizing with the shouters and not with the speaker, and thinking the proclamation of infallibility allowable without the moral unanimity of the Council. Accordingly a categorical demand was sent in to them to declare themselves on this point, and, in case of their giving no answer, another last step is reserved, which will have the nature of an ultimatum and will bring the Œcumenicity of the Vatican Council to a decisive test. And so it may be said that the Bishops of the minority have delayed but not wavered. The moment for a decisive move, which may test the existence of the Council, must come when a dogmatic decree has to be voted on. This crisis seemed to have arrived on Saturday, March 26, when the preamble of the Schema de Fide was to have been voted on. Various amendments had been proposed, one very important one by Bishop Meignan of Chalons, in which the Fathers were designated as definers of the decrees, and another equally important, implicitly containing infallibility, by Dreux-Brézé, Bishop of Moulins. Moreover this preamble contained the obnoxious passages immortalized by the glowing eloquence of Strossmayer. The antagonistic principles seemed to have reached their ultimate point. Votes were to be taken on dogmatic decrees before any agreement had been come to on the necessary conditions of such voting. At the last moment the Presidents resolved to evade the crisis. The very day before the sitting, Friday, March 25, Cardinal Bilio went to the authors of the amendments and persuaded them to withdraw them, and so on Saturday the text of the preamble was brought forward without any amendment. Nor was there any voting on that either, but they passed at once to the discussion on the first chapter of the Schema, in which the Primate of Hungary (Simor) made an adroit and conciliatory speech as advocate of the Commission on Faith. The debate then proceeded. By the eleventh article of the new order of business, every separate part of a Schema must be voted on before the next can come on for discussion.

It was a breach of this rule to pass on straight to the first chapter of the Schema, without having voted on the preamble. The Bishops asked themselves what this meant. Was it intended, by the withdrawal of the amendments and the abandonment of the discussion, to declare the preamble tacitly accepted? Was it intended to correct that objectionable passage? But the wording of the regolamento was too strict to allow of that being done except in the General Congregation. It seemed at any rate as if more prudent counsels had prevailed and it was intended to avert the dreaded contest on the main principle by concessions, so as to pass such decrees as were possible, that they may be unanimously promulgated in the Easter session. Thus time would be gained for loosening the compact phalanx of the Opposition, and at the same time getting it more deeply implicated in a compromising actual acceptance of the new order of business, in its form as well as its spirit. This double danger is always imminent, but in fact the Opposition as yet has suffered no loss.

We are at the end of the fourth month of the Council, and yet they have not dared to put one decree to the vote. The amendments, which were so obnoxious, have disappeared. The passage about unbelief being the offspring of Protestantism, which Strossmayer assailed, will perhaps be corrected, though in an irregular manner. The simple and sanguine spirits among the Opposition Bishops exult over a victory obtained. One of the most famous of them exclaimed, “It is clear the Holy Ghost is guiding the Council.”

Thirty-Third Letter

Rome, March 30, 1870.– Yesterday (the 29th) the first voting in Council took place, on the preamble of the Schema de Fide. As I told you in my last letter, this preamble had been objected to by Strossmayer on account of the passage representing rationalism, indifferentism, the mythical theory of the Bible and unbelief as consequences of Protestantism. Several amendments had been proposed; two of them I have mentioned already, one introduced by Bishop Meignan of Chalons, substituting for a mere approbation of the decree a statement expressly guarding the right of the Episcopate to define, – the other, proposed by Dreux-Brézé, designed to smuggle in the infallibilist doctrine in a form requiring a sharpsighted eye to detect it.72 Many infallibilists had reckoned on the victory of their dogma last week by means of this amendment. The Presidents had got some of the amendments withdrawn on Friday, the 25th, but these two they suffered to remain. They were equally sure that the first would be rejected and the second accepted by the majority; nay they counted on a far larger majority for the passage implying infallibility than for the rejection of Meignan's proposal, and hoped that this occasion would tend to bring to light unmistakably the power and extent of the infallibilist party.

At the beginning of the sitting of Saturday, the 26th, the exact regulations for the method of voting were first read out, and this was repeated a second time to preclude any risk of misapprehension. Yet it was announced immediately afterwards that there would be no voting, and this unexpected change was made during the Session and in presence of the Fathers. There had in fact been a kind of fermentation going on since Tuesday, the 22nd, when Strossmayer's affair occurred. The justice of his criticism on the passage about Protestantism and unbelief had become evident to many; at least fifteen Bishops made representations to the President about it as late as the Friday. According to a very widely-spread report, one of them was the Bishop of Orleans and the other the Bishop of Augsburg. But in spite of this, and of the prospect of a catastrophe, which the union of the Germans made imminent, they seem to have gone into Saturday's sitting firmly resolved not to yield. Yet a last attempt succeeded. After the mass, when all were assembled, a Bishop handed in a paper with a few lines to the Presidents, on which two of them at once left the Hall. Meanwhile the order of the day and the method of voting was read out. On their return the decision was announced; the preamble was withdrawn to be amended. It was an English Bishop whose paper produced such important results.73

On Monday, the 28th, the preamble was distributed in its revised form; Dreux-Brézé's objectionable amendment had disappeared, the passage about Protestantism was altered, and even the style was improved. Primate Simor, speaking in the name of the Commission, had already stated officially that the Bishops were at liberty to subscribe the decrees by definiens subscripsi, i. e., to use the ancient conciliar formula by which the Bishops used to describe themselves as defining the decrees. And thus the principle for which Meignan, Strossmayer, and Whelan had contended, was conceded. In this form and after these concessions the preamble could no longer be opposed.

The strength of the minority has been proved, though in an irregular manner. But obviously this gives an opening to the majority for similarly setting aside the order of business when it is inconvenient for themselves. Beyond a doubt the spirit of conciliation has triumphed over all opposition at the critical moment. And it may be distinctly said that this result was attained, partly through the firm attitude of the minority, partly through the prudent and abundantly justified yielding of the Presidents. By this discreet procedure they have declined all responsibility for the conduct of those who, on Tuesday the 22d, would hear of no objections to that portion of the preamble. And their doing this so decidedly makes their silence on the other matter, which caused such an outbreak, the more surprising, and some explanation of it is all the more necessary.

The amended preamble was then accepted unanimously. But the chapter De Deo Creatore did not pass so easily, though it might have been expected that, at the end of four months, the Bishops would have arrived at some agreement on that point. The main difficulty arose from the tendency again to smuggle in statements favourable to infallibility, and paving the way for its definition by a sidewind. The first paragraph, e. g., opens thus, “Sancta Romana Catholica Ecclesia credit et confitetur unum esse Deum verum et vivum, Creatorem cœli et terræ.” Two amendments were proposed on this: (1.) “Proponitur, ut initio capitis primi simpliciter dicatur, ‘Sancta Catholica Ecclesia credit et confitetur,’ ” etc. (2.) “Proponitur, ut in capite primo verba ‘Romana Catholica Ecclesia’ transferantur, ita ut legatur ‘Catholica atque Romana Ecclesia.’ Sin autem non placuerit Patribus, ut saltem comma interponatur inter verba Romana et Catholica.” There was a great deal of discussion about this word “Romana.” The German Opposition Bishops exhibit a better organization than the French. In spite of the great majority, it was announced that the voting would be only provisional, a “suffragatio provisoria,” and it is probable that the first chapter will be revised in this point, as in several others, before being presented for definitive acceptance.