Letters From Rome on the Council

The members of the Court of Rome vie with one another in assurances that perfect freedom will be left to the Bishops in the grand question of the proclamation of the new dogma of Papal Infallibility. This is confidently asserted by those Germans who are more deeply initiated into the views of the Curia, such as the Jesuits Franzelin, Schrader, and Kleutgen. And above all, Bishop Fessler, the Secretary of the Council and favourite of the Curia, who was the first among the Bishops to declare that it was the main business of the Council to formulate and proclaim the new dogma, takes especial pains to convince the Bishops that the Pope has no intention of bringing the subject before them himself. He admits that the preparatory Commission has discussed this most important and comprehensive of all doctrines, and has almost unanimously decided it to be both true and opportune; and that their reporter has shown conclusively, that considering the boundless devotion to Rome of the present episcopate (at least the majority of them), no more favourable moment could be chosen for enriching the Church with this new and fundamental article of faith.

This is now their watchword. All the initiated repeat it, and some episcopal optimists try to persuade themselves and others that the danger is really past, and the scheme abandoned for this time. But the truth is this: the authorities know well enough that the absolutists among the Bishops – all those who hope to strengthen their dominion and extend it over secular matters by means of Papal Infallibility – are both numerous and organized, and only await the intimation that the right moment has arrived to come forward themselves with a motion powerfully supported. To begin with the Germans, there is the Bishop of Paderborn, whose Jesuit theologian, Roh, says that, precisely because Papal Infallibility is called in question by Bishops like Dupanloup and Maret, the Council must define it, to make any repetition of this atrocity impossible for the future. Then there are the Bishops of Regensburg, Würzburg, St. Pölten, and Gratz, the Belgian and English Prelates, and those of French Switzerland, among whom Mermillod rivals Manning in his fanatical zeal for the new dogma; the Spanish Prelates – men selected for promotion by Queen Isabella and the nuncio at Madrid, simply for their thorough-paced ultramontanism – pure absolutists in Church and State, who would gladly see the new dogma ready-made at once, but have to be restrained for a while. To these must be added such French Prelates as Plantier of Nîmes, Pie of Poitiers, the Bishops of Laval and Montauban, and others. One knows least of the votes of the Italian and United States Bishops, who, like the Irish, will probably be divided. In any case the Court party can count on a considerable majority in favour of the new dogma.

Of course the opposite party, who wish to stave it off, is strong and numerous. To it belong the majority of the German and Austrian, as well as the Bohemian and Hungarian Prelates, and among the French, the Archbishops of Paris, Rheims, and Avignon, the Bishops of Marseilles, Grenoble, Orleans, Chalons, and many more. And on the point of the time being inopportune for defining the Infallibilist dogma, a portion of the “old Papal guard,” – viz., the Italian Bishops – will join them, not to speak of American and Irish Prelates.

But – and in this lies their weakness – they are only held together by a very loose bond. The one point they are agreed upon is that the promulgation of the new dogma will cause great embarrassments to the Church and to themselves personally, and involve them in all sorts of conflicts. On the main question, whether this substitution of an infallible man for an infallible Church is true, and attested by Scripture and Tradition, they are themselves divided. If the confidants of the Curia understand how to insert the wedge into this split, and drive it home, they may perhaps contrive to break up the whole Opposition, and carry through, by an imposing and apparently almost unanimous vote, this Alpha and Omega of ultramontanism, in which all their wishes and hopes are concentrated. Meanwhile no stone will be left unturned, and very various methods will be applied, and arguments used, in working upon different Bishops. The earnest desire of the Holy Father will be urged on some soft-hearted Prelates; they will be told that the only way the Council can rejoice his heart amid his bitter trials, and brighten the evening of his life, is by freely offering him that crown of personal infallibility which former Popes have striven for, but never obtained. To others it will be intimated that the Council itself must look like a play with the chief figure left out, or an abortion, if the Syllabus and Infallibility are not made into dogmas, for there is no other question important enough to justify collecting 500 Bishops from five quarters of the world. Those who agree with the doctrine, but shrink for the present from the unpleasant consequences it might entail upon them, will be told, “Now, or perhaps never.” With freedom of the press established everywhere, it will be impossible much longer to keep the poison of historical criticism, so especially rife in Germany, out of the theological schools and seminaries, and so perhaps the next generation of clergy will not believe so absolutely in Papal Infallibility as the clergy in many countries do now, and then the new dogma will come at an unseasonable time, and encounter powerful opposition. Besides, it is best to lose no time in putting the iron bar of the new dogma across the way, for then all historical facts that witness against Infallibility, all results of criticism and investigation, all appeals to the forgeries and fictions which helped to build up the edifice, are once for all got rid of and destroyed, at least within the Church. No Catholic will any longer venture to appeal to them, and if he is an historical student, he will only be able to console himself by saying, Credo, quia absurdum. The dogma has triumphed over history, as Manning has so admirably explained in his last Pastoral.

Their favourite argument is the common one about increasing the strength and security of the coercive power of the Church. The Bishops are told that the personal infallibility of the Pope will make not only him but them, his delegates and plenipotentiaries, much more powerful, and that under its shadow they will rule with a stronger hand, for resistance will, in most cases, be blasphemy against the Holy Ghost, speaking through the Pope and his chosen instruments. Who, for instance, would any longer dare to defend a book condemned by the Congregation of the Index, after it had become infallible? On the other hand, the Bishops have their scruples, and some of them may be heard saying that this would be a poor consolation for losing half their episcopal authority, and that it is hard to ask them to degrade themselves, and renounce their former dignity as the supreme tribunal of faith, by making the Pope infallible. It might not be pleasant to return home from the Council with the consciousness of having themselves abdicated at Rome the best, and what has hitherto been held in the Church the highest, part of their authority, and burned it as a holocaust on the altar of Papal autocracy. The rôle of a Papal courtier, however convenient at Rome, has its dark side north of the Alps.

Already many symptoms of uneasiness betray themselves. Pius ix. said the other day to a German Prince of the Church, who formerly gave his opinion against the Immaculate Conception, and has now again pronounced openly against the Infallibilist dogma, Ce dogme de l'infaillibilité passera, comme l'autre, malgré vous. On the other hand, the Regolamento has excited great discontent, for it unmistakeably indicates the design of giving the Pope the decision, and making the Bishops only consultors. Had the assembly been in some degree prepared for it, and had time allowed them for coming to an understanding, there would certainly have been opposition to it. But the heads of the French episcopate have only just come together, and no attempt even has been made to bring the German and French Bishops into communication with each other. And a feature of Roman policy about the Council, now first introduced, is not exactly calculated to promote confidence and a happy expectation of the prosperous results of the Synod. I mean the rigid secrecy. According to the last directions, all, bishops and theologians, are to maintain the strictest secrecy about everything, and the preliminary labours, as is well known, had to be carried on under the seal of secrecy of the Holy Office (the Inquisition). Nothing was communicated to the Bishops themselves, who came to Rome in complete ignorance of what they were to vote about – a procedure without any precedent in Church history. It really seems sometimes as if the object was to turn the Church topsy-turvy, and take pleasure in doing exactly the contrary to what the Church of earlier ages did when nearer her original foundation. Formerly the idea of a Council was associated with the notion of the fullest publicity, and the common participation of all the faithful; the deliberations were conducted with open doors, and all were admitted who wished to hear them, – for from the beginning all secrecy was strange and unnatural to the Church, which was distinguished from heathenism in the very point of neither having nor tolerating any esoteric doctrine or secret compact. But the Roman prelatura too shares the Italian predilection for making mysteries, – as evidenced in the number of secret societies in the Peninsula, – and then the Jesuits of the Civiltà, and their French and German copyists, had so solemnly promised that the Council would provide in its decrees a sure and effective remedy for humanity, sorely diseased as it is, and threatened with destruction. As yet we have waited in vain for any intelligible intimation of what this panacea is to be. Beyond Papal Infallibility and the Syllabus, nothing has transpired. Were the curtain to be drawn back at the beginning, and the secret betrayed, – that the much lauded panacea is only moonshine, and that the Council is not in a position to prescribe any other medicine to the patient named mankind than the usual and well-known remedies of faith, hope, and charity – the discord, already growing, would be still further increased. It is well therefore to lay the finger on the lips.

Meantime the Pope has united the most thorough-paced Infallibilists, Manning, Plantier of Nîmes, Pie of Poitiers, Mermillod of Geneva, and Deschamps of Mechlin, on a Committee said to be intrusted with the discussion of very important questions. Manning appears to be recognised as their leader by all the adherents of the new dogma, and Mermillod strongly supports him. Cardinal Pitra, the French Benedictine formerly intrusted with a mission, which proved unsuccessful, to the Archbishop of Rouen, Cardinal Bonnechose, has lately tried the same plan with the German Bishops. He began by describing the Bishop of Orleans as a mischievous teacher of error, and was obliged to hear, much to his surprise, that these German Bishops quite agreed with Dupanloup, and the Hungarians with the Germans. Thus all have taken their side, or will do so in the next few days. All the Spanish, Belgian, and English17 Bishops, the majority of the Italians, and a considerable number of the French, have ranged themselves under the banner of the new dogma. They all declare that it must now be decreed that every one, without exception, must inwardly believe and outwardly confess Papal Infallibility on pain of damnation; and all the more so, since Pius himself has now abandoned the reserved attitude he had maintained up to this time in presence of the diplomatists, and openly proclaims, that, being himself profoundly convinced of his own infallibility, he neither can nor will tolerate any further doubt about it in others. And thus the influence of this party is very powerful, and already preponderates; the whole mechanism of the Council, the order of business, the personnel of its officers, in short everything, is substantially in their hands, or will be placed at their disposal. All preparations were made in their interest, and all alternatives were foreseen. That great ecclesiastical polypus, with its thousand feelers and arms, the Jesuit Order, works for it under the earth and on the earth; Mea res agitur is its watchword.

On the other side, ready for the contest, and resolved at least to show fight, stand the German, Bohemian, and Hungarian Bishops, – with the exception, of course, of Martin, Senestrey, Fessler, and some others – and all among the French, American, and Irish Bishops who possess any culture and knowledge. These men still hope to see a portion of the Oriental Bishops – the real ones, not the mere Italian so-called Vicars-Apostolic – join their side, and there is indeed a very general anxiety as to what position the Orientals, especially the Armenians, will take up in reference to the great questions at issue. They would all like to keep the Church free from the millstone of the new dogma intended to be hung about her neck, though very few even among them have a clear perception of the momentous consequences it would entail, in science and literature, in politics, and in the relations of the Catholic Church to other Churches. But the whole party has wind and sun against it, and has to join battle in the most unfavourable position, on slippery soil, and confined to acting on the defensive under the greatest difficulties. The Infallibilists, from the nature of the case, are far clearer and better agreed, both as to end and means, than their adversaries, many of whom do not conceal their predilection for the dogma, though they tremble at the consequences of it. Moreover, many of them will allow themselves to be gained over before long, whether through devotion to Pius ix., or by the threats and enticements the Curia knows so well how to apply, and for which it possesses an inexhaustible treasury to choose from. There is, for instance, the honorary title granted by Rome to about 250 Bishops, solio Pontificio assistens, which seems to the short-sighted only fit for lackeys, but is in fact greatly sought after, and will be most graciously accorded to those who unconditionally surrender themselves. And then there are those manifold concessions out of the rich store of Papal reserved rights, special benedictions, and the like, so that there are always nine out of every ten Bishops who want one at least of these privileges.

We may readily conceive the excitement in the Jesuit camp. After the patient, indefatigable toil of years of seed-time, the harvest-time seems to them to be come at last. Up to 1773, their Order, from its numbers, the cultivation of its members, the influence of its schools and educational establishments, and its compact organization, was unquestionably the most powerful religious corporation, but at the same time was limited and held in check by the influence and powerful position of the other Orders. Augustinians, Carmelites, Minorites, and, above all, Dominicans, were likewise strong, and, moreover, leagued together for harmonious action through their common hatred of the Jesuits, or through the natural desire to escape being mastered by them. Dominicans and Augustinians possessed by long prescription the most influential offices in Rome, so much so indeed that the two Congregations of the Index and the Holy Office were entirely in the hands of the Order of Preachers, to the exclusion of the Jesuits. Since the restoration of the Jesuits this is completely changed, and entirely in their interest. All the ancient Orders are now in decline, above all, in theological importance and influence; they do but vegetate now. Moreover, the Dominicans have been saddled with a General thoroughly devoted to the Jesuits, Jandel, a Frenchman, who is exerting himself to root out in his Order the Thomist doctrines, so unpalatable to the Jesuits. The youngest of the great Orders, the Redemptorists or Liguorians, act – sometimes willingly, sometimes unwillingly – as the serving brothers, road-makers, and labourers for the Jesuits. And hence, now that they enjoy the special favour of the Pope, they have come to acquire a power in Rome which may be called quite unexampled. They have, in fact, become already the legislators and trusted counsellors of the Pope, who sees with their eyes and hears with their ears. To those familiar with the state of things at Rome, it is enough to name Piccirillo. For years past they have implanted and fostered in the mind of Pius ix. the views he now wants to have consecrated into dogmas, and have managed to set aside, and at last reduce to impotence, the influence of wise men, who take a sober view of the condition of the times. When the Dominican Cardinal Guidi, who was then the most distinguished theologian in Rome, freely expressed to the Pope his views about the projected Council and the measures to be brought before it, from that hour he was not only allowed no audience of Pius ix., but was excluded from all share in the preparatory labours of the Council, so that he remained in entire ignorance of the matters to be laid before it. But the Jesuits are also the oracles of many Cardinals, whose votes and opinions are very often ready-made for them in the Gesu. The Congregation of the Index, which they used formerly so often to attack, blame, and accuse of partiality, when their own works were censured by it, is now becoming more and more their own domain, though the chief places are still in the hands of the Dominicans; and this may gradually take place with most of the Congregations in whose hands is centralized the guidance and administration of Church affairs in all countries.

And thus, if Papal Infallibility becomes a dogma, what inevitably awaits us is, that this Infallibility will not merely be worked in certain cases by the counsel and direction of the Jesuits; much more than that. The Jesuits will for the future be the regular stewards of this treasure, and architects of the new dogmas we have to expect. They will stamp the dogmatic coinage and put it into circulation. It is enough to know the earlier history of the Society to know what this means, and what an immense capital of power and influence it will place at their command. “Rulers and subjects” – that will henceforth be the relation between the Jesuits and the theologians of other Orders. Worst of all will be the position of theologians and teachers who belong to no Order. At the mercy of the most contradictory judgments, as is already, e. g., the case in France, constantly exposed to the displeasure of the Jesuits, of the Curia, and of their Bishop or his adviser, and daily threatened in their very existence, how are they to get spirit, perseverance, or zeal for earnest studies, deep researches, and literary activity? Every Jesuit, looking down from the impregnable height of his privileged position, will be able to cry out to the theologians of the secular clergy, “Tu longe sequere et vestigia prorsus adora;” for now is that fulfilled which the Belgian Jesuits demanded 230 years ago in their Imago Societatis Jesu. Their Order is now really, and in the fullest sense, the Urim and Thummim and breastplate of the High Priest – the Pope – who can only then issue an oracular utterance when he has consulted his breastplate, the Jesuit Order.18 Only one thing was still wanting for the salvation of a world redeemed and regenerated once again: the Jesuits must again become the confessors of monarchs restored to absolute power.

It is one of the notes of an age so rich in contradictions that the present General of the Order, Father Beckx, is not in harmony with the proceedings of his spiritual militia. Here, in Rome, he is reported to have said, “In order to recover two fractions of the States of the Church, they are pricking on to a war against the world – but they will lose all.” But for that reason, as is known, he possesses only the outward semblance of Government, while it is really in the hands of a conference. With this the fact seems to be connected that he has appointed for his theologian at the Council the most learned and liberal-minded man of his Order, Father de Buck – a man whose views stand in much the same relation to those of his fellow-Jesuits Perrone, Schrader, and Curli, as the Bishop of Orleans's views to those of the Archbishop of Westminster.

Second Letter

Rome, Dec. 18, 1869.– After the solemn receptions, and the formal opening of the Council, visits, audiences, and homages, the time for serious business has arrived, and the Fathers have emerged from the dim twilight of early synodical dawn into the clear daylight. People have begun to get mutually acquainted, and to question one another. The first chaotic condition of an exceedingly mixed assemblage, some of whose members scarcely understand one another, or not at all, has been succeeded by a sort of division, through the rapprochement and closer combination of men of similar views. As we related before, two great parties of very unequal strength have organized themselves, and the shibboleth which caused this division is the question of Papal Infallibility, which is universally and consistently taken to imply that whoever is resolved to vote for this dogma is also ready to give his vote for all the articles of the Syllabus, and generally for every dogmatic proposition emanating from the Pope.

The Synod is unquestionably the most numerous ever held; never in the early or mediæval Church have 767 persons entitled to vote by their episcopal rank been assembled. It is also the most various in its national representation. Men look with wonder at the number of missionary Bishops from Asia, Africa, and Australia. If one considers the constant complaints of want of funds in the missionary journals, the great distance, the difficulty and expense of the journey, and how much these men are wanted in the ill-organized state of their dioceses, with so few priests, the question occurs, Who bears the cost, and what means were employed to rob so many millions for a long time of their spiritual guides? Meanwhile most of the Bishops are pupils of the Roman Propaganda, and obedient to every hint of its will. And the more the new dogma is combated, the more necessary is the imposing consensus of five quarters of the world – of Negroes, Malays, Chinese, and Hottentots, as well as Italians and Spaniards.

More than two-thirds of the Council are either completely agreed, or at least won over to the necessity of making the personal infallibility of the last 256 Popes, and their future successors, an article of faith now. Since the original design of carrying it by simple acclamation has been given up, Manning has renounced the rôle assigned to him of initiating it. But the Bishops of the Spanish tongue on both sides the ocean – in South America and the Philippine Isles – have declared, in a meeting held in the apartments of their Cardinal, Moreno, that they are ready to propose the dogma. A Roman Cardinal said lately of Bishops of this sort, “If the Pope ordered them to believe and teach four instead of three Persons in the Trinity, they would obey.”

The other party, opposed to the dogma, includes towards 200 Bishops, and this is more than even the most sanguine ventured to hope at first. To it belong the majority of the German, Austrian, and Hungarian Bishops, half the French, all the Portuguese, some Irish, at least half the North American and Canadian, and a considerable number of the Oriental. If the votes were not only counted, but weighed according to the intellectual standard of the voters, the 200 would be far the majority. Among the German Bishops, besides those already named, the two Tyrolese, Gasser and Riccabona, Leonrod Bishop of Eichstadt, and the Vicar of Luxembourg, belong to the Infallibilists. Ketteler of Mayence, half won over by his hosts – he lives in the German College19– half succumbing himself, is said to purpose deserting to the same camp. He, as well as Stahl, Leonrod, and Martin are hampered awkwardly by the Fulda Pastoral, which they subscribed, but when once the knot is loosened or cut, they have only to bring their assent to the new dogma.

It is said in the ruling circles that an opposition of 40 Bishops and under is so small and insignificant in so large a Council that no account need be taken of it. This would be to give up the principle always hitherto maintained, even at Trent, that no decision in points of faith could be issued without the physical or moral unanimity of the Council. But as the dogma in question is one which for the future will make all majorities and minorities of episcopal votes superfluous and valueless, it may very well be that by anticipation, or by virtue of an exception which is now to be made into a rule, the minority should in this case be pronounced non-existent and undeserving of any notice. I hear other curialists say that, as soon as the Opposition is reduced to 40, they, under a sense of their impotence, will give up all resistance, and either quit the field, or come over to the conquering side. And so the present strength of the Opposition must be greatly diminished, and this is being strenuously laboured at. There are plenty of means for the purpose, and as long as there are Bishops who think themselves fortunate if they gain the title of “Domestic Prelate to the Pope,” a gentle pressure or insinuation, the prospect of a privilege, or a robe of distinguished colour, will produce the desired effect on many. Such things act like those insects which bore through the hardest wood. The episcopate of course has still many men to show who are inaccessible to threats or seduction. But we should like to count up at the end of the Council how many have passed unscathed through the fiery ordeal. Meanwhile a confident certainty of victory prevails among the majority. Manning said the other day to an acquaintance of mine, “So sure as I stand here, the dogma of Infallibility will be proclaimed,” and on the other hand, one of the leading Bishops of the Opposition said lately, “I came here with small hopes, and with a feeling of oppression, but I have found everything worse than I expected.” A German priest had been summoned to Rome as theologian of his Order by the General, a Spaniard. At first greeting him the General said that the great end they were all bound to work for was to come to an understanding on the dogma of Papal Infallibility. And when the German professed an opposite opinion, and handed him a work he had written in that sense, the conclusion was soon arrived at: he was sent home at once as useless, and even mischievous. When he was taking leave of certain Bishops, one of them said to him, “I should rejoice if any one recalled me or sent me home; we Bishops have been ordered here to the Council, without being told what we are to deliberate upon, and now that I know it I would gladly turn my back on the Council and on Rome.”