The War Upon Religion / Being an Account of the Rise and Progress of Anti-Christianism in Europe

by Francis A. Cunningham

This attempt of the Government to stir up a conflict with the Holy See was further accentuated by the suppression of the salaries of eleven bishops; and by the reduction, without any reasonable motive, of the budget of worship in 1904.

Two other cases which, provoked by the Government, served as a pretext for urgent separation were the affairs of the Bishops of Laval and Dijon. I prefer to use in its relation the words of M. Faguet as found in his work "l'Anticlericalism." "Two bishops, M. Gay, bishop of Laval, and M. Le Nordez, bishop of Dijon, were agreeable to the French Government and suspected, either for their private conduct, or for their administration, by the Curia. M. Le Nordez was advised by Rome to resign his functions. The Roman letter was turned over by the bishop to the French Government, which protested to the Vatican, claiming that, according to the Concordat, the nominations of French bishops ought to be made by the French Government, and only the canonical institution of them was reserved to the Holy See, that their revocations ought to follow the same law as their nominations, and hence, that the Holy See had not the right to depose a French bishop. Exactly the same procedure was followed with regard to M. Gay, and exactly the same protests were made by the French Government in his case. At the same time the French Government commanded M. Gay and M. Le Nordez not to quit their posts. The Roman Under-Secretary of State answered that the deposition of a bishop was one thing, and the notice given to a bishop that he must resign temporally his functions in order to go before the Roman Curia to justify himself, was another; that such notifications belonged of right to the Holy See to which the bishops by it canonically instituted were responsible."

"The French Government was headstrong, rushed blindly into the affair, recalled its ambassador, and gave his passports to the Nuncio. War was declared."

"The two bishops, who were obliged to choose between their obedience to the French Government and their loyalty to the Holy See, decided for the latter. They set out furtively for Rome, submitted to the Curia, and resigned their French Sees."

"M. Combes saw in all this motives sufficient, not only to break all relations with the Holy See, but still more to denounce the Concordat and to pronounce for the separation of Church and State, at the same time formally casting—as he had done a score of times—all responsibility for these grave measures upon the Pontifical Government."

The anti-clericals were determined to abuse the patience of the Holy See until it should finally be driven into an action upon which the French Government might seize as a final pretext for a rupture. Already Pope Leo XIII. had pointed out such intentions during his lifetime. In a Letter to the Clergy and Catholics of France, February 16, 1902, he thus wrote: "For them, separation signifies the negation of the very existence of the Church. They make, however, a reservation which might be formulated thus: 'As soon as the Church, utilizing the resources which the common law allows to even the least of Frenchmen, will be able, by redoubling her native activities, to make her labors fruitful, the State will and must intervene to put the French Catholics outside the common law itself.' In a word, the ideal of these men is nothing less than a return to paganism; the State will recognize the Church only when it wishes to persecute her."

This great Pope had, by the end of his life, exhausted every means of condescension and delicacy towards the French Government; but his efforts were doomed to failure before the hatred and bad faith of his enemies, and he began at length to feel that the time had come when he should enter a firm and dignified protest.

Pope Pius X. upon his accession was called upon to behold the accelerated progress of official persecution; he began to recognize the utter uselessness of even the most legitimate claims, and he hastened to express his sorrow and indignation for the continuous violation of human rights. On March 19, 1904, on the occasion of his name-day, he addressed the Sacred College upon the subject: "We are profoundly saddened," he said, "by the measures already adopted, and by others on the way to adoption in the legislative houses against the religious congregations which form in this country, by their admirable works of Christian charity and education, a glory not less for the Church than for the fatherland. They intend to go farther still, when they prevent and defend a project having for its end the interdiction of all teaching to the members of religious institutes even authorized, the suppression of approved institutes and the liquidation of their property. We deplore and strongly censure such harshness so essentially contrary to liberty as it is understood, so essentially opposed to the fundamental laws of the land, to the inherent rights of the Catholic Church, and to the rules of civilization itself, which forbid the persecution of peaceful citizens. To this end we cannot dispense Ourselves from expressing Our sorrow over the measures adopted of deferring to the Council of State, as abusive, the respectful letters addressed to the first magistrate of the Republic by many well deserving pastors, among whom are three members of the Sacred College, the August Senate of the Apostolic See, as if it could be a crime to address the chief of the State to call his attention to subjects intimately connected with the most imperious duties of conscience, and with the common weal."

The solicitude of the Holy Father, however, only served to increase the venom of his foes. Toward the end of April, 1904, M. Loubet, President of the French Republic, visited Rome, and contrary to the spirit of the Concordat and the rules regulating the relations of the Holy See and the French Government, went immediately to the Quirinal to pay his respects to the Italian king. The Holy See considered this visit of M. Loubet "as a very grave offense against its dignity and rights. At the same time, while uttering in the face of the French Government an energetic and formal protest against the offense thus suffered, it sent in analogous terms by means of its foreign representatives, an account of its action to the governments of all the other States with which the Holy See held direct relations." The Pontifical note declared that "a head of a Catholic nation inflicts a grave offense against the Sovereign Pontiff in coming to give homage at Rome, not to the Pontifical See but to him who contrary to all right usurps his civil sovereignty." The "note" goes on to remark that the offense is all the greater coming from the "first magistrate of the French Republic, presiding over a nation which is bound by the most intimate traditional relations with the Roman pontificate, enjoys in virtue of a bilateral contract with the Holy See certain signal privileges and a large representation in the Sacred College, and possesses by a singular favor the protectorate of Catholic interests in the Orient." It goes on, moreover, to state that this visit of M. Loubet was "sought intentionally by the Italian Government for the purpose of enfeebling the rights of the Holy See," and it concludes by declaring that "the Sovereign Pontiff makes these most formal and explicit protests to the end that so afflicting an action, (as that of M. Loubet) might not constitute a precedent."

On the receipt of this protest the French Government gave the Holy See to understand that it rejected the note in its form and in its substance. The anti-clerical journals went even farther than this, publishing not only the Pope's answer to French Government, but also the note which had been sent to the other Catholic Powers. The intention of such publication being to stir up the rancor of all who were moved by hostility to the Holy See.