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

by Francis A. Cunningham

The new concordat contained among its articles the following: "The Catholic, Apostolic, Roman religion, will be as in the past, the religion of the State, to the exclusion of all others. The Church shall conserve the rights and prerogatives which belong to her according to divine law and the sacred canons; in public and private institutions, education shall be conformable to the Catholic religion; the bishops in the exercise of their ministry and of their mission shall enjoy that entire liberty demanded by the sacred canons; the Church shall continue to possess, and to acquire new properties, under whatsoever legitimate title; and this her right of possession shall remain inviolable."

ATTEMPT ON THE LIFE OF QUEEN ISABELLA.

The concordat was signed at Rome, by Pope Pius IX., who in the consistory of September 5, 1851, proclaimed its publication in terms of the greatest gratification. But the joy of the Catholic people upon this return to Spain to better sentiments was not long lived. On February 2, 1852, Queen Isabella, as she was speaking on the street with the Papal Nuncio, was attacked by a ruffian, who attempted to plunge a dagger into her side. The would-be assassin was arrested and thrown into prison. He was one of the conspirators under Espartero.

As the unhappy man had once been an ecclesiastic and had apostatized under the fury of the revolutionary propaganda, the revolutionary journals made capital of the fact to cast aspersions on the clergy, declaring that the assassin belonged to the clerical party. The government comprehended that it was necessary to put a restraint upon the press, and in consequence, many journals were compelled to stop publication. At the same time a spirit of conversion began to touch the hearts of the people. Everywhere the missionaries were active, and out of the religious houses the words of new life were heard to echo into the homes, the factories, the army and the navy. The revolutionists began to be alarmed, and set to work to destroy what the preaching of Catholic doctrine had effected.

The Liberals, haters of God and of country, commenced a series of barbarities. With the intention of destroying the monasteries and convents, they set fire to the Jesuit houses in Valladolid, Huesca, Barbastro, Saragossa and Valencia. At Valladolid in one day they burned three convents, and among them the celebrated and magnificent Trinidad. And these same incendiaries when they came into power in Spain two years later, dared to cry out against the barbarities of the Catholic Church.

REVOLUTION OF 1854.

In 1854 the revolution again broke out. Many of Spain's best generals, among them Leopold O'Donnell, went over to the party of rebellion, whose object was the overthrow of the monarchy and the establishment of a republic. The people, misled by a thousand rumors, knew not to whom to turn, but finally took as their leader that Espartero who had already proven himself a danger to Spain, hostile to the Church, and a slave to the secret societies.

On July 18, 1854, the royal palace at Madrid was sacked by the mob, though the Queen succeeded in escaping to safety. Though the Revolution called for a republic, with Espartero at its head, yet that general preferred rather to lead the ministry under royalty, and so contrived to restore Isabella to her throne. Under this second regime of Espartero the Church suffered even more cruelly than before. The agents of the secret societies, which controlled the Cortes, began to demand the revocation of the concordat, the suppression of the religious orders, and a general persecution of the Church. The minister Alonzo set the example by driving out of the Escurial the monks of St. Jerome.

PERSECUTION AND CALUMNY.

To persecution the anti-Christians added calumny against the bishops and clergy of Spain, accusing them of desertion in the time of danger, of abandoning the victims of the cholera. These open falsehoods aided somewhat in stirring up a spirit of hostility even in places where the devotion of the clergy was known to be most heroic. Stories then were circulated of arms hidden in the sanctuary of Loyola; as a consequence, the Jesuits were driven from this shrine, even though it was well known that their only occupation at Loyola was the maintenance of a college for the education of missionaries to Cuba, Porto Rico and the Philippine Islands.