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

by Francis A. Cunningham

To the most farseeing Catholics of the country it had long been evident that there was need of a strong organization of Catholic political forces. Before the Franco Prussian war no such distinctive organization existed. At the Reichstag of Northern Germany the Catholics were not grouped together, and at the Prussian Landtag they formed only an inconsiderable minority. There appeared to be no need of concerted action in the political field since peace and security seemed fully assured. The schools were Christian, the religious Orders performed their benevolent actions freely and unimpeded, the clergy was respected and honored. Nothing being attacked, there was nothing to defend. The Catholic deputies could enroll their names in any party they chose to favor. Thus it was that when the time of danger came they were scattered on every side.

After the war, however, Malincrodt, with some of his friends, brought the Catholic members together, and elaborated a manifesto which served as a platform for the voters of the country, according to which Catholics were asked to cast their votes only for such candidates as would pledge themselves to enter the new Catholic party and support its principles. In the elections of March 3, 1871, the advice of these leaders brought sixty-seven Catholic representatives to the Chamber, a number that increased as the Kulturkampf progressed.

The new party took the name of the "Centre," and on March 27 affirmed its existence by publishing its programme. At the head of this document was written its motto: "Justice, the basis of Governments." The chiefs of the party, Savigny, Windthorst, Malincrodt, Peter Reichensperger, Prince Loëwenstein, and Freitag, were appointed a committee of direction for the party and empowered to act for the furtherance of its interests. The party thus constituted took for its permanent devise the words: "For truth, justice and liberty," and the Catholic deputies pledged themselves to defend these three causes with all the energy of their will and intelligence. They demanded, moreover, in the members of the party qualities worthy of its great purposes; no candidate might place his name on their list except such as were without fear and without reproach. For the interests of religion were in danger; and could they be defended efficaciously by men who were not themselves living in conformity with that religion? Every inconsistency of behavior would naturally be taken advantage of by the enemy and made the basis of scandal, and hence, as it was necessary not to give an opportunity for criticism, the party bound itself to a platform of moral integrity and austerity. A Catholic deputy guilty of having engaged in a duel contrary to the laws of the Church, could not be admitted. Even the stain of imputation, however undeserved, provided it gained popular credence, could debar one from its numbers. And thus for the thirty years of its existence not one of its members, as far as is known, has cast dishonor upon the standard thus raised by its leaders. It is because of this high moral standard, this unflinching loyalty to the Church in all her endeavors, that the Centre was enabled to stand uncowed and unconquered throughout the long war that followed its inception.

The new Centre party was called into action almost from the day of its birth. The first Reichstag of the German Empire met on March 21, 1871. In his speech from the throne the Emperor solemnly declared that the new Empire was to be "the citadel of the peace of Europe." The Reichstag voted an address in answer to the Emperor's speech, which, while containing a sentiment of greeting and congratulation to the sovereign, was at the same time, to define the attitude of Germany with regard to European questions of the day. The Catholic people still remembered the promises formulated at Versailles on November 8, 1870, and confirmed at the beginning of 1871, and accordingly had reason to hope that Germany would make use of her diplomatic intervention in favor of Pope Pius IX., despoiled by his enemies and imprisoned in the Vatican. This hope was expressed in a resolution formulated by the Centre and proposed for the acceptation of the Reichstag. But the Liberal party, at the instigation of Bennigsen, repulsed the proposal of the Centre as a clerical intrigue, and voted that "Germany, without being influenced either by sympathy or antipathy, would permit every nation to attain its unity in its own way, and leave to each State the choice of the form of government which that State might consider best." This attitude of the new Government was thus a refusal to support the Holy See and an official recognition of the claims of Victor Emmanuel and his followers.

It was an act, moreover, which placed the Centre party in a very compromising position, for in refusing to vote the address containing such an article they would lay themselves open to the charge of disloyalty and disrespect toward the sovereign, while in case they should vote for it, they would thereby approve of the iniquitous spoliation of the Papal States and the indignities heaped upon the Holy Father. There was no hesitation, however, in the action of the Centre. While faithful to their religious principles, and at the same time loyally devoted to their Fatherland, they refused to vote the obnoxious article. As was expected, their action drew upon them the envenomed hatred of all parties, in months they were greeted as traitors, renegades, and the "ultramontaine party."

The resolution of Bennigsen was voted on March 30, 1871, by a majority of 150. It was but the prelude of open hostilities. On April 1, 3 and 4, a discussion upon the Constitution was in progress, and Peter Reichensperger, of the Centre, endeavored to conserve in the new document the religious liberties guaranteed by the Constitution of 1850, with its consequences of freedom of worship and freedom of association. Under the leadership of Lasker, Treitschke and Blankenberg, the Liberals again repulsed the claims of the Catholic despite the fervid and logical eloquence of Bishop Ketteler. By a vote of 223 to 59 these liberties were expunged from the Constitution, and at its reading one of the Liberals, Marquard, remarked: "We have declared war upon Ultramontainism, and we will carry it to a finish."

The efforts of the Centre, however, although meeting with repulse in their first appearances, were yet indicative of a power with which the Liberal party would have to reckon. Hence it was considered necessary to effect its ruin in order that the principles of State absolution should acquire the domination to which it aspired. To effect this object, Bismarck made use of a stratagem entirely in accord with his usual dishonesty and lack of scruple. His plan was no other than to throw discredit upon the Centre attack in the eyes of the Catholic people. He had already misrepresented the Centre before the Holy See as a source of trouble for the Church in the Empire, and he strove to induce the Holy See to formally disavow the operations of the Centre. Not being able to obtain such a disavowal, he pretended that he had actually obtained it. One of the Catholic members, Count Frankenberg, was deceived by the assurances of the Chancellor, and abandoned the party, on May 17, 1871, without giving any apparent reason. Three days later Malincrodt, certain of the trickery of Bismarck, published a formal protest against such an unworthy manoeuvre. Frankenberg, beginning to doubt, asked of Bismarck an explanation, and was assured that "the interview of which you have spoken between Count Tauffkirchen and the Cardinal Secretary of State will hardly be revoked. The Centre party has been disapproved. This disapprobation does not surprise me after the evidences of satisfaction and the expressions of entire confidence which His Majesty, the King, has received from His Holiness, the Pope, on the occasion of the re-establishment of the German Empire." So categorical an avowal at first threw the Catholics into a state of consternation, but Bishop Ketteler, of Mentz, feeling that something was wrong, wrote to Cardinal Antonelli, who at once, on June 5, sent a solemn denial of the interview, which was published as an answer to the declaration of Bismarck.

The chagrin caused by this exposure found its vent in the non-Catholic journals of the time, stigmatizing in the broadest terms the loyalty of Catholics. Bismarck's own newspaper, the Gazette of the Cross, called all Prussia to arms against the Centre and Ultramontainism, those internal enemies who must be punished as were the Austrians and the French "for it is time to take up again the work of the Reformation, and to assure the supreme victory of Germanism over Romanism." In accordance with these sentiments the friends of Bismarck set to work with open aggressions. On July 8, 1871, a royal ordinance suppressed the Catholic section of the Ministry of Worship, which had been founded by Frederick William IV. in 1841, to give the Catholics an opportunity of presenting their needs and claims before the Government. The Catholic population was thus shut out from any officially favorable recognition.

At the same time Bismarck hastened to acts whereby the free action of the German bishops were nullified at the caprice of the State. There was at the time, in the Gymnasium of Brauensberg, a certain teacher of Christian doctrine, named Wollmann, who had undertaken to speak openly in opposition to the dogma of Papal Infallibility, and thus incurred the imputation of heresy, together with a director of the Normal School, one Freibel, a member of the Old Catholic sect. Bishop Krementz, of Ermland, after vain endeavors to bring him to a sense of his errors, excommunicated him and his companion, and then reported his action to the Minister of Worship, von Muhler, claiming that an excommunicated heretic should not be permitted to teach in a Catholic school. The Minister refused to remove the objectionable teacher (June 29, 1871), declaring that the dogma of Infallibility in no way affected the relations of Church and State. When, on July 9, following, Bishop Krementz protested in so just and logical a manner that none of the official journals dared to report his words, the Ministry replied by threatening to expel any student of the Gymnasium who should refuse to attend the lessons of Wollmann.

The persecution proceeded from day to day. On November 23, 1871, the Bavarian Minister, von Lutz, presented before the Reichstag a law entitled "for abuse of the pulpit," the "Kanzel-paragraph," which went into vigor on December 10, 1871, and which was expressed in the following terms: "Any ecclesiastic or official of the Church, who during the exercise, or on the occasion of the exercise of his ministry, be it in the church in presence of the crowd, or in any place set apart for religious gatherings, shall, before several persons take as the theme of his discussions affairs relating to the domain of the State, in such a manner as to jeopardize the public tranquility, shall be punished by imprisonment the duration of which can be extended to two years."