[Footnote 78: Apocalypse iii. 20.]
Is this all, however? For his love is jealous and liberty is not enough; there must be the combat and the sacrifice. What were the desperate conflicts, free though you were, that rendered your decision so difficult and so painful? I may not speak of them. Family, friends, country: I have seen these sacred wounds too near to dare to touch them. I will only say that I was ignorant until now of what it costs even to the mind most perfectly convinced, and to the strongest will, to leave the religion of their mother and of their country!
Ah! why is it that on that noble soil of the United States our church is still, I do not say unknown, but despised, by so many souls? Would to God it were only unknown! A new apostle will invoke upon her shores the God whom Paul invoked before the Areopagus, ignoto Deo, the church which they love in the ideal, without knowing it in its reality; and, free from prejudices, the sober-minded Americans will receive it better than did the frivolous Athenians. But they think they know us, while they see us through such base report that even our name excites disgust and hatred. How much longer must these sectarian misapprehensions continue? and when will God at last command that the walls of division shall be thrown down? At all events, it depends upon us to prepare for that much desired day, by coming together, not with doctrinal concessions, which would be criminal if not chimerical, but by abandoning our respective prejudices before the better known reality, and by the formation of those kindly relations, while esteem and charity could yet unite those whom diversity of beliefs still separate. As for me, this is my most ardent prayer, and as far as I understand and appreciate the situation of religious affairs in this century, this feeling is invested with a quickened and more pressing character. And since, then, the time has come when judgment should begin at the house of God, [Footnote 79] let us Roman Catholics know how to give the example; let us arise resolutely and give a loyal hand to our separated but well-be-loved brethren.
[Footnote 79: "Quoniam tempus est ut incipiat judicium a domo Dei." (i Peter iv. 17.)]
But what do I say? Is it not you, madam, who have come to us first, surmounting obstacles which I cannot recount? You have overcome them not only with the sweat of your brow, but by the blood of your soul; for, as Saint Augustine so truly says, "there is a blood of the soul." And it is this which you have poured out; you have removed by your heroic hands the hewn rocks which shut you in. Like the daughter of Zion, you have made straight your way and have come. [Footnote 80]
[Footnote 80: "Conclusit vias meas lapidibus quadris, semitas meas subvertit." (Lam. iii. 9.)]
Ah! let me welcome you with these words of your own, in which you expressed the inspiration which was your strength: "My love, my beautiful, calls me: I know his voice, and though I am weak and trembling I will come to him."
III.
Let us finish this song of the loving-kindness of God in your soul. Affianced by baptism, even in the bosom of your involuntary errors, espoused by the Eucharist in the integrity of Catholic faith and charity, what remains for you to complete the cycle of divine love and to consummate your life therein, except to become a mother in the apostolate?
Our Lord was speaking one day to the multitude, when he was told that his mother and his brethren were without and had asked for him. Surveying the people with his look of inspiration, he asked, "Who is my mother, and who are my brethren?" Then stretching out his hand over the listening multitude, he said, "Behold my mother and my brethren. For whosoever shall do the will of my Father in heaven, the same is my brother and my mother." [Footnote 81]