What Kolping did for young mechanics must, with suitable modifications, be now done for those of both sexes occupied in factories and other such establishments. This is the most important step that can be taken by Catholics, to solve certain social questions, and which can be solved only on Catholic principles. Indeed, the greatest social danger of the age is the dechristianization and demoralization of the laboring classes of mechanics and the employees in manufacturing establishments. This dechristianization and demoralization are, to a great extent, the cause of the wretchedness of these classes, and make that wretchedness, even under the most favorable circumstances, incurable. What enormous dimensions has this evil assumed under the, in part at least, so unnatural, social, and economic relations which modern liberal political economy has brought about! But even the evils resulting from this condition of affairs might be healed, if the laboring classes could be restored to Christianity. The Society of Young Mechanics, founded by Kolping, demonstrates that, even under the most unfavorable circumstances, the laboring classes can be redeemed from evil and reclaimed to right, provided they can be made to enter the atmosphere of Christianity in which the members of these societies live. Let us work unanimously and for the same object, and we shall see the number of Christian laborers increase. We shall see them living more and more in one another, associating with one another, and being strengthened by that association. When we have such men, and not before, it will be possible to make those associations really useful in the improvement of the material condition of the laboring classes. So long, indeed, as the laboring classes themselves remain unchristian and immoral, it will be impossible to do anything for their material improvement; for they will never be satisfied. Only by strengthening the spirit of Christianity in all classes of society can legislation itself be made Christian, and it will become Christian just in proportion as the several classes of society become Christian.
Let us now examine in brief the most important movements which the general assembly of this year has initiated toward the establishing of Catholic societies.
For a number of years, the principal subject that has engaged one section of the Catholic Congress is the Christian solution of the so-called social question. Through the efforts of the assembly, the question has been fairly brought before the clergy and the laity. The session of this year has, under this head, recommended the establishment of Christian social associations, the raising of helping funds, the encouragement of appropriate literature, the circulation of the Christian Social Journal, and the erection of dwellings for the laboring classes. They have pointed out how important it is to study on every hand the condition of the laboring classes, in order to discover the principles on which we must proceed, in order to legislate concerning labor and the laboring classes in a just and Christian manner.
The general assembly has, moreover, recommended the Catholic missionary associations in the most emphatic manner. Among these, the first place belongs to the Society of St. Francis Xavier for Foreign Missions, and the Society of St. Boniface.
Considering the terrible blows that have fallen upon France and upon Rome, it has become our duty to redouble our efforts in behalf of the missions to foreign parts, and in behalf of the Society of St. Francis Xavier; for on those efforts must depend, in a great measure, the permanency and spread of Catholic missions the world over. Unfortunately, the Society of St. Francis Xavier has gone backward rather than forward, in Germany, during the last ten years. In many places it has ceded to other societies. And yet it should not be so. The Society of St. Francis Xavier is and must remain the first and most important of all missionary associations. It embraces the missions to all parts of the world, and they all look to it for support. Even Germany has been helped by it more than by any other association; and now, although the Society of St. Boniface has extended so widely, it cannot be dispensed with. Therefore it is that all Catholics, and, above all, the clergy, who are always in all matters pertaining to Christianity the divinely appointed leaders of the people, should take the deepest interest in the Society of St. Francis Xavier. The Society of St. Boniface will suffer nothing from this. On the contrary, the more the Catholic spirit is strengthened, the more will this and every other Catholic society thrive. As truly as the church embraces the whole world, so truly can we not be real Catholics if we feel an interest only in the missions of our own country, but none in the missions to other parts of the world.
True it is that charity demands us to look first to the wants of those who are our nearest neighbors. And on this account the Society of St. Boniface cannot be too strongly recommended to our benevolence. The general meeting has done its duty in this matter. It has recommended the society in very earnest terms.
Besides these great societies, there are other smaller ones with special objects of charity in view—smaller, but by no means unimportant. The Society of the Holy Sepulchre is, independently of its religious object, the most powerful auxiliary of the missions in the East. The Society of St. Joseph is doing the work of the Society of St. Boniface among the large and exposed Catholic German population in large and foreign cities, and especially such cosmopolitan cities as Paris and London.
A work of the highest importance is to care for the emigrants to America. Here it is possible to do a great deal with little means. The Committee on Emigration, presided over by Prince von Isenburg, has placed its cards of recommendation at the disposal of all parish priests, in order that emigrants presenting those cards to the agents of the Catholic Emigration Society in America may receive proper advice and direction in their new homes, and—who would have imagined it?—those cards of recommendation have been used much less than one might rightfully expect.
How great is sometimes our ignorance or indifference concerning the interests of religion! It was, certainly, only right that the general assembly of this year should have approved the founding of an association, that of the Archangel Raphael, whose sole object it is, besides the saying of a few prayers for the success of this movement in behalf of the emigrants, to defray the heavy expenses of the same, and thus to relieve the president of the committee of that charge. We hear many exclaim just here, We have too many associations, too many meetings! We know very well that, when societies increase beyond measure, even when those societies are benevolent ones, there may be danger. But that there may be danger is no reason why we should not encourage the organization of such societies when they may be necessary or useful. We do not, however, wish to blame the taking of steps to prevent too great a competition of societies having charitable or other objects in view.
The Catholic Congress this year could not well help—as, indeed, all those which preceded it did—considering the school question. There can be no question that the anti-Christian party in the state is straining every nerve to do away, by means of legislation, with the right of Catholic parents to a Catholic education of their children in Catholic schools—with the right of the church to instruct her people in a Catholic manner, and to found institutions for that purpose. The members of the assembly spoke on these matters in no ambiguous terms, and took, besides, into consideration what they should do in case the state, siding with the liberalism of the day, should banish the Catholic religion, the Catholic Church, from the schools of the nation. Should this happen, there was nothing left but to appeal to the consciences of parents. It then became the duty of bishops to tell their people that it was not allowed them to send their children to unchristian schools. Liberty of education must be defended to the utmost, and every sacrifice made in order to give Catholic children opportunities for a Catholic education from the primary schools to the university. But the impression is not hereby intended to be conveyed that in this Catholics see the salvation of the church, of her children, and of the nation. No; they will always remind princes and states that it is their solemn duty to govern a Christian people in a Christian manner, and, leaving out of consideration the sacredness of the foundations and the right of the church to teach, to give their Catholic subjects Catholic schools—schools standing in proper relations with the church.