However, the law of the organization of religious worship enjoined on all the curates and vicars of the canton the oath of obedience to the laws. The Council of State shrunk for a long time from the application of this provision in the rural communes. At length, yielding to the impatience of the “Catholic Superior Council,” it decreed that the oath should be taken on the 4th September by the seventeen curates and the two vicars officiating in the country.
On the appointed day, a large crowd assembled around the entrance of the town-hall. Not a priest summoned presented himself. They, too, were proud to wear the device of Mgr. Lachat: Potius mori quam fœdari!—“Death rather than shame!”
Immediately afterwards, the Council of State pronounced the aforesaid cures vacant, and suppressed the pay of their occupiers from October 31. This measure was communicated to the “Catholic Superior Council,” with the view of its filling the vacancies.
Great was the embarrassment of the latter. As a commencement, it demanded of the Council of State the power of disposing of the country churches from the 31st October. The reply was that it had only to apply to the municipal authorities. It then devised the plan of publishing in the journals, amongst the advertisements, a notice to the effect that “the registry was open at the office of the superior council for the offices of curate and vicar in twenty-two parishes of the canton, which had become vacant in consequence of death, dismissal, and revocation.” When at length it had found a candidate, it resolved to present him to the parish of Grand-Saconnex, one of the nearest to Geneva, and which on that account appeared to it to be ripe for schism. But only thirty-three electors out of one hundred and sixty-six responded to the call. It was less than a third, and the election was abortive in consequence.
Such a check was suggestive. The measure decreed on the 4th September was not put in force, except that the salaries of the faithful curates remained suppressed. But they revenged themselves by annoying the Catholics in every possible way.
We will cite two instances.
An Old Catholic interment having taken place at Hermance, after several provocations, the population threw some stones on the coffin of the defunct. The blame was immediately laid on the curate, and he was expelled from the canton on the pretext that “he troubled the public peace,” said the decree, “by his preachings, and excited hatred of one another among the citizens.” No accusation could be more serious than this. For, indeed, had he been guilty of it, it was before the courts he should have been brought. But all that was wanted then was to punish the parishioners for having, a few days before, given an ill reception to two intruders who had attempted to pervert the village.
The second is a yet sadder incident. One fine day, an Old Catholic inhabitant of Geneva, named Maurice, who lived close to the Old Catholic church, took it into his head to have his infant child baptized by the intruding priest, Marchal, in the Catholic Church of Compesières, used for two communes, Bardonnex and Plan-les-Ouates. On the arrival of the cortége, the mayors of these communes, habited in their scarfs of office, and surrounded by their subordinates, opposed its entry into the church, and forced it to beat a retreat. At the news of this there was great consternation at Geneva.
The whim of M. Maurice was not only a violation of the liberty of religion; it was a wanton provocation, since he belonged to the commune of Geneva, and could have had his child baptized in the church of S. Germain, of which the schism had taken possession. No matter. The Council of State took advantage of the incident, and ordered the mayors of Compesières to keep the parish church open for baptism of the little Maurice. At the same time it ordered thither some squadrons of gendarmes and of carabineers, and, thanks to this display of the public force, a locksmith was able to force open the doors of the sacred edifice. They had it sealed with the borough-seal, and a huge placard was stuck on it, bearing the following inscription: “Property is inviolable.” Before the profanation, a delegate from the communal authorities of Bardonnex and of Plan-les-Ouates had communicated to the invaders a final protest.
Any commentary would be superfluous. We limit ourselves to quoting the following words of the Journal de Genève: “What has passed at Compesières has but too quickly justified the mournful forebodings inspired by the violent policy which is growing from bad to worse in official quarters. We persist in demanding that a stop be put to this sowing the wind at the risk of reaping the whirlwind.” But the object had been achieved. The Catholics had been outraged, and a pretext had been made for dismissing M. de Montfalcon, mayor of Plan-les-Ouates and president of “l’Union des Campagnes.”