Life of Father Hecker

by Walter Elliott

"Such an exposition of Christianity, the union of the internal with the external notes of credibility, is calculated to produce a more enlightened and intense conviction of its divine truth in the faithful, to stimulate them to a more energetic personal action; and, what is more, it would open the door to many straying but not altogether lost children, for their return to the fold of the Church. The increased action of the Holy Spirit, with a more vigorous co-operation on the part of the faithful, which is in process of realization, will elevate the human personality to an intensity of force and grandeur productive of a new era in the Church and to society; an era difficult for the imagination to grasp, and still more difficult to describe in words, unless we have recourse to the prophetic language of the inspired Scriptures."

It is thus made plain that Father Hecker does not deny the harmony between the devotional spirit and practices prevalent in different ages of the Church; but he calls attention to the fact that the dominant note of one age is not always the same as that in another. And in using the words criterion and test, descriptive of the Church, he would convey their full meaning: not merely a plumb-line for the rising wall but divine accuracy itself made external. His outer criterion is to the inner life what articulate speech is to the human voice.

"The Exposition is nothing else," he writes home, "than a general outline of a movement from without to within; as in the sixteenth century the movement was one from within to without. This was occasioned by the nature of the attack of Protestantism. The Church having with increased [external] agencies protected what was assaulted, can return to her normal course with increased action. I give an indication of the nature of this movement:

"An increased action of the Holy Spirit in the soul in consequence of this greater attention directed to the interior life, and a more perfect explanation of the same. An exposition of the relation of the external to the internal in the Church. The action of the Holy Spirit in the soul and His gifts are the remedies for the evils of our times. The development of the intelligible side of the mysteries of faith, and the intrinsic reasons of the truths of divine revelation. Such a movement will open the door for the return of the Saxon races. The Latin-Celts in relation to the development of the hierarchy, discipline, worship, and æsthetics of the Church are considered. Causes of Protestantism—antagonism and jealousy of races; present persecutions. The Saxon idea of the Catholic Church. Reason for it—they see only the outward and human side of the Church. Return of the Saxons in consequence of the new phase of development—the display of the inward and the divine to their intelligence. The transition of races; in the future the Saxon will supernaturalize the natural, the Latin-Celts will naturalize the supernatural. The plan and suggestions given are the way to escape the extermination of Christianity by the Saxons, and the denial of Christianity by the apostasy of the Latins. The union of these races in the Church, with their civilization and force, is the means of spreading Christianity rapidly over the whole world.

"In the Exposition I follow simply the footsteps of the Church as indicated in her history, in the Encyclicals of Pius IX., and the Vatican Council. The Church is God acting directly on the human race, guiding it to its true destiny, the road of all true progress."

The Exposition, as already said, had been talked to all comers by Father Hecker, and in various parts of Europe, but was put into shape in the autumn of 1874, while he was in the north of Italy. He took it to Rome and offered it to the Propaganda Press. No fault was found with it; many high dignitaries, some of them members of the Congregation of the Sacred Palace, which has charge of the censorship, heartily approved of it and would have it published at once; but at the last moment this was decided by the authorities to be inexpedient. It was then sent to London, and Pickering brought it out anonymously, and it was at once put into French by Mrs. Craven. It was published as a leader in The Catholic World about the same time, and in 1887 formed the first chapter of The Church and the Age, a compilation of Father Hecker's more important later essays.

The Exposition contributes to the solution of the race problem as it affects religion. A glance at Europe shows the radical difference which is symbolized by the terms Transalpine and Cisalpine, Latin and Teutonic. The one group of races most readily clings to the interior virtues of religion, the other to external institutions. The problem is how to reconcile them, how to bring both into unity. Father Hecker believed that the Latin race had crowned its work in the Vatican Council and done it gloriously, and that the time had arrived to invite the Teutonic race to develop its force in the interior life of the Church. There are passages in the following letter which indicate the weight of this racial problem to him, as well as the supernatural earnestness which he brought to the study of it. It serves to explain a remark he once made: "I wrote the Exposition while I was having very many lights about the Holy Ghost—I couldn't help but write it."

"PARIS, June 11, 1874.

"DEAR GEORGE AND JOSEPHINE: There is not much for me to add to my letter of the third of this month. My preparations are made to go to Mayence during the Catholic Assembly, which commences on the fifteenth and lasts three days. There I shall meet several persons whom I am interested in and wish to see. Besides, ecclesiastical affairs in the German Empire are in a very critical state, and this must add to the interest of the Assembly. Meeting, as I frequently do, the leading minds of Europe, enables me to compare views, appreciate difficulties, and hear objections.

"It is just as difficult to get the Celtic [and Latin] mind to conceive and appreciate the internal notes of the Church, and the character of her divine interior life, as it is to get the Teutonic mind to conceive and appreciate the divine external constitution of the Church, the importance, and essential importance, of her authority, discipline, and liturgy. But the weakness of the former, and the persecutions now permitted by Divine Providence to be visited on the latter, are teaching them both the lessons they need to learn. To complete the development of the truth, of the Church, each needs the other; and Divine Providence is shaping things so that in spite of all obstacles, natural and induced, a synthesis of them both is forming in the bosom of the Church. The work is slow but certain, concealed from ordinary observation because divine; but exceedingly beautiful. Underneath all the persecutions, the oppression, the false action, the whole outwardly critical condition of the Church and society, there is an overpowering, counteracting, divine current, leading to an all-embracing, most complete, and triumphant unity in the Church. To see how all things—wicked men as well as the good, for God reigns over all—contribute to this end and are made to serve it, gives peace to the mind, repose to the soul, and excites admiration and adoration of the Divine action in the world.