Paradoxes of Catholicism | Page 7

passeth
knowledge to which the great Apostle commended his converts. This
then, we are told, is of the very essence of Christianity; this is the
supreme benediction on the peacemakers that they shall be called the
children of God.
Yet, when we turn to Catholicism, we are bidden to see in it not a
gatherer but a scatterer, not the daughter of peace but the mother of
disunion. Is there a single tormented country in Europe to-day, it is
rhetorically demanded, that does not owe at least part of its misery to
the claims of Catholicism? What is it but Catholicism that lies at the
heart of the divided allegiance of France, of the miseries of Portugal,
and of the dissensions of Italy? Look back through history and you will
find the same tale everywhere. What was it that disturbed the politics of

England so often from the twelfth to the fifteenth century, and tore her
in two in the sixteenth, but the determined resistance of an adolescent
nation to the tyranny of Rome? What lay behind the religious wars of
Europe, behind the fires of Smithfield, the rack of Elizabeth, and the
blood of St. Bartholomew's Day but this intolerant and intolerable
religion which would come to no terms even with the most reasonable
of its adversaries? It is impossible, of course, altogether to apportion
blame, to say that in each several instance it was the Catholic that was
the aggressor; but at least it is true to say that it was Catholic principles
that were the occasion and Catholic claims the unhappy cause of all this
incalculable flood of human misery.
How singularly unlike, then, we are told, is this religion of dissension
to the religion of Jesus Christ, of all these dogmatic and disciplinary
claims and assertions to the meekness of the Poor Man of Nazareth! If
true Christianity is anywhere in the world to-day it is not among such
as these that it lies hid; rather it must be sought among the gentle
humanitarians of our own and every country--men who strive for peace
at all cost, men whose principal virtues are those of toleration and
charity, men who, if any, have earned the beatitude of being called the
children of God.
II. We turn to the Life of Jesus Christ from the Life of Catholicism, and
at first indeed it does seem as if the contrast were justified. We cannot
deny our critic's charges; every one of his historical assertions is true: it
is indeed true that Catholicism has been the occasion of more
bloodshedding than has any of the ambitions or jealousies of man.
And it is, further, true that Jesus Christ pronounced this benediction;
that He bade His followers seek after peace, and that He commended
them, in the very climax of His exaltation, to the Peace which He alone
could bestow.
Yet, when we look closer, the case is not so simple. For, first, what was,
as a matter of fact, the direct immediate effect of the Life and
Personality of Jesus Christ upon the society in which He lived but this
very dissension, this very bloodshedding and misery that are charged
against His Church? It was precisely on this account that He was given

into the hands of Pilate. _He stirreth up the people. He makes Himself a
King._ He is a contentious demagogue, a disloyal citizen, a danger to
the Roman Peace.
And indeed there seem to have been excuses for these charges. It was
not the language of a modern "humanitarian," of the modern tolerant
"Christian," that fell from the Divine Lips of Jesus Christ. Go and tell
that fox, He cries of the ruler of His people. _O you whited sepulchres
full of dead men's bones! You vipers! You hypocrites!_ This is the
language He uses to the representatives of Israel's religion. Is this the
kind of talk that we hear from modern leaders of religious thought?
Would such language as this be tolerated for a moment from the
humanitarian Christian pulpits of to-day? Is it possible to imagine more
inflammatory speech, more "unchristian sentiments," as they would be
called to-day, than those words uttered by none other but the Divine
Founder of Christianity? What of that amazing scene when He threw
the furniture about the temple courts?
And as for the effect of such words and methods, our Lord Himself is
quite explicit. "Make no mistake," He cries to the modern humanitarian
who claims alone to represent Him. "Make no mistake. I am not come
to bring peace at any price; there are worse things than war and
bloodshed. I am come to bring not peace but a sword. I am come to
divide families, not to unite them; to rend kingdoms, not to knit them
up; I am