Communications

...I have been told of factories that have closed down or are working half time or two or three days a week and of others that have been taken over by English firms...

...This question, full of practical consequences, is not answerable by the historian alone...

...Is it not that our spiritual culture (as distinguished for a moment from our piety or our charity, or any other virtue) has not kept pace with our worldy success...

...On the contrary, the history of the relations of the Papacy with ancient Russia, the Russia antedating Peter the Great, suggests the impression that the Popes never looked upon Russia as, for instance, they did upon England under Elizabeth...

...Bernard J. Rothwell...

...From this moment, however, the historian should insist hardily, that on the territory of historical facts, distinction must be made between Russia and Byzantium, and that an attentive study of these facts leads to very different views from those which have hitherto prevailed concerning the situation of Russia from the point of view of union, and I would add, to views more consoling...

...Especially have our Anglican fellow citizens retained a large measure of the real old Catholic tradition of song...

...possibly accumulate a small liturgical library, or at least a bibliography with references to local libraries...

...It, therefore, should command the respect and obedience of every well-disposed citizen, and it should be enforced by every lawful means...

...nevertheless, the tone of your argument with regard to enforcement of the prohibitory amendment to the Constitution appears to be one to which exception is justifiable...

...Possibly...

...There should be no possibility of any misinterpretation of Catholic attitude...

...ARCHBISHOP MANNIX ON IRELAND Dorchester Centre, Mass...

...In the public statements of His Grace, Archbishop Mannix, there is quite a different view of the situation...

...2l8 THE COMMONWEAL December 30, 1925 RUSSIA'S CHURCH AND ROME Washington, D. C. TO the Editor:—Pere Lev Gillet, commenting on the actual distribution of the Christian churches considered from the point of view of corporate union (La Revue Catholique des idees et des faits, Brussels, October 23, 1925) emphasizes a point of great importance with regard to the Orthodox church of Russia...

...Many others are reading from small prayer books containing short prayers suited, roughly speaking, for a bright child of eight...

...Expediency, not principle, seems to be the ruling idea, in this regard, among our college heads...

...Rather, those views which are expressed are apologetic —more or less complaisant...

...For centuries the laity have been elbowed out of their part in the Mass...

...What Catholic colleges lecture to their undergraduates upon the Mass of the catacombs, the Mass of the middle-ages, the vestments, their origin, their meaning, the Eucharistic services of the Uniate Eastern churches...

...As for my own native city of Washington, I know of no parish where the laity are encouraged to join with the choir as they do, for instance, in the cathedral at Westminster...

...The plain fact seems to me to be that our spiritual leaders, engrossed as they are with the all absorbing tasks of organization of schools and parishes, have no time to devote to what is considered the somewhat dilettante taste for "liturgy...

...Many have rosaries and are saying them devoutly...

...Clarkesville, Tex...

...If it is my right to disregard one law, it is yours to ignore another, and that of our neighbor to violate such other as restricts, not merely his liberty, but his absolute license...

...When I was a boy in a typical parish, the old familiar Benediction tunes were sung and many of the people sang with the choir...

...William Franklin Sands...

...get in touch, again through a committee, with the Calvert Associates in other cities...

...There are only two classes in Ireland satisfied with the midnight agreement—the Imperialists or Britishers and those who have got comfortable jobs under the Free State government...

...In all this history of the relations between Rome and Russia there are alternations so disconcerting between intercommunion and separation, so many puzzling cases like that of Saint Sergius of Radoniezh (of whom one wonders if he is a Saint of the Catholic Church or not) that the more one examines the facts, the more confusing are one's impressions...

...While Rome and Constantinople exchanged anathemas, Rome never, by any official act cut off the Russian Church from Catholic communion, and never has the Russian Church, as a church, by any official act, declared itself separated from the Catholic Church...

...distribute his choir among the congregation...

...How many can tell you about the structure of the Mass...

...We cannot pick and choose...

...Go to any late Sunday Mass in any large American city—what do you see...

...It looks as if competition has become so keen, the necessity of advertising so pressing that our Catholic educators are willing to wink at the present supremacy of college athletics over scholarship for the sake of sizeable registration lists...

...Sursum Corda...

...Who will lead us in Washington ? Let me close with a quotation from the Motu Proprio of our late Holy Father, Pius X, on sacred music...

...TO the Editor:—Mr...

...Speaking of plain chant, he says— "Especially should this chant be restored to the use of the people so that they may take a more active part in the services as they did in former times...

...they seemed to see in the Russian situation an abnormal and transient condition rather than an open rebellion...

...If we are to do this, we must govern our action by its laws...

...The doctrines of Russian theologians and bishops, decrees of czars or of the Holy Synod have never touched the responsibility of the Russian Church as a church...

...Elisha Francis Riggs...

...We may rightfully seek by legitimate means the abrogation of laws we believe unwise, but while they are in force, our obligation is unmistakable...

...We may thoughtlessly commit occasional infractions, but he is a traitor who would flaunt defiance...

...Those of sensitive ear might have said that it was not musical, but it would have been utterly impossible to deny that it was liturgical—liturgy such as we could do with more of in this country...

...Walsh as a Free State propagandist...

...He will be surprised at the result...

...That amendment has all the binding force of any other article of the Constitution, and of any law, federal or state...

...John Xavier Regan...

...Now for a suggestion—Can we not get a parish rector of good will, say, one in each city, who will act as the chaplain of the Calvert Associates of his city...

...Individual preference must yield to the collective judgment...

...To our western ears, it was strange and somewhat harsh, but when every man, woman and child in the packed cathedral joined, literally by thousands, in singing the Creed and the Gloria I felt like shouting and wished I had a sword to wave as did the Polish gentlemen in the days gone by...

...Upon us, whose Faith inculcates obedience to legitimate authority, there rests a special responsibility, for our example may fan or check the rampant spirit of anarchy, of which the daily prints bear tragic witness...

...there lies the road to chaos, to the annihilation of that civilization which is the fruit of man's laborious struggle upward and onward through uncounted centuries...

...That there is certainly a material separation between the two, but not at all a formal, juridical, canonical separation...

...In some a Motu Proprio is taken for what it is-—a command of the Holy Father...

...The opinion expressed as to the real animus of the attack upon Governor Smith is most likely correct...

...I know of perhaps two or three parishes where an effort is made to have hymns sung in English by the people...

...This has got out of hand of the faculties and has become a grave abuse...

...The music during Mass at the others ranges from irrelevant hymns in the vernacular to something which the respectability of The Commonweal makes it impossible for me to attempt to describe...

...Pastors who cannot command the services of a graduate of the Schola Cantorum or who have no ready made choir expert in plain song and Palestrina despair of making a start...

...Instead of resistance to this strong current toward materialism in college life, we find no emphatic voice among Catholic educators raised against it...

...As a layman with no pretentions to learning it seems ta me that the core and essence of any liturgical movement must be the recognition of the essentially social nature of the liturgy and of course, above all, of the Mass...

...Two parishes in Washington that I know of have the full Mass sung during certain seasons of the year...

...Here let me note what seems to me a pitfall in the path of the liturgical movement...

...Yet, these same congregations, almost totally ignorant liturgically speaking, are no doubt educated people in a worldly sense...

...Quite recently the laity have been elbowed out of participation at Benediction...

...marble and gold and lace and embroidery and silk at the Altar...

...the theologian and the canonist also enter into it to clarify the notion of formal separation...

...How many are reading the Graduals, and the Communions and the Post-Communions of the day...

...arrange, through a committee, for conferences on the liturgy and on church history...

...Business men who have been supporting the Free State by their money, votes, and influence told me in Ireland that the country was rushing to economic ruin...

...George J. Reid...

...in others it is treated as a kind of archeological curiosity which no one would think of applying...

...How well they sing may be a subject for debate, but any one who served in the A. E. F. knows that they do sing readily...

...There have, however, been occasions when—within our own communion—it has been "more honored in the breach than in the observance...

...The Catholic University of Washington, I understand, has no course or no lecture on the liturgy, and apparently there is no demand for this kind of learning on the part of students, or parents, or faculty...

...December 30, 1925 THE COMMONWEAL 217 As an example...

...Let someone take the lead...

...There is not an act, or a name, or a date, in Russian history whereat we may pause and say: here began the separation between Russia and Rome...

...While no singing can be too technically perfect or too beautiful to accompany the Mass, yet the essential emphasis must remain on the singers in their liturgical function and not on the song as a piece of vocalization...

...Again, who has heard a sermon on the history and the structure of the Mass...

...Russia, in its Christian origins was in communion with the Church of Rome...

...I use the word advisedly: became stranger...

...They can tell you all about the sources of the Merchant of Venice...

...It is a common thing to see the Celebrant waiting, apparently helplessly, until he can continue with his Preface and I have lately heard a hymn theatrically rendered in English by a soloist during the very moments of the Consecration and Elevation...

...Later, under the influence of Byzantine prelates who took over the administration of Russian dioceses, and by reason also of the Tartar invasions which isolated Russia from the western world over a period of centuries, the Russian Church became stranger to the Roman Church...

...Employing the utmost restraint one cannot but regard Dr...

...How many look at the calendar at the door on going in...

...Walsh had an article in which the impression was conveyed that the people of Ireland are satisfied with the present regime...

...The very last thing they would consider or think of, apparently, is appealing to their own people...

...In the choir loft a highly advertised group of musicians of mixed sex and according to rumor, often of mixed creed...

...They are familiar with secular literature and secular culture of many kinds...

...The head of a prominent Catholic institution in the East has recently spoken in commendation of college (which means intercollegiate) athletics, and the president of a Catholic college west of the Mississippi, about the same time, declared for "the expediency, if not the propriety" of his school joining the intercollegiate athletic conference of the state...

...Now the rosary is a most beautiful prayer, and has this connection with the Mass, that it is a meditation on the Passion, but the more devoutly one says one's Rosary at Mass the less is one able to join in the responses or follow the Mass...

...I will touch here," says Pere Gillet, "upon a point of which the importance is not sufficiently grasped generally, even in well informed circles, that is, the very special position of Russian orthodoxy in its relation to the Roman Church...

...Should we conclude that Russia is separated from Rome de facto but not de jure...

...Is the feast, unless it be a very great one, ever mentioned from the pulpit for the information of the people...

...In justice to the people of Ireland I trust you will publish this letter and the following remarks of that distinguished Irish prelate: "I found that wherever I went in Ireland thousands, in many cases tens of thousands, of Irish men and women cheered to the echo the statement that Ireland would never be content until she was absolutely undivided and absolutely free...

...Now, choirs are permitted to sing the Tantum Ergo and the O Salutaris to airs obviously devised to exclude the congregation and glorify the soloist...

...It is for us, in turn, to transmit it, not only unimpaired, but strengthened, to those who follow...

...When it crops out in the individual, especially in the layman, he is too apt to be received with a few preoccupied phrases, or even with an official frown...

...Laurence Washington, in a late number of America, is of the opinion that Catholic schools are trailing, to their disadvantage, after the public schools, in standards and methods...

...And yet we wonder that Protestants often seem to doubt our sincerity when we say that we believe in the Real Presence...

...Lines of expensive motors outside, rich dresses and jewels and furs in the nave...

...It has become notorious that non-Catholic institutions of "higher education" have surrendered to the clamor of more or less commercialized athletics...

...TO the Editor:—Referring to the editorial, Pulpits and Politics, in The Commonweal of December 2, there can be no question as to the soundness of the fundamental principle upon which it is based...

...TO the Editor:—In your issue of October 7, Dr...

...We see many causes of this at work at the present time, the hurry of modern life, the legacy of ignorance coming down from times of persecution, the vanity of choirs, and the indifference of pastors...

...TO the Editor:—I have been so much interested in the letter signed by Father William Busch on The Liturgical Movement, that I have been tempted to write asking for more on this subject from his pen or from other interested readers of The Commonweal...

...How many of the congregation are doing what it would seem the obvious intention of the Church that they should do, if they can...

...In regard to the faith of the Irish Republicans, he declared that "their faith is as sound as that of the Vatican and they are as loyal as the Pope...

...Now look for a single person who is really following the Mass with the sacred "libretto," the missal...

...We must draw, hard and fast, the line that divides liberty and license...

...two years ago in Peking I heard a large congregation composed almost entirely of Chinese, singing during Holy Week...

...The English word "estrangement" expressing exactly the process by which step by step one person becomes a stranger to another whom he has known, seems to me most apt in describing the situation which developed in course of time in Russia with relation to Rome...

...arrange instruction in the simplest forms of congregational singing...

...PULPITS AND POLITICS Boston, Mass...

...In other words, how many are following the Mass...

...It is too often treated as a highly technical musical question involving untold expense...

...There was never a rupture...

...There has been handed down to us the most beneficent political institution yet devised for the betterment of free men...

...After all, a large part of the worship of our non-Catholic neighbors is song...

...DO ATHLETICS DOMINATE EDUCATION...

...It is difficult or impossible to generalize for the whole country, dioceses differ greatly in liturgical matters in the United States...

...What is clearer is that our colleges and universities are in a fair way to follow in the wake of secular ones with regard to athletics and extracurricular activities...

...say a Mass for us on Sunday where it is understood that all shall sing from cards left in the pews...

...Even books on such subjects are exceedingly hard to obtain in this country...

...As the true believer does not elect which of the Ten Commandments he will obey, so the true citizen of the republic, in reverent spirit, obeys its every law...

...Priests say to me—"The Americans are not a musical race, they won't sing...