Mother Alphonsa Lathrop
Walsh, James J.
302 THE COMMONWEAL July 28, 1926 siastical supervision and furnished with the necessary control of the...
...There laughter was heard bers of their family are out at work, their care be- as often as in any hospital, and oftener than in faccomes an added burden in already difficult circum- tories or workshops...
...In- terra-cotta eyes were gentle in her proud face...
...generation at least...
...The which are supported from the national treasury...
...erations but for centuries, since her heart beat high And another day he said: "A princess, I think, for humanity and devoted itself to making life bear- should hold her head higher...
...once again absorb the attention of the Austrian people They also prescribe that the matrimonial contract is not without its good effects...
...Who may not send a silver trout-line swooping And she lifted one foot and looked at it with an air O'er rowdy streams...
...There serious disposition, were very largely responsible...
...Every now and then an announcement is made that Nathaniel thought he loved her because she was the cause of cancer has been discovered, and hopes the first princess he had ever seen, and because her arise that some treatment for it will be found...
...the canonical rule than are those in other countries, The fact that problems of a religious nature now and remain particularly strict with reference to divorce...
...Who may not lie "It's a pity you hold yourself so stiffly," he remarked...
...By this time other young women had joined graphed in her habit as a nun...
...They are ATHANIEL MOLESKIN had seen a Chinese sadly...
...Mother Alphonsa's death leaves a well-organized Renting an apartment on the lower East-side of New little community of Servants of Relief...
...could not be kept there because hospitals are for In them no distinction of race or creed was made...
...She had been feeling very well, people die of cancer, but the effect upon the public declaring only a day or two before, that she had never is very like that French view of mankind's attitude been better-intensely happy as she was in the thought toward death : "People die"-a shrug of the shoulthat in spite of her seventy-five years she was still able ders-"Oh, yes...
...Dominic, and inaugurated the...
...Then they took another aparthopelessly) in order to continue her work of caring ment and increased the number to a dozen...
...and with it the successful treatment of cancer, she spoke to him...
...Cancer, as we have said, is increasing-not (Mother Rose, as she came to be in religion, and decreasing...
...Not It is not surprising that, under the circumstances, July z8, 1926 THE COMMONWEAL 303 Mother Alphonsa had to struggle (sometimes almost ment for themselves...
...The city home was beautifully the place she deservedly came to occupy in the affec- situated opposite a park in view of the East River, tions of many, this is a record in our publicity-seek- but as some of the cancer patients lived for several ing age...
...At first they cared for half a the disease makes no distinction between rich and dozen patients, leaving very little room in the apart- poor, there are so many more of the latter that there 304 THE COMMONWEAL July 28, 1926 are numbers in all our large cities in need of such help THE CHINESE PRINCESS as is afforded by Mother Alphonsa's homes...
...The conquest of several other respects, notably as regards marital crime, ideal good and the legitimate defense of the rights of the law of the land also takes cognizance of Catholic the Church continue to interest our people more than moral principle...
...Patients who could pay were in need of help than any other...
...The impression is growing that cancer represents one of the terminal stages "The scorn in her voice has withered the poor creaof existence, an insurrection in the body-cells against ture away," he whispered to himself, and he looked the vital control which has kept them in coordination...
...Sister S'etants for the Something of her own suppression of self in connec- Relief of Incurable Cancer...
...But evitably, disappointment has followed these announce- the Chinese princess did not bother to think anything ments...
...a green bowl beside her...
...the beginning of the century...
...Her memory ventured to say one day...
...photographer...
...Catholic citizens of Vienna are obliged to carry on a Professors at ecclesiastical seminaries established in continuous battle of defense, because of their legitimate dioceses where there are no universities, are also sup- fear that the position of the Church may be underported by the state...
...I can dance most beautifully...
...Many people religious order...
...She absolute, and not merely relative to the greater numwho had seen death come so inexorably and so piti- ber of people, nor even to the fact that our progress lessly during the past thirty years to many hundreds in sanitation has enabled ever so many more people of her cancer patients, had scarcely known of its ap- to live on to the cancer age...
...disease which so often means a fatal termination, more Mrs...
...But those who visited Mother Alphonsa's be cared for in their tenement homes, or find their way homes were not likely to think so...
...do the cares and trials incident to poverty...
...every reason to believe that she initiated one of those Every day he grew more and more fond of her, enduringly beneficent foundations which for genera- and every day he became a little more exacting...
...Walsh emphasizes the service many knew of her magnificent work, for, like all to medicine and the poor rendered by one of the great women supremely good work, it was carried on with a charof our time...
...seemed to cause her such surprise, that Nathaniel burst into laughter...
...MOTHER ALPHONSA LATHROP By JAMES J. WALSH (The following article by Dr...
...Many of them have the deepest reluctance and above all, Mother Alphonsa, with her happy yet toward ending life among the dependent poor...
...of astonishment, and then she set it down, and raisA pity for the child who may not follow ing her elbows, curved her palms upward and looked Or understand inquiringly at the ceiling...
...It is possible that this insurrection may be the result "Honorable Lord does well to deprive presumpof some specific irritation, but there is nothing to in- tuous young man of intelligence," she remarked to the dicate that we shall be able to check it for another goldfish...
...There is ample need at the work before a young woman from Kentucky for it...
...finally for the poor, suffering from incurable cancer...
...self, do you...
...She stood on a tiny nounced the other day that practically nothing was mahogany pedestal, and once in a long while vouchbeing done throughout the world seeming to justify safed a comment on life to the goldfish that swam in the hope that the cause of cancer would be discovered...
...I suppose one shouldn't be able to understand In the meantime, Mother Alphonsa's work, organ- a princess always," thought Nathaniel humbly...
...The inmates were to the hospital for the dependent poor...
...But when he looked no nearer the heart of the problem than we were at around there was no one there but himself...
...The Commonweal hopes to supplement this dis- acteristic quietness...
...solution of the problem very seriously but very simply...
...Naturally, circumstances are not all favor- the movement to abrogate its temporal status in the able, especially since a Social-Democratic majority has republic of Austria...
...and their goal is secularcumstance which gives rise to a great deal of argument...
...On moss to watch the first bright star grow dim in "I once saw a Chinese girl dancing . . . " He paused A crowding sky ; as if dreaming of some incomparably lovely thing...
...tions will continue to diffuse good-for, as Aristotle "I don't think you should be carrying a scarf," he said, "good is ever diffusive of itself...
...I'm sure I know how a princess should act," said Nathaniel, and his cheeks were very red...
...has been a prejudice, inherited from preceding gen- Every cancer patient knows from experience that erations when it was too well deserved, against such from the time of the first serious symptom of the institutions...
...It should be added, however, religious convictions feel that the influence of the that the public schools are inter-confessional-a cir- Church is still far too great...
...Only the assurance that this notoriety might years after their admission, there was need of a place enable her to be of greater help to sufferers from in the country...
...Mother Alphonsa's cancer padeserving of sympathy, and yet so situated that it was tients learned to face the inevitable without great unextremely difficult to care for them in such a way as happiness, and pain being relieved and diversion of to make life reasonably bearable...
...Nearly a hundred thousand people died who has been her colleague ever since) asked to be of cancer in the United States last year...
...She had not been long work and who will carry it on...
...For a while the danger must be agreed to in the presence of an ecclesiastic, was very great that material need would concentrate civil marriage being adequate only in cases where the all the thought and energy of our people upon material rightful pastor declines to perform the ceremony...
...It was her dream that the future would see other homes for NBy MARIE GALLAGHER these patients established in many places...
...A need of fields...
...to ensure permanency to her work...
...City Night One day he became bolder than ever before, and Warm nights wake pity for imprisoned women he stood with his head tilted critically to one side...
...cess neither raised her head nor dropped her scarf...
...On the other hand, those without as a matter of duty...
...tion with her work may be gathered from the fact Gradually friends gathered round her, and she wall that when, a few months ago, a committee from the able to build the hospital of Saint Rose's Free Home New York Rotary Club went to Hawthorne to pre- for Incurable Cancer at 71 Jackson Street...
...The public does not like to hear much THE newspapers of Saturday morning, July 10, about cancer...
...princess, and he had fallen in love with her...
...And this union in dered for the sake of a sentimental desire to escape turn served the Catholic Church in so far as it halted opposition...
...302 THE COMMONWEAL July 28, 1926 siastical supervision and furnished with the necessary control of the Viennese metropolis and wages a modern mandates from the Apostolic See, state foundations Kulturkampf with all the means at its disposal...
...The before her, and looked at her-and at last one day cause...
...Lathrop, later to become Mother Alphonsa, than one friend, in perfectly good health at that time, recognized in such cases a set of patients eminently will meet death first...
...But the Chinese prinable for those who were neglected and in great distress...
...Most of us prefer to to occupy herself with the care of her beloved cancer put the consideration of cancer aside and not to read patients...
...Her presence among them at Hawthorne much about it, and anything concerning it is likely to until the very last day of her life had proved a bene- be shunted aside and relegated to the background...
...The Catholic position there ficiently strong majority in the hour when the existence is too valuable and too firmly entrenched to be surren- of the nation was really at stake...
...This did not come to pass...
...There were just two requirements for admission Mother Alphonsa's life work began nearly thirty to these homes...
...You should have given will indeed be held in benediction, not alone for gen- it to one of your ladies-in-waiting...
...These did This situation explains the nature of the difficulties not prevent the conservative Christian-Social and the encountered by the Church in Austria, in so far as these liberal German-National parties from forming a sufare political in character...
...Frequently operated care for them, and Mother Alphonsa preferred to upon in the hospitals, sometimes more than once, they reserve her homes entirely for those without means...
...Such patients must either gloomy...
...of cancer...
...mined, not only in the administration of government, Religious instruction is...
...For office hostages, desk-bound and stooping "Oh l" said the Chinese princess, stepping down Beneath dead dreams, from her pedestal...
...An English statement made last year seemed very Every day Nathaniel walked up to her and stood hopeful for a time, but has proved unfounded...
...at the Chinese princess in awe...
...This insent her with a medal for outstanding work in charity, stitution was capable of accommodating one hundred she allowed herself for the first time to be photo- patients...
...It attracted very little attention cussion later with a more detailed and personal narrative of because it was concerned with the disturbing problem Mother Alphonsa's life.-The Editors...
...The elfin flight of firefly and swallow All of her movements were so slow and queer, and Towards fairy-land...
...She took up the mind afforded, they enjoyed intervals of peace...
...needed...
...other people...
...asked Nathaniel, mockingly...
...and while allowed to help her...
...We are more than a little ostrich-like in our attitude With Mother Alphonsa's death there passed from toward some of the serious diseases of mankind...
...Yet at the beginning of the present year, brought the announcement that Mother the United States Public Health Reports announced Alphonsa Hawthorne Lathrop had quietly that the increase of the disease and its fatality were passed to her reward early on Friday morning...
...In accordance with this 'dea she obbegan to feel that they wanted to help Mother tained an affiliation with the Third Order of Saint Alphonsa in the wonderful task she was accomplishing...
...But the Chinese princess did not deign And, for myself, a surging, stinging pity That living yields to take any notice of either him or his laughter, and Only a sudden hatred of the city, only continued her solemn dancing...
...The first was that the applicant years ago when her soul, looking upon suffering human- should be a sufferer from cancer declared by physiity from the eyes of the "Rose of all the Hawthornes," cians to be incurable...
...us one of the great souls of this generation...
...This was purchased in Westchester cancer induced her to yield to the solicitations of the County, and called Hawthorne...
...The Austrian marriage laws are more like through...
...For this condition the sisters, stances...
...ization of the fundamental Austrian code, after the Catholic primary schools may be erected without legal fashion of those countries in which complete separadifficulty, but the state does not contribute to their tion of Church and state has already been carried upkeep...
...There seems walked away making a mystery of her words...
...Upon the death of her husband, Mrs...
...In their usually cheerful, at times even happy, and sympahomes, frequently alone during the day when mem- thetic toward one another...
...Recently, though Lathrop realized that the surest way to secure perthe struggle to secure its proper development had to manence to the work, would be the foundation of a be kept up assiduously, recognition came...
...You don't think anyone can be as fine as yourJOHN HANLON...
...diction and a consolation...
...and he ized so well during her life, remains...
...In ends...
...There are York City, she proceeded to care for as many patients over thirty women who have vowed themselves to this as could be accommodated...
...Considering her posi- her little community, vowing a life service to the care tion as the daughter of Nathaniel Hawthorne, and of the cancerous poor...
...those who can be benefited by medical or surgical It might be expected that places sheltering only patreatment, and not refuges for those for whom noth- tients suffering from incurable cancer would be rather ing further can be done...
...We know that many proach to herself...
...The London Bureau of Cancer Research an- at all about Nathaniel Moleskin...
...prescribed by the government as is already now the case, but also in the domain of for all lower and secondary educational institutions constitutional law...
...The second was that the applifound one class among the poor in New York more cant should be poor...
...of course, may be found at any time, yet in spite of the most painstaking research during the past twenty- "Remove that creature, Honorable Lord," said her frail, haughty voice through the shop-window, and five years which at times seemed promising, we are Nathaniel hastened to obey...
...It took renting a house and filling almost every available space many years to attract the practical attention necessary with the sick...
...They were those not taken, for these could find other institutions to suffering from incurable cancer...
Vol. 4 • July 1926 • No. 12
