Transmutation (verse)
Downing, Eleanor
June 23, 1926 THE COMMONWEAL 185 transmit an hereditary disease, or even of persons LIFE IN...
...For over two centuries position solely on the ground that there were plenty the most strenuous efforts were made and every possible measure was employed, by the Knights of the Sword from the East of voluntary agencies for those who wanted them, and and the Knights of the Cross from the West, to spread Chrisobjected only to the use of public money...
...The desert-rose that blossoms from the anguish The Catholic Church in independent Lithuania had achieved Of burning skies...
...Lithuania Have you heard silence murmurously singing has now adjusted her difficulties with her neighbors, except Into your ear, those with Poland under whose occupation part of Lithuania A magic music wrung from depth of shadow still remains...
...ing of contraceptive methods at maternity centres in Lithuania was, however, amongst the latest of the European a recent debate in the House of Lords, based his op- nations to receive the Christian faith...
...The propagators of was carried by a large majority at the recent National the Faith in Lithuania were Poles and from this time for over four centuries the Catholic Church in Lithuania was subConference of the Independent Labor party, though ject to Polish influence and was, in fact, dependent upon a this does not, of course, commit the Labor party as a Polish province in matters of administration...
...it isgained her independence, three and a half centuries had passed...
...The President and Before your eyes, members of the cabinet are all Catholics...
...The moral tianity in Lithuania, but without success...
...At the present time the Christian Democrats And tawny grass- (Catholic) are in power with an absolute majority of three Have you seen beauty, starry-petaled, blooming representatives in the national parliament...
...Not less severe were the struggles which the And of fear...
...Apart from this Protestant mentality and German occupation...
...parties ranging from extreme communistic to extreme conserWhen noon lay level on the tortured prairie vative...
...This independence was not won And not a cricket quavered from the meadow, by Lithuania without many serious struggles with her neighbors, Nor note of bird- especially with Bolshevik Russia and with Poland...
...Throughout those centuries Lithuania, from the national and the defender of religious education, and is in general economic standpoints, suffered much and lost much, but in a defender of the rights and prestige of the churches...
...The moral issue seems to By JOSEPH KONCEVICIUS escape them altogether...
...Catholic Polish queen, Jadwiga, becoming himself a Catholic The Labor party is equally unsound on this ques- and so giving encouragement and impetus to the general intion and a resolution on similar lines to the above troduction of Christianity to the country...
...In 1569 Lithuania and Poland were united and this union The Catholic Church is thus, as ever, the one bul- endured until the so-called Poland-Lithuania partition by Ruswark for the protection of family life and Christian sia, Austria, and Germany in 1795, following which the Church idealism...
...From 1915 to 1919 Lithuania was under of view...
...Transmutation Lithuania always strove for independence...
...The ideals voiced Have you heard silence singing in the twilight, by the late President Wilson, of independence for all small When all was hushed and grey, nations then under the domination of their larger and stronger When black and still across white pools unrippled neighbors, afforded encouragement to the Lithuanian people The shadows lay...
...from the Church of Rome on this important national Iagela, the Grand Duke of Lithuania, in 1386 married the issue...
...was under the jurisdiction of a German province, part under...
...Even the Archbishop of Can- T HE Lithuanians are one of the oldest nations in Europe terbury in opposing a resolution in favor of the teach- and were located in prehistoric times by the Baltic Sea...
...Where all lay parched and white It is true that 75 percent of Lithuania's population is CathoBeneath the terror of the all-revealing, lic, but this population is represented by some fifteen political Enshrouding light...
...June 23, 1926 THE COMMONWEAL 185 transmit an hereditary disease, or even of persons LIFE IN LITHUANIA whose economic position would be lowered if they had a number-of children...
...Altogether, from the consummation of consequent confusion of thought, the Conservative the union with Poland at Lublin (1569) until Lithuania reparty is according to its lights a Christian party...
...At the end of the EuroWhen from the marshlands rose the mists upcurling, pean war they saw their dearest hope realized in the regained And not a wind-breath stirred, independence of the nation...
...the matter of religious faith she remained true always to the Catholic Church...
...whole...
...This statement by the Archbishop has been influence of other nations upon their national and political hailed by those in favor of birth control as one which affairs, and thus it was that they remained true to their pagan "happily completely separates the Church of England beliefs...
...country was called upon to wage in defense of her religious faith during this period, particularly against the propaganda Have you seen beauty blooming in the wasteland, of Bolshevik Russia...
...The Lithuanians question was raised only by the Catholic Lord Fitz- were not afraid to accept Christianity, but they did fear the Alan...
...These parties, however, are reduced in the ultimate Where cloud-shapes never pass, to two outstanding parties, namely, the Christian and AntiAnd dew drips not upon the rough-thorned cactus Christian parties...
...Happily, however, there are in all parties in Lithuania was placed under the administration of a Rusa number of men, not of our faith and sometimes not sian province and so remained until the outbreak of the Euroof any faith, who accept in the main the Catholic point pean war in 1914...
...no real organization for the reason that part of its population ELEANOR DOWNING...
...and inspired them to greater effort...
Vol. 4 • June 1926 • No. 7
