Consolation, July 18, 1945
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Contents
Why Pacelli Wants a “Soft Peace”
A “Prodigious Spiritual Cure”
' Churches as Arsenals
The Archbishop of the Prayer
Mussolini's End
**, Latvia, the “Belgium” of Eastern Europe 10
J Some Events Since World War I
Stirring Events in Utah
The Home of Guayule and Scheelite
Kruger National Park
Termites, or Wood Lice
The Special Edition Racket
“Thy Word Is Truth”
Right Use of the Bible
Current Education
Odd Ideas on Education
Mere Longevity or Life Everlasting
Something on the Other Side
“I Dissent!”
Supreme Court Reviews Federal Prosecution 22
Let Public Officials Take Notice
John Wycliffe and the Lollards
The First English Bible
Wycliffe’s Last Years ■
“An Honest and Good Heart”—Luke 8:15
The Haunted Church Pillar ' Twenty-five to Thirty Copies of Every Issue 31
President
Secretary Editor
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In Brief
The State/ Department and
Kennedy and Tyler Kent
♦ That is a big idea the politicians have, getting Catholic votes by turning over as many big political jobs as possible. That is why Kennedy was sent as ambassador to Britain. His own relatives consider him a joke. He was a Catholic, and so was Tyler Kent.
It used to be that 30 Americans were selected for presentation to the king and queen of England, but Kennedy pre-' sented_his daughters Kathleen and Rosemary and two or three others, Kathleen made wise use of her time. She nabbed the Protestant marquis of Huntington, son of duke of Devonshire.
Her pa was at Chamberlain’s right hand while that gentleman was selling Czechoslovakia dawn the river, and as soon as the job was done he confided to New York businessmen that Hitler’s triumph in the coming war was a foregone conclusion. Then he resigned, as was meet.
r One of his clerks was Tyler Kent, educated in the University of Madrid, and, of course, a member of his “chureh”. The state department, learning from Scotland Yard -that Kent was crooked, issued a statement regarding his activities which reads, in part, as follows:
By his own showing, he had, while occupying a very special position of confidence within the embassy, displayed a shocking disregard for every principle of decency and honor so far as his obligations toward the United States were concerned.
This rascal had in bis private room copies of 1,500 private embassy papers. . He had “the whole confidential communi-, cation system of the United States”. He had “two newly made duplicate keys to the Index Bureau and the Code Room of the Embassy”, and the papers which he stole “covered practically every subject on which the Embassy was carrying on correspondence with the department of state”. He got seven years.
CONSOLATION
“And in His name shall the nations hope/’—Matthew 32:21, A. 5. P.
Volume XXVI
Brooklyn. N. Y., Wednesday, July 18, 1945
Number 674
Why Pacelli Wants a “Soft Peace”
THE popes are always much interested in wars and their outcome. The present pope is no exception; In practically every war the subjects of the pope light on both sides; so he might be expected to show some interest in the outcome, though, as the professed father of Catholics he is supposed to be very impartial, lie has said so on many an occasion, especially when caught in an embarrassing situation, 'flic present pope, moreover, has been called the "pope of peace”, which, it seems, should now be amended to the "pope of a soft peace”.
Having come at last to a realization that the side, he has been favoring was losing, the "soft peace" song has been sung by Mr. Pacelli with increasing vehemence. It was not so before.
That the haby-killer Franco and his religious backers were and are Fascists, and that they were ably sup|M>rted by the Axis partners Hitler and Mussolini, cannot be denied. The record is there. The pope called Franco the Butcher “that illustrious chief” of Spain, who had given "unequivocal proofs" of his “supreme religious" interest. Hence Franco was given the "paternal congratulations” of the pope, who thus acknowledged his fatherhood. The pope generously overlooked Franco's killing of thousands of inoffensive Catholics.
Franco had no "soft peace” for those who defended the Spanish republic against his betrayal. Ten months after that republic had been completely destroyed by the combined treachery of Italy, Germany and Pacelli, together with the aid of certain interests in Britain and the United States, there were still '>00,00(1 men and women in Franco's prisons, while 1,200,000 were in their graves.
In those ten months, it was estimated, 40,000 executions had taken place in Madrid. By the end of the year they wore still 1,000 a month, and gave a striking proof of Franco’s "supreme religious" interest. The prisoners were shot at the Eastern Cemetery at dawn, and taken away by the lorryload. Sometimes there were as many as four lorryloads per day.
Thousands of men, women and children, crowded into prisons built to hold fewer hundreds, lived in fear of suffering the same fate as those who had been taken to the Eastern Cemetery. Some of them wore beaten to death and others were garroted. German Gestapo constantly questioned them.
Franco's “supreme religious” interest was in full harmony with the sentiment expressed by that eminent French Catholic Veuillot, whose candor was unusual, when he said, “When you are the masters we claim perfect liberty for ourselves, in accordance with your principles; when we are the masters, in accordance with our principles, we refuse liberty to you.” Nice, isn’t it ?
Returning now to the pope, who approves all this, hut who now wants a soft peace for the Nazi criminals. Don’t blame him too severely. Remember his "impartiality”. Of course, he knew the plans upon which the "new order” contemplated by the Nazis was to be based. If he and his partners didn't succeed in carrying them out that was not their fault. At first everything seemed to be going along all right, and the pope waxed quite enthusiastic, forgetting that old proverb of Holy Writ, “Let not him that girdeth on his armor boast himself as he that putteth it off.” Or, as a modern writer has rather" quaintly expressed it, “It is best not to get too fresh too soon.”
Some Revealing Dispatches
According to one “Reverend Father” Geo. Alfred Beck, Jesuit, the Catholic church stood to gain by the course the Nazis were taking. He said, as reported in the press when they started out, “National Socialism is preparing the way for the unification of all Christians in Germany and is gradually sending all who want Christianity to the Catholic church.”
This trend was favored in the provision, on October 26,1935, that all Protestant churches in Germany were required to fly the swastika Hag, but the Catholic churches were not required to fly it. On November 29 of that year the Nazis seized the funds of the Confessional (Protestant) Church and Confessional Synods, consisting of voluntary contributions by Protestants.
About that time, too, Hitler had a lengthy interview with Count von Preysing, the Roman Catholic bishop of Berlin. It was followed by a statement that “Hitler will lead the party along the path of positive Christianity, and not along the false path of anti-Christian doctrine”.
On June 9,1941, an editorial appeared in the Turin newspaper Stampa saying that Germany and Italy were organizing a new European order in conformity with the principles laid down in the encyclical Rerum Novarum, to which Pope Pius called attention in his June 1 speech. Postwar Europe, the editorial said, will be a group of states whose national sentiments will he subordinated to a greater Europe. It added that the new order was already being put in operation.
Von Papen, Hitler’s Catholic ambassador to Turkey and the politician who, more than any other, was responsible for Hitler’s theft of power in January, 1933, said, “The Third Reich is the first power which not only recognizes, but which puts into practice the high principles of the papacy.”
At the beginning of the war a dispatch to the New York Times from Frankfort-on-the-Main said, “The Catholic leaders of Germany have been exhorting the faithful at home and abroad to do their utmost in the fight for the righteous cause of the German nation under the guidance of Chancellor Hitler.”
A “Prodigious Spiritual Cure”
When France had been overrun and Petain had been put into the position of power, the pope’s newspaper, Osserva-tore Romano, said of him:
Petain . . . the brave marshal, the good marshal who, more than any other man, seems to personify the best traditions of his race. It is of this old octogenarian that the youth invoke the renewal of their country with a happy intuition in that perennial youth which the religious, Christian, Catholic faith of the marshal knows how to guard to obtain for his sick country a prodigious spiritual cure. Such is the dawn of a new radiant day, not only for France but for Europe and the world.
That was taking in a good deal of territory, but indicates the aims of the papacy in conjunction with Germany and Italy, to administer that “prodigious spiritual cure” of which the “supreme religious” ardor of Franco gave a demonstration in Spain. As a start in that direction a French priest, Abbe Robert Aleche, caused the arrest of more than 800 French patriots during the German occupation, as charged by Judge Doniso-mi at Paris, presiding over an inquiry into the activities of the French Gestapo in Paris. Aleche heard the confessions of the political prisoners and others in the Fresnes prison, and would hurry to the Gestapo with the information he extorted from his foolish victims.
The dissatisfaction of the French resistance movements with the attitude of the priests during the German occupation was shown in comment on declarations by the pope. They said, “We wish the pope had taken his stand during the shameful years and done his denouncing then. It is painful to think that the church left that task to others who were more obscure and who lacked the church’s authority ...”
That was putting things mildly, but put the pope on the spot when he was trying to crawfish while at the same time gently hinting that a soft peace was the Christian thing to hand out to the Nazis.
“Father” Richard Felix, O.S.B., of Conception, .Mo., who believes that the most effective argument in answer to one who does not agree with you is to give him a stinging blow in the face, knock him down, or see that he wears the stripes of a convict, explained why Hitler was not excommunicated. He said: “The church has not excommunicated Hitler for the reason that Hitler has excommunicated himself long ago.” This was hardly in harmony with the foregoing facts, and overlooked that “touching occasion” when Hitler and Goebbels attended St. Hedwig's cathedral for the “requiem mass” on behalf of the soul of Klarshal Pilsudski. Both stood at the elevation of the wafer.
Catholics in Germany did not suffer under Hitler, and the pope was aware of Hitler’s favorable attitude, so why excommunicate him ? The editor-in-chief of the Madrid Alcazar, Senor Casariego, made the statement:
There are 30 million Catholics living in the Third Reich, and in all cities all the Catholic churches are open the entire day. In Berlin’s cathedral, we Spanish journalists attended a solemn high mass after which a Dominican priest preached a sermon lasting nearly an hour. In Berlin’s sixty Catholic churches, and in thousands of others throughout Germany, exactly similar services were taking place at the same time. Later on, in the occupied section of France, we saw posters, placed by the military authorities at the doors of numerous churches, announcing the hours of masses for the soldiers of the garrison. Great care is taken that soldiers attend church service regularly.
That statement is in full harmony with one that appeared in the San Antonio Light for January 21, 1945, headed “Religious Items Fill Nazi Homes”. It said:
American soldiers who invaded Germany found rosaries all over the place, and religious statuettes in every room of the homes the German occupants had fled, Chief Warrant Officer Wally Gursch . . . informs his parents ... in a letter.
Churches as Arsenals
Some will contend that the use of churches in Italy as arsenals shows that the Nazis were lacking in respect for the church. But that conclusion does not follow. It is not unusual for Catholic churches to be so used. It was done extensively in Spain, and it accounts for the fact that so many nuns and priests lost their lives in the Spanish Civil War. It was a case of kill or be killed with their ammunition.
Incidentally, mention may be made of the bomb caches seized in Colombia early this year. Several hundred homemade hand grenades were found in sacks beside the organ in the Bogota cathedral, ready for use. When caught with the goods, the archbishop said that he was “painfully surprised”, which was doubtless true. Archbishops have a neat way of getting out of scrapes of this kind. The one at Bogota even accompanied the police to the cathedral, knowing they would go there anyway.
The foregoing proves again that outward appearances are often deceiving. In neither case was the presence of ammunition, etc., in the churches revealed until it was discovered by others than the church authorities themselves. Draw your own conclusions. It seems to suggest that the “soft peace” idea, like the proposition of liberty, works only one way. It is like saying, “When you are the
winners we claim a soft peace for ourselves, in accordance with your principles ; when we are the winners, in accordance with our principles, we deny it to you.” Which brings us back to our theme.
Not only does Pacelli sing for a soft peace for the Nazi criminals, but his Yellow religionists sing the same song. With due caution we look into the sayings of the “Rt. Rev.” Msgr. Fulton J. Sheen, who certainly must know the mind of the Hierarchy and its head. He said, in a broadcast over NBC, Sunday, February 4, 1945:
You must love your enemy as you love yourself. Does that mean that you must love Hitler as you love yourself ... "It means just that.
Presumably Americans could not love their enemies as Franco, with his “supreme religious” sensibilities, loved his enemies. Or perhaps one does not properly understand Hierarchy.reasoning. If that is the case it isn’t because they haven’t made themselves clear in the past. Remember Veuillot, and you will understand it perfectly. “Heads, I win; tails, you lose 1” Monsignor sure preached a touching sermon, but those who remember Hierarchy persecutions of the past and the present will not be deceived.
Let the other side of the picture appear, and keep things in focus. Hear the German archbishop of Muenster, Count von Galen, reputed “foe” of the Nazis. He said, “The German people must consider the Allies as enemies and take it for granted that you regard them as such. I hope the future will bring a time when we are all good neighbors. But that will be a long time away. Maybe it will be possible in 65 yrears.” That would give the Germans an opportunity to try once more to unify the world in harmony with the principles of the papacy, as they at» tempted to do in the last six years. The report states that the interview with this representative of the Hierarchy was* conducted standing. Evidently the archbishop did not love his enemies sufficiently to offer them a seat. Americans, with characteristic softness
(suspected by some to be softness in the head), dined with Nazi leaders until Eisenhower, feeling justly indignant,' . put a stop to it.
Nor did the Nazis show any love for their enemies, in spite of the “Christian” program which they were supposed to be following, as laid down by the papacy. The atrocious treatment accorded their victims is well known, and Consolation here spares its readers a repetition. One item, however, will be mentioned as summing up the story fittingly.
Two hundred and fifty children liberated by the Red Army from a German slave camp near Lodz, Poland, recently arrived in Kiev. They were all that survived of more than a thousand children taken to the camp. The little captives related with horror what their experiences had been. They were driven tq work and fed on starvation rations. Many died of starvation, exhaustion, and beatings. Anyone with an ounce of manhood would want to be shot rather than lend himself to such treatment of children.
Another archbishop sang the song of a soft peace quite poetically. It was a “prayer”, published in the papers, and apparently intended for the eyes of the people rather than the ears of'God. The archbishop offered it from the throne, instead of to the Throne. He said, among other things,
Grant that in victory we not offend thy justice by revenge, sinning against mercy [like Franco] by hate, destroying also ourselves.
The prayer was read from the pulpit in the cathedral at every mass. A member of the cathedral staff, preaching at solemn mass, asked “merciful judgment” for the conquered countries. Said he, “Our attitude toward the average per-' son in the conquered countries should be one of Christian consideration and compassion,” He quoted the spurious text crediting Jesus with the words, “Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do.” Jesus never uttered them.
They are not in the oldest manuscripts. Even so, such sentiments would hardly apply to the Nazis. They knew what they were doing. .
Constant Needling
The constant needling of the pope and his assistants for a "soft peace” is designed to get under the skin of those concerned, and particularly now that the pope or his representative is not having a part in the visible peace negotiations. The archbishop just referred to, Francis Spellman, was slated to be the pope’s “peace envoy” at postwar peace parleys, if the pope should be invited to participate, officially or indirectly. His indirect efforts would be through contact with the most important United Nations’ leaders. .
The archbishop is a great admirer of the pope, according to reports. He ■ thinks the pope “parallels Christ”, in the following inordinate words of Battery:
No robust physical stature nor strong broad shoulders has the pope to bear the sorrows of the world, but the Christlike figure, Christlike shoulders, and above all, a Christlike sanctity and spirit seem to characterize him. It is impossible for me to see him without identifying or rather paralleling his life with the life of Christ- and the cross of Christ, and today he reminds me of the wounded Christ.
Aside from the fact that no one knows anything about the figure or shoulders of Christ, the foregoing words, in their obsequious flattery, are but another boot for the “soft peace” propaganda. They do not fit in with the pope’s enthusiastic endorsement of Franco the Butcher.
Nor do these tactics deceive the mentally pubescent. Russia, which has suffered so tremendously from Nazi aggression, is exceedingly wary of the pope. Ever and anon some statement comes from Moscow indicating that it is not taken in by the ‘drooping figure’ propaganda, or anything else that comes from the Vatican. Rather, the Russians saw the pope as the “Nazis’ Mouthpiece”, and offered no apologies. Russia’s stand on the Polish question is greatly influenced by its suspicion of the Vatican. The Red Star, Russian paper, said,
The Vatican’s anti-Soviet campaign on the Polish question is being carried on by the Catholic press in England and the United States.
Nor can one blame Russia for being suspicious, even though that suspicion may take on aspects which it may be hard for Americans to understand. It was not a little disconcerting to have the Russian ambassador Andrei Gromyko call at the state department and demand to see the body of President Roosevelt before its interment. But the request could not be granted. No one had seen the dead president in his coffin, once the lid was closed, which was done privately. Others besides the Russian ambassador have wondered about this. It was all bather unusual. But Andrei Gromyko was not satisfied to accept the refusal. He insisted that the message from his government requesting the viewing of the body be signed, so that he could be seen to have done his duty. It was signed.
Eastern Churches Make Statement
Charging the Vatican with seeking to shield the Nazis, representatives of the Eastern Churches met in Moscow and issued the following statement addressed to the people of the world,' on February 10:
In view of the present international situation representatives of the Orthodox church present at the Sobor (church congress) raise their voices against those, the Vatican especially, who try to protect Hitlerite Germany from responsibility for crimes committed by her and ask forgiveness for Fascists who spilled the blood of innocent victims all over Europe.
Some of the erstwhile Protestant churches are also waking slightly.
The Atlanta Baptist Ministers Conference in February demanded an investigation by the Senate of the government’s relationship with the Vatican. The resolution was signed by 89 ministers.
Establishment of diplomatic relations between the United States and the Vatican was also opposed in a report presented to the biennial meeting of the Federal Council of Churches, representing 25 Protestant denominations with a claimed total of 26,000,000 members in America. They did not, however, see any harm in Myron C. Taylor’s activities at the Vatican as President Roosevelt’s personal representative, which began in December, 1939. They wouldn’t. They said: "We find it necessary to make a sharp distinction between the Roman Catholic religion and the political power exercised by the Roman Catholic hierarchy for its own institutional ends.” They “see men as trees, walking”.
Another statement opposing any involvement of the democracies in a “deal” with either the Vatican or any other religious establishment was signed by 1,600 religious leaders. The statement read, in part:
It is tragically significant that when, in 1929, the papacy re-entered the political field it did so in alliance with enemies of those very cultures in which its church had thrived. As a political power it gained its first fatal successes in treaties of friendship with Fascist powers. Supporting Mussolini in Italy, Dolfuss and Schuschnigg in Austria, Hitler in Germany, Franco in Spain, and Petain in France, the papacy has thrown its weight into the scales of the present human struggle on the side of the enemies of democracy.
(And not mentioning the deal with Japan, after Pearl Harbor.) The statement was directed to Roosevelt, Stalin and Churchill. ■
The Archbishop of the Prayer
The archbishop of the prayer, mentioned foregoing, was highly displeased with the statement of the 1,600 protesting religious leaders, however mild their protest. He could not let it pass. The very next time he entered ,the cathedral he censured these clergymen, even though he had to talk to the Boy Scouts about it. He knew that it would get into the papers all right, like his prayer. (Peter never got his prayer printed in the papers.) The archbishop was really - “mad”. Said he:
These self-styled super-patriots could have benefited with the Boy Scouts of America and learned the fundamental tenets of the Boy Scouts, the love of God and country. In the newspaper article published yesterday 1600 men call themselves ministers and religious leaders. They do a disservice to the country and violate the Golden Rule. [Which the archbishop and his friend Franco always observe!]
The Boy Scouts didn’t know what it was all about, but they knew the archbishop wasn’t talking about Catholics. Anyway, the 1,600 protesting ministers put one over on the archbishop. They cabled their message to the big three, where it would do the most good. He had to be satisfied with telling it to the Boy Scouts.
The pope is suspect in South America too. The Ulster Protestant recently published the following statement:
The Roman Catholic Church and its priests are decidedly most unpopular among the people of South America. One indication is that a book written against the Boman Catholic Church and the priests is an assured bestseller in those lands. Leading Latin Americans welcome Protestant missions . . . They look upon adherents to South American Roman Catholicism as “defenders of a privilege rather than followers of a faith”.
This statement was made by a Methodist minister, who also said, 'T find myself doing now what in all these [35] years I refused to do. [Preaching against Romanism.] I do it because we must win for ourselves the privileges of religious freedom.”
. The proponents for a “soft peace” do not seem to be popular: So the Vatican is trying .to backtrack a bit. When Hitler was wounded in the July 20, 1944, bomb attack condolences were sent by the pope. Thereafter Hitler was reported as hiding in a Jesuit monastery at Salzburg, Austria. Three Jesuit priests reported the matter at the Vatican. The monastery was made a secret refuge for Hitler, they said. Meanwhile the Nazis were reported as using a double for Hitler. The London Daily Express said it had “incontestable proof” that this was the case. The double did not have the same size of ears as Hitler, which is said to have given the secret away.
Mussolini’s End
Hitler’s partner, Mussolini, came to a sad end. He had found sanctuary in the palace of Cardinal Schuster, but was suspicious and left his place of hiding, with the result that he was caught and executed. His remains were subjected to numerous indignities, being kicked and spat upon and hung up by the heels for public contempt.
But a mass was held for him in Santiago, Chile, at the Catholic Temple of National Gratitude. Throughout the service Italians present gave the Fascist salute. The temple is said to have been assaulted by “Communists”, persons who expressed their disapproval of the ceremony.
And so Mussolini and Hitler disappear from the world-stage. Their “popu-arity” had begun to wane, however, long before they themselves were finished. Their friend, Franco, foresaw the outcome. A story in Time (July 31, 1944) illustrates the point. It said:
An Allied observer, visiting the State Department, graphically illustrated current political trends in Spain with a story about pictures. The pictures were on General Francisco Franco’s handsome desk. A year ago, when the observer visited Franco, there were three of them, a large autographed photograph of Pope Pius XII, flanked by large autographed photographs of Hitler and Mussolini. When he called again eight months later the pictures were still there. But when he went to see Franco less than a month ago, two of Franco’s heroes had disappeared. Gone were Hitler and Mussolini.
The pope’s “new order” lies in fragments. All he can do is pick up the pieces, and save what he can of the wreckage. This he is attempting by holding out for a “soft peace” for the aggressors. Sometimes the publicity given to some of his agents is amusing, and defeats its own purpose. Cardinal Faulhaber, of Munich, for instance, was represented as about the only good German a reporter met in Germany. The story was given wide publicity. But if he is the only good German, the rest of them cannot be considered as worthy of a “soft peace”. The cardinal is supposed to have opposed the Nazis right along, but kept out of danger. He did not get into a concentration camp.
The pope continues to put the Nazis, Fascists and Allies in the same category. He says they are all equally guilty, and is planning a “holy year” for thtf “purification of the world” from all the crimes committed during the conflict. The last “holy year” failed to bring peace or prosperity, but coincided with Hitler’s rise to power. The pope had a lot to do with that development. And still he sings of a “soft peace”.
A Good Story from the West
♦ One of Jehovah’s witnesses in a far-western state was proclaiming to a fellow worker the good news of The Theocracy as the only hope of man. The man was so interested that, without knowledge of the witnesser, he slyly appropriated to himself the January 17, 1945, issue of Consolation. That interested him so much that he came back, admitting that he had pilfered the magazine, but that it had such a ring of truth about it that he wished to know more about the whole subject. Now the man who lost the magazine is delighted.
Latvia, the “Belgium” of Eastern Europe
MANY have reflected upon the fact that the Belgians are peaceable, in, dustrious and intelligent citizens of a fertile land, and yet they are not permit* ted to live in peace. For about two thousand years Belgium has been a battleground over which some paper-hanger or Hohenzollern or Napoleon or other monstrosity has sent millions of men to . their death, and made it plenty hard for the Belgians as well.
Latvia is in the same predicament in eastern Europe. The Letts are also peaceable, industrious and intelligent citizens of a fertile land, and, although the Letts have lived in Latvia for two thousand years and have never tried to overrun any other peoples or lands, their land has been constantly made a battleground by Germans, Russians, Poles and Swedes who know that there is such a thing as the Golden Rule but haven’t the least idea or intention of guiding themselves by it.
The middle one of the three states on the eastern shore of the Baltic sea, Latvia, half as large as New York state, is twice the size of Denmark; or, to put it in still another way, is as large as Belgium, the Netherlands and Luxembourg put together. The people are mostly farmers, and considered among the most progressive and intelligent in that indispensable industry. The population in 1935 was 1,950,502. -
On account of being alternately "bossed” by the Germans and the Russians, the Letts commonly speak three languages, Lettish, German and Russian. A woman traveler describes them as only a woman might:
As to dress. The men dress much 'better than the women. For Some reason the latter are devoting themselves to hard felt hats of uncompromisingly bright colors. And this brings out the fact that Latvian women as a rule have large hands and feet. Their mouths, however, are generously medium and well
shaped. The men run to bright colored raglan coats, spats and high-heeled shoes. Their hats are usually gray felt, and they always carry canes. All Lettish noses turn up, and nearly all Letts are blond and gray-eyed. .
Riga, Queen of the Baltic
It used to be that if anybody wished to go anywhere in Russia he took the steamer to Riga, the capital of Latvia, and from there went wherever he pleased, by rail. The population of the city in 1930 was 3'77,917. The gulf in which it is located is 100 miles long and 60 miles wide and is frozen for an average of 127 days in the year, but the port is equipped with great ice-breakers which smash their way through ice three feet thick, and in normal times the city is equipped to do a great business in its position as Russia’s port to the west.
Deprived by the Devil of any sense of sanity otthumor, the popes have attempted to run everything on the planet, and so, in viewr of the present fact that 57.2 percent of the Letts are Lutherans, and only 22.6 percent of them are Roman Catholics, it is comical to read in the encyclopedia :
About 1190 the Augustinian monk Mein-hard erected a monastery there, and in 11991201 Bishop Albert I of Livonia obtained from Pope Innocent III permission for German merchants to land^at the new settlement, and chose it for his seat, exercising his power over the neighboring district in connexion with the Teutonic Knights. [ Despite the pope, the people became Lutherans anyway.]
It should be explained that the Teutonic Knights and Knights of Columbus were evidently sired by the same father and had the same mother. The Lettish religious census above mentioned showed 9.1 percent of the population Russian Orthodox, 4.8 percent Old Russian Orthodox, 5.1 percent Jews, and all others, such as non-Luther an Protestants, etc., only 1.2 percent. "
When Riga was functioning normally it was the Reno, Nevada, of Europe. A person wanting divorce went there and established a residence for three months, but during those three months he could go anywhere in Europe that he chose. At the end of that time he came back and all that he had to do was to sign a paper that he and his companion had not lived together for a time, and the total divorce costs were $40 for the attorney and $1.20 for court expenses.
As seen from the deck of an incoming steamer, Riga is a magnificent city.
Some Events Since World War I
It seems not worth while to summarize Latvian history for two thousand years, but on August 11, 1920, Russia, which had been the ruler of the country for the past 122 years, signed a peace treaty with Latvia and recognized Lat-. via’s independence forever. It was good that this was to be for such a definite period, because Russia grabbed the country again on June 17, 1940. It thus appears that “forever” is a period of 19 years 10 months 6 days, Russian style. The hitch in this ease is that Germany has had it , since then, for a few months only, but now the Russians have it a second time. Just how long the “forever” will be is at this time not known, but it might last until Armageddon, depending on when Armageddon comes.
When the Letts had their try at liberty, they did not get along any too well. But who do, when they have been restrained so long? Years ago, in Washington, D.C., there was a little boy whose parents were overcautious in taking care of him. He was never allowed to play with other boys; he might get hurt. He was always in the care of a servant who watched his every step. He chafed under the restraints, and one day, when the eyes of his caretaker were diverted for a moment, the lad ran for liberty and was killed by an automobile.
So, when the Latvians had their spell of liberty from August 11, 1920, they divided their parliament of one hundred members into twTenty parties, which is eighteen too many. America has proved that a first-class political fight calls for just two sluggers who mean Iftsiness, or pretend that they do. When there are more than two parties, democracy works poorly. The ten women in the parliament of Latifia wTere sprinkled around among the various political organizations. That was the situation in 1923. In 1934 Karlis Ulmanis, who had been a professor in the University of Nebraska, tried to straighten out the tangle by taking charge of the whole works. He suspended the constitution, replaced parliament with a so-called “state economic council” and a state cultural council, and from then until Russia’s grab of the country in 1940 it was an authoritarian or totalitarian setup.
Under the Ulmanis dictatorship there were sweeping land reforms that broke up both the Russian communal village system and the vast estates of the Baltic barons and the absentee Russian and German and Polish aristocracy. There was created an army of 220,000 small holders out of these huge estates. In taking over the huge German holdings the Letts argued that they were entitled to the land on the theory that it had been stolen from them seven centuries previously. This was slightly irregular, because the regular theory is that if some hundreds of years ago somebody obtained, by theft or murder or otherwise, a title to land or a title as king or queen, then it is their divine right to hold it forever. ,'
Seventy percent of the Latvian people are engaged in agriculture; they have made a great success at it and have been in great demand as teachers of modern farming methods, the use of agricultural machinery and fertilizers, and the standardizing and marketing of products. Of course, World War II has upset everything, but the farms and the farmers are still there, and the future is still future.
Some odd items about Latvia are that wooden plows are still used to some extent, or wTere in 1924; pretzels are exceedingly popular and widely sold by their makers on the public streets; there are a dozen varieties of bread sold in the markets; and, finally, there are Dilling-iers there as elsewhere, and in 1927 one iof them was hanged at two o’cloqjr in the morning (why such an unearthly hour?) as his reward for committing two hundred robberies, of which two were one-man holdups of entire trains, and incidentally killing twenty-two of his fellow men. What he did looks like a smalltown show compared with what has been done since his day.
x Stirring Events in Utah
IT WAS but one Eve that God created and brought to Adam, and God’s will respecting marriage was expressed by His own Son and in His own words: “For this cause shall a man leave father and mother, and shall cleave to his wife: and they twain shall be one flesh.” (Matthew 19:5; Genesis 2:24) It was Sarah that pressed concubinage upon Abraham; it was Laban’s treachery that brought polygamy to Jacob. Noah had but one wife; Shem had but one wife; Ham had but one wife; Japheth had but one wife. Lot had but one wife. Isaac had but one wife. Joseph had but one wife, Moses had but one wife. Job had but one wife. Polygamists were not to be made bishops (overseers) or deacons (assistants). (1 Timothy 3:2, 12) Jehovah God is represented as the husband of one wife (His organization), and Christ Jesus as the spouse of the one and only true bride of Christ, His church.—Ephesians 5: 25-33.
It is not denied that David, Solomon, and many others were polygamists; nor is it denied that there have been, and still are, cases where men have six fingers on each hand and six toes on each foot. So much and no more for the outbreak of polygamy, which is never long out of sight in Utah. Out of every 33 births, 17 are males and 16 are females. The males are more easily killed. The sexes were evidently intended to pair off, one of each. In actual practice, polygamy has brought no blessings to anybody. Never, at any time, was plural marriage practiced by more than 3 percent of the Mormon population. Harems or convents were unknown in Utah. Where a Mormon did have more than one wife he had her and her children in a home by themselves.
The Ogden (Utah) Standard' Examiner comes to hand explaining thus :
Apostle Charles A. Callis said that John Wesley and Charles Wesley, God bless them, in the spirit world are Mormon elders, working with Joseph Smith, shoulder to shoulder.
There is no doubt that Joseph Smith was guided by unclean spirits, demons, devils; and what else can be said for men who, like the Wesleys, spent much of their lives teaching the horrible bias- i phemy of eternal-torture? But it will be a shock to some Methodists (there are 20 kinds) to learn that the Wesleys and the Mormons are now all Mormons together. Of course, it is all pure nonsense. These men are all dead, and if they ever wake up, those who do will be much ashamed of what they once believed and taught.
Released Time in Salt Lake .
Always eager to do anything it can to destroy the American public school system, the Roman Catholic Hierarchy in Utah has joined with the Mormons to “permit” high school, students to attend religious instruction classes off public school premises for one period each day. If the Hierarchy could fix that period so that it would take the entire school day on each of the five days in the week when classes are held, it would be well pleased. The tremendous illiteracy in Roman Catholic countries is proof of this statement. The Protestants are sore and will not participate. About 40 of the 256 denominations are represented in the strife.
At Layton, a few miles north of Salt Lake City, the board of trustees met and solemnly decided that if an American citizen is of Japanese ancestry he may not conduct a business in their midst. They might just as well have decided that he may not conduct it. if he has freckles on his face, or if he has red hair, or if he has false teeth, or if he walks flat-footed, or wears spectacles. Clarence Okuda, born in the United States, moved into Layton in the spring of 1942, opened a grocery, was refused a license to operate it because his ancestors were Japanese, and was threatened with arrest for operating his business without a license. Can you beat that for injustice and narrow-mindedness? He sued for an injunction. What kind of country would America be if nobody with curly hair could be legally employed? Or if everybody must worship the pope or starve?
At Price, the other side of Salt Lake City, on the Denver and Rio Grande railway, were two boys each twelve years of age, who were led astray by just such intelligence as was manifested by those Layton trustees. They set on fire the home of a Japanese-American and his wife, who had five little American children, with just as much right in America as the youngsters who wanted to burn them alive. The boys said that they “wanted to help”. Neighbors broke down the doors and rescued th'e family from the flames. Within a month thereafter the Salt Lake Tribune said editorially of another case, probably in Salt Lake itself:
It is reported and verified by bullet marks that the home of a Japanese family, the head of which had been, interned several weeks ago, was twice the target of fusillades of rifle shots fired from moving automobiles the other night, the first at 00 a.m., and the second two hours later. Only cowards, afraid to enlist and fight for their country and for the maintenance of its integrity, would fire upon the fragile shelter of a mother and five children while the father is in a concentration camp.
The Home of* Guayule and Scheelite
No, Mabel, Guayule is not a Frenchman, and Scheelite is not a German. It is nothing like that. Guayule is a plant that grows in desert places in Utah, Arizona and California, and is one of many shrubs that can be used for making rubber. When the plants are four years old a tractor-drawn vacuum harvests the seeds needed for the plant reproduction. Then the stalks ard1 cut and* pulverized, When the pulp is moistened, the liquid bearing the rubber globules floats to the top. The rubber is then skimmed off and cleaned, and the result is a very good grade of natural rubber. So Utah now is helping to provide rubber for Uncle Sam.
There are vast mineral treasures in Utah. One of these is scheelite. This, it has been discovered, is rich in tungsten. Uncle Sam used 9,027 tons of tungsten in 1937, and of that amount 5,527 tons came from Burma and China, which are not now able to ship any at all. Scheelite, it has been discovered, becomes fluorescent when it is exposed to ultraviolet light. It can thus be quickly identified. Uncle Sam has to have the tungsten, because cemented tungsten carbide, the hardest artificial substance known, is required in today’s activities for the production of tools which can cut or drill the very hard metal castings and alloys so much used. There are 210 minerals in Utah, metallic and non-metallic.
It has been freely admitted by Amer- * ican statesmen that the National Irrigation Law of 1902, by which the government co-operates with the people of the Rocky Mountain and plains states in extending and building up a system of irrigated agriculture, had its inception with the enterprising Mormon pioneers of Utah.
Kruger National Park
LOCATED two hundred miles east of
Johannesburg, on the railway to Lorenco Marques, and stretching north therefrom 200 miles, and' with a width of about 40 miles, the Kruger National Park of 5,000,000 acres in extent is the world’s greatest wild life sanctuary. None may enter or leave the park without permits; they must travel by automobile; they may travel only on the 1,100 miles of automobile roads; they must not get out of the cars except at the park stations.
Motorists often have to slow down to allow lions to get out of the way; they often hear them roaring outside the camps where they stay overnight; they may see families of giraffes, impala, buffalo, elephants, elands, reedbucks, steen-bucks, waterbucks, wildebeests, leopards, hippopotami, kudu, warthogs, zebra, duikers, bushbucks, baboons, tsessebe, jackals, and crocodiles. And when it comes to birds, there are secre-tary*birds, guinea fowl, hornbills, hoopoes, partridge, heron, and other interesting forms of life seldom seen elsewhere. The martial hawk eagle has a nine-foot wing span. The giant baobab tree, shown in one of the park tourist guides, is not less than sixteen feet in diameter.
Termites, or Wood Lice
TERMITES, or wood lice, are' often called "white ants’’, but they are not ants, though they do have many traits in common. The 1,200 kinds of termites do immense injury to man by the destruction of trees, crops, buildings, and goods, Among certain forms of termites there is but one king and one queen and they remain true to the connubial attachment for life, being fed and tended by their numerous progeny. Among some of the termites, the queen may attain a length of four inches, and may lay 4,000 or more eggs a day, and many millions during a lifetime of perhaps ten years. ■
- The termite lives in the ground and works and feeds in wood. To get at the wood he thinks nothing of building vertical tunnels of mud, excretia, saliva and wood dust for as much as three or four feet from the ground into a wooden beam, from wffiich, if he gets the' chance, he will remove most of the cellulose contents, leaving it an empty shell. If he can build on a brick or concrete wall, he may extend his tunnel (he always works in the dark) as much as tw’d stories until he finds some beam that he can rob from the inside.
In southern and tropical Africa, and in Australia, certain species of termites build termitaria, as they are called, which may reach to a height of twenty feet, with a basal diameter of twelve feet. These are formed of earth particles cemented together and are of cementlike hardness. In the deeper recesses of these vast structures the brood is reared, and here the royal cell of the queen termite is located. In the United States -the department of agriculture has estimated the annual damage done by termites at $29,300,000. They eat up houses, telegraph poles, and trees, and, once they get started, are difficult to check. ■
Like ants, the termites have workers, soldiers, chemists and carpenters, and,
f
like ants, they may attack and have at- helpless and in their power. To get rid tacked banians that they believed to be of them, creosote the timbers.
The Special Edition Racket
Occasionally one sees special editions of big and little newspapers, featuring reviews of industry, holidays, anniversaries, and carrying advertising the total of which runs annually to hundreds of millions of dollars. In Fact mentions these, after due and proper mention that modern racketeering had its origin in Chicago newspaper wars between Hearst’s Herald-Examiner and the McCormick-Patterson Tribwic. After remarking that the sluggers and shooters branched oil into the liquor, prostitution and labor field, In Fact returns to the newspaper theme with this one:
The newspaper business, while pretending to be pure as Caesar’s wife in its public relations, privately admits its racket. For example, here is the November, 1942, issue of The National Publisher in which Maynard Knis-kern, publisher of Cranston (R. I.) Herald, says:
“It is not too difficult, as every publisher knows, to ride herd on advertisers . . . and corral them into special pages, anniversary editions, .booster messages, congratulation cards, flag-waving space, and the like. But we" on the Herald have always been opposed to racket pages of this sort. ... It seems to us that to prey on civic spirit, fear of public opinion, or simple vanity, is a mighty poor way of conducting a business, particularly when that business is a newspaper.”
This 1942 quotation brings up to date the old story of corruption of the press which was given to the world in 1934-35 when the Federal Trade Commission published its 73 volumes of testimony showing that the electric light and power lobby (NELA), representing $10,000,000,000, spent an average of $25,000,000 a year corrupting the majority of American newspapers.
Today’s bribery, blackmail, or racketeering, as it is known within the advertising and journalistic professions, consists largely of the special edition in which the corporations which have been- defended and whitewashed throughout the year, and in whose behalf labor has been smeared, and for whom news has been suppressed, can pay off.
Viewing the advertising racket from another angle, that always interesting paper The Railway Clerk explains further :
According to the U. S. Department of Commerce, all sorts of advertising have increased 60 percent over the'prewar level. The money spent for advertising would, if not so spent, go to the Treasury Department in taxes and would help pay for the war. What were these advertisements going to say if they did not advertise to increase sales 7 Well, you know the answer to that one if you read the advertising pages. They told how the dear old Yo-Yo Company is helping win the war. Even for products not even remotely connected with the. war effort, some contribution to the war effort is dragged in by the heels to give the company credit for helping win the war.
The vice-president of the National Association of Manufacturers wryly observed, in speaking to a group of businessmen, that if this trend kept up, the boys in the foxholes, when they got back, would be forced to hire a press agent to convince the public that soldiers, too, had something to do with our victory.
Fourteen Thousand Packing Cases ♦ When William Randolph Hearst bought the Saeramenia monastery in Spain, he had it taken apart stone by stone, packed in 14,000 packing cases, and shipped to New York, where the cases are now for sale. Srf, if you wish to build a monastery for yourself and your family, now is your chance. The path of glory leads to 14,000 useless packing cases.
JSWOR.D ISTkUTH”
-Johnl7:17
Right Use of the Bible
THE true follower of the Son of God, while always interested in all things relating to the Bible, does not give him* self concern in the matter of textual criticisms which are leveled against it by men learned in the world’s wisdom. He does not concern himself about those much more numerous and harmful “higher criticisms” which are made by the religious clergy, which clergy, although set apart by their respective sects to expound the Bible, nevertheless spend time in criticism professedly to make it clearer but really to destroy the belief that it is the revelation of God to man.
To the disciple of Christ it is enough that Jesus accepted the writings of Moses, the law, the historical records, the Psalms, and the prophets as a Godgiven record for the guidance and instruction of all His servants, not excluding himself. To Jesus these sacred writings were a treasure store of God’s revelation of His purpose for man.
. Today the Bible is in greater circulation than ever before. The Bible societies which exist to get it into circulation are active in their work. They ardently further their work abroad; and even during total war times it has continued to be the “best seller”. Yet by the great mass of Christian peoples, who profess to be guided by it, it is held in less esteem than ever; for the critic has been abroad in the land, with the result that confidence in th$ Lord’s Word is very low among Protestants as well as Catholics.
If it is objected that without “scholarly criticism” we do not know that these Scriptures, which we reverence and to which we trust, are the same as those which Jesus knew so well and which He took for His guidance, then let us answer that the Hebrew Scriptures as we have them, which contain the same writings that Jesus used, are consistent with themselves. There is no indication of their having lost or gained in their long journey through the changing centuries down to us. The quotations from the Hebrew Scriptures which were made by Jesus’ apostles and disciples in setting the foundation of the faith and practice of the church of God lix the authority of such Scriptures for the church.
Further, the researches of men of good-will, and even of those who have searched rather to find errors than to find corroboration, have only served to prove to the follower of Christ and to the lover of God that the Bible is singularly free from serious blemishes which might naturally, have so easily gotten into it. To the honest Bible student there is no room for doubt on any matter that is really vital to a true knowledge of God’s will and purp'ose.
To the old Hebrew Scriptures must be added the writings of the apostles, the whole making the complete Word of God, which is to be received by Jesus’ followers now and ultimately by all men that live. Every word of Jesus that has been recorded is part of the revelation of God. Also the accounts written of His birth and works, of His death and resurrection, are received as God-given. The common trivial matters of the early Christians’ daily arrangements and of their communal life were not necessary to the faith and life of the church, and are not recorded.
That the holy spirit or active force of God brought back to the apostles’ memory those things necessary to be recorded and believed is certain. (See John 16:13.) The doings and sayings of the apostles as they instructed the church were made part of the revelation in order to guide the church; and the whole of such forms the Word of God as it must be received, the Word which is able-to make a man wise unto salvation and to make the man of God perfect in his equipment for service. Besides this,_ it should be understood that the Scriptures are God’s wntness to Himself. Its prophecies were placed on record that when, in God’s due time, their time for fulfillment would come, they would thus be a proof that Jehovah alone is God. None other than Jehovah could foretell the future; and there are thousands of years between the prophecies and the events which have fulfilled them.
How is the Word of God to be used? Moses told Israel that the things which he taught them about God they were to bind on their hand for a sign, and have • them for frontlets between their eyes. How literally this was to be understood is not certain. Israel was to write the instruction of Moses on the door posts; that is, some reminder, a text as we would say, was to be written there as nowadays we have mottoes with Scripture words for hanging on the walls of dwellings. But the Israelites were also to write the words of the law on their hearts; that is, they were to lay them up in their minds so as to be able to meditate on them day and night, abroad or at home; and to preserve them by telling their children the story of God’s wonderful dealings with them, and of all His goodness.-—Deuteronomy 6: 4-9. ' The Israelites in, the days of their nation’s degeneracy made a great profession of reverence for the law of God, and with great ostentation wore their phylacteries, with passages from the law, on their arms and on their foreheads. But it was almost all for outward show. Jesus did not condemn the Pharisees for wearing a phylactery; all He said was that they made them broad so as to call the people’s attention to their claim to reverence for the law. At the same time the Word of God was not in their minds, nor the love of the Word of God in their hearts. The organized systems of “'Christendom” have made the same profession of reverence for the whole of the Bible as the Jew did for His sacred writings, the Hebrew Scriptures. But they have done exactly as the Jew did. The religious systems of Rome and of England have done little to explain or expound the Word of God. Each, based its claim upon the Word, and founded its ceremonies and creeds, and then expected no further light on the Scriptures.
In later days, as Protestantism began to be broken up into sects, more attention was paid to the Bible. In still later days sects have arisen which have called attention to certain texts of Scripture and, by making “a belief" out of their choice, have emphasized them. Thus it has come about that with many there is a much wider knowledge of the text of the Word of God than ever before. It is apparent that a knowledge of certain texts is not in itself of service; indeed, frequently such knowledge does more harm than good, because pride takes the place of a humble desire to serve God. “Knowledge puffeth up,” says 1 Corinthians 8:1, and this refers especially to Bible knowledge. But, granted a knowledge of the truth of the Bible, and humility along with it, also a desire to glorify God by means of that knowledge, then the more of it that Christ’s follower has, the better he can serve his Master. Thus he makes right use of the Word of God, the Bible.
The law of the Lord is perfect, converting the soul; the testimony of the Lord is sure, making wise the simple. The statutes of the Lord are right, rejoicing the heart: the commandment of the Lord is pure, enlightening the eyes. The fear of the Lord is clean, enduring for ever: the judgments of the Lord are true and righteous altogether. More to be desired are they than gold, yea, than much fine gold: sweeter also than honey and the honeycomb. Moreover by them is thy servant warned: and in keeping of them there is great reward.—Psalm 19:7-11.
Current Education
IN ITS survey of 7,000 freshmen in
36 American colleges the New York Times discovered that 25 percent of the* _ students did not know that Lincoln was president of the United States during * the Civil War; 30 percent did not know that Woodrow Wilson was president of the United States during World War I, and 85 percent did not know that William McKinley was president of the United States during the Spanish-American war. Only 6 percent could name the original 13 states of the Union, and only 40 percent connected Robert Fulton with the steamboat or Alexander Graham Bell with the telephone. Many had only the haziest and most ridiculous ideas as to where the various states are located, what are the contents of the Bill of Rights, or what Thomas Jefferson contributed to American institutions. Whatever else they had been taught, they knew but little about their own country.
Those with their eyes open can see that what is going on all over the world is a campaign to keep the people in ignorance of the things they have a right to know. How apparent that was in Poland, for example, where the Nazi rulers decreed that there should be no schoolbooks in the Polish language; and in Belgium, where all mention of the in-■ vasion of the country by Germany in 1914 was forbidden! The German authorities have said that they would make the French people forget all about the French Revolution.
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