Very often Catholicism
is presented in the English speaking world as being rather primitive.
The worldly-wise English look particularly on their Catholic neighbours,
the Irish, French and Spanish and the inhabitants of that country where
the Church of Rome has her seat, the Italians, with a mixture of pity
and suspicion. So many children! So poor! Such slaves to their tyrannical
religion! Here in South Africa of course we are not so subject to those
notions since although here, as in England, Catholics are in a very small
minority, there is no behemoth state religion to impose prejudice on its
population through the media at its disposal, primarily state schools,
and later television. In fact, in this country Catholic schools have enjoyed
such a reputation that many seek to enrol their children despite not sharing
the faith of the Church. Even our own small parish school, St. John the
Baptist, enjoys standards which many a state school today can only dream
of.
In this month’s issue we reprint that section of Cardinal Newman’s Apologia pro sua vita which he wrote on his conversion to Catholicism in the middle of the nineteenth century. Known throughout England as a towering intellectual his conversion brought about dismay at a time when Catholicism was barely out of the stage of open persecution. People could not understand how a man who was so manifestly clever, or better said intelligent, could convert to a religion so inimical to the popular liberal way of life at the time. He was the subject of many calumnies from non-Catholics and suspicion from his co-religionists. In response he wrote a clear and well-reasoned defence not only of Catholicism in general but also of the foundation of his conversion. His attitude to Infallibility is particularly illuminating and was a source of great controversy. To many in England at the time it was simply a nonsense to proclaim that a man could not make a mistake and the suspicions of the non-believers were not assuaged by certain prominent Catholics uttering such wishes as “I should like a Papal infallible statement delivered every day with my copy of the Times at breakfast”. Treading very carefully between the jingoism of the Ultramontanes and the scorn of his Protestant countrymen he clearly defended the teaching while at the same time putting it in the perspective of nineteen hundred years of Christianity. His explanations and his warnings are as valid today as they were then and are another proof of the wisdom as well as the piety of the Church of Christ.
The Editor and staff take this opportunity to wish all our readers a holy and fruitful season of Lent.
