Episcopal
Silver
Jubilee
'L'l B R.AR.Y
OF THE
U N IVER.SITY
or ILLINOIS
LIBRARY OF
M. W. KELLY.
I DO NOT LEND.
2279
V-
Z- 7
T*
RT. REV. JOHN LANCASTER SPALDINO, D. D.
Bislwp of Pcoria
SOUVENIR
of the
(Episcopal ^itoer Jubilee
of the
Rt. Rev. J. L. Spalding, D. D,
BISHOP o/PEORIA
1903
PRESS OF HOLLISTER BROTHERS
CHICAGO
"B
3fntrolmctorp
In response to the unanimous desire of the priests of the
; diocese, a meeting of the Diocesan Deans was held early in
February at St. Patrick's rectory, Peoria, to consider the man-
ner of celebrating fittingly the Episcopal Jubilee of the Rt.
Rev. J. L. Spalding on May I, 1902. Auxiliary Bishop
:" O'Reilly was voted into the chair, Dean Keating of Ottawa
^ elected secretary and Vicar General Weldon of Bloomington
made treasurer. Committees on various arrangements were
appointed and ordered to report to the general meeting to be
called by the chairman. Within a few days the following
letter was sent to the priests of the diocese:
SILVER JUBILEE YEAR DIOCESE OF PEORIA.
Rev. and Dear Father:
On May the first, of this year, Bishop Spalding will cele-
brate the twenty-fifth anniversary of his elevation to the
Episcopate. By a rare and happy coincidence, the occasion
. will also commemorate the "Silver Jubilee" of the diocese, and
witness the consecration of the Cathedral. His Eminence
Cardinal Gibbons and many other eminent prelates and ec-
j: clesiastics will take part in the: celebration. At a meeting
.of the deans of the diocese held recently in Peoria, a resolu-
v tion to present to Bishop Spalding a substantial testimonial
J on his "Jubilee Day" was unanimously adopted. It was also
moved and carried that Very Rev. M. Weldon, V. G., be made
treasurer, and that the Auxiliary Bishop be requested to send
a circular to the priests of the diocese, asking for contribu-
tions to the fund. In accepting this trust, I would suggest
that all subscriptions towards the proposed testimonial be sent
to the treasurer at least one week before Jubilee Day, May the
first, nineteen hundred and two. Yours very truly,
P. J. O'REILLY, Auxiliary Bishop.
Peoria, February 28, 1902.
At a subsequent and final meeting of the deans all com-
mittees reported and the details of the celebration were agreed
upon. Following the first Solemn Pontifical Mass at the
newly consecrated Cathedral it was decided that a noonday
banquet should be given in the recital hall of Spalding Insti-
tute, at which felicitations were to be offered the Rt. Rev.
Jubilarian by the distinguished guests and by representatives
of the diocese. Bishop O'Reilly was appointed to act as
toastmaster and the assignment of toasts and speakers made.
Before adjournment a committee was empowered to decide
all questions of detail that should not have been anticipated
and settled in the full meeting.
Meanwhile Rev. Francis J. O'Reilly, rector of St. Mary's
Cathedral, acting under direction of Bishop Spalding, was
making preparation for the consecration of the cathedral and
for the celebration of the Golden Jubilee of St. Mary's Parish.
On account of the time required it was thought best to have
the solemn ceremony of consecration performed a day before
the other functions of the jubilee. So thoroughly was the
work of preparation accomplished that nothing was left un-
done to make the triple celebration memorable.
f olju iUncastrr
When on May i, 1877, John Lancaster Spalding, priest
assistant in St. Michael's Parish, New York city, was con-
secrated First Bishop of the Diocese of Peoria, this city was
made the abiding place of a vital force in American life. The
inheritance of talent and piety come to him from a sound-
hearted, wholesome race, had been so largely increased by his
personal worth that he at once took high rank in a distin-
guished hierarchy.
The Spaldings are an old English Catholic family from
Lancashire, where Spalding Abbey, founded in the middle
ages, still stands as a monument to their early devotedness to
the church. The American Spaldings date their origin in the
early days of Lord Baltimore. For two hundred and fifty
years the numerous branches of the family have been con-
spicuously active in the development of Maryland and Ken-
tucky. No name shines brighter in the annals of the Catholic
Church in America than that of Martin John Spalding, Arch-
bishop of Baltimore.
John Lancaster Spalding was born in Lebanon, Kentucky,
June 2, 1840. Early in the days of his boyhood he began to
show signs of the priestly vocation and set about fitting him-
self for that holy calling. His preparatory studies finished at
St. Mary's, Kentucky, he went to Mount St. Mary's, Emmits-
burg, and to Mount St. Mary's, Cincinnati, thence to the Amer-
ican College, Louvain, Belgium, where he was ordained priest
in 1863. Among his classmates at this institution, which had
been founded a short time before by his uncle, Archbishop
Spalding, was Archbishop Riordan of San Francisco. A year
then spent in special studies in Rome left him thoroughly
equipped to begin his life work. In 1865 he entered upon his
priestly career at the Cathedral of Louisville. Even at this
time he was a scholar of such marked attainments that he was
chosen theologian to Archbishop Blanchet of Oregon at the
second Plenary Council of Baltimore in 1866. With Father
Hecker, the Paulist, and Father Ryan, now Archbishop of
JO Episcopal Silver Jubilee
Philadelphia, he was selected though but twenty-six years of
age for the rare honor of preaching at the Council.
His labors, on his return to Louisville, included the found-
ing of a parish for negroes, which, in spite of many difficulties,
he completed and left in a flourishing condition after three
years of zealous and persistent effort. In 1872 death ended
the strenuous career of his illustrious uncle. Father Hecker,
to whose keeping the archbishop's papers had been entrusted,
persuaded that the records of a life so worthy should be cast
in permanent form, set about finding some one equal to the
task. His choice fell upon Father Spalding, who left his par-
ish in Louisville and took residence in the House of the Paul-
ist Fathers in New York in order to devote his uninterrupted
thought to this labor of love.
When the life of Archbishop Spalding was published it
was accepted as the best biography in American Catholic lit-
erature. One distinguished critic, Brownson, says: "It
proves the author an accomplished literary man, a deep, earn-
est thinker, a learned and enlightened theologian, and a de-
voted priest. . . The author shows a breadth of view, a
depth of reflection, a knowledge of the moral and spiritual
wants of modern society, of the dangers of the country and
the real issue of the hour, that promise the country an au-
thor of the first order, and to the church a distinguished
servant."
Father Spalding did not return to Kentucky, but resumed
work as assistant to Father Donnelly at St. Michael's Church,
New York. A preacher of rare excellence, he soon impressed
himself on the thought of the city; priests and people flocked
to hear the orator who could make men think.
From this field of promise, while still an assistant priest,
he was called to another sphere of activity in the newly erected
Diocese of Peoria. He accepted the responsibility and was
consecrated Bishop of Peoria in St. Patrick's Cathedral, New
York, May I, 1877. Here his work has been writ large; he
that runs may read. Churches, schools and charitable insti-
tutions have sprung up everywhere; waning parishes having
waxed strong again; scattered communities have been united
into parishes; a strong, purposeful priesthood has been
John Lancaster Sp aiding n
formed, and all in a spirit of such kindly and masterful leader-
ship that not once in twenty-five years has an appeal been
made against his judgment.
But a diocese afforded too narrow a scope for action. He
had a message for mankind. Keen observation and study had
convinced him that Catholics were slow to understand that
America meant opportunity for the church. Most of them
were gathered in a few cities. The vast numbers of immi-
grants who came from many countries of Europe, especially
from Ireland, were swallowed up in the large centers of pop-
ulation. For generations they had tilled the land at home and
could not suddenly enter another kind of life without danger
to themselves and, perhaps, ultimate deterioration for their
children. With wise prevision of these lamentable conse-
quences Bishop Spalding, in association with Archbishop Ire-
land, established the Catholic Colonization Society for the pur-
pose of placing the immigrant farmers on the fertile prairies
of the West. It was a magnificent conception. In time pros-
perous parishes, flourishing dioceses would spring up; the
church, unhampered, would grow into vigorous life, and in
free America the dream of centuries would come true.
Notwithstanding the immense labor and energy of its two
great promoters, the plan did not wholly succeed. The immi-
grants are still in the cities ; the land is held by a thriftier race ;
the opportunity is gone forever, while the prosperity of the
colonies that were established proves the wisdom of their
founders.
Through a lecture on "The Higher Education of the
Priesthoood," delivered at the Silver Jubilee of the Salesianum
of Milwaukee, the Catholic world was made aware of another
grand conception that had for some time been taking form in
the mind of Bishop Spalding. In due season it was given ex-
pression in the Catholic University of America at Washing-
ton. During the years of its existence it has developed more
and more into the ideal seat of universal knowledge that is to
be the intellectual center of American Catholicity. In many
other ways has he shown deep interest in things educational.
The comprehensive Catholic educational exhibit at the World's
Columbian Exposition in Chicago, was due to his breadth of
12 Episcopal Silver Jubilee
view in the office of President of the Board. Spalding In-
stitute, a boy's high school established in Peoria, will be a
fitting memorial to his munificent faith in education. Bishop
Spalding is by nature a teacher. The deepest purpose of his
life and writings is to lead men to higher life, to, give em-
phasis to the divine in man. He is the embodiment of his
own ideas. America has no finer type of the cultured Chris-
tian gentleman; an uncynical sage, a thinker unafraid, a
churchman without cant, an unselfish patriot, a large-minded,
genuine, reverent man.
His writings have the ring of kindly sincerity; he writes
himself into books. In the life of Archbishop Spalding one
can feel the throbbing of a great heart.
"Essays and Reviews," a reprint of articles that appeared
in the Catholic World, is a volume of rugged discussion of
church questions, supplemented by a charming "Essay on Re-
ligion and Art." "The Religious Mission of the Irish Peo-
ple" was written to further the cause of the Catholic Coloniza-
tion Society, but will long outlive .the occasion that inspired it.
Two books of virile verse, "America and Other Poems," and
"The Poet's Praise" gave assurance that the versatile Bishop
of Peoria was a poet. The assurance has been made doubly
sure by the translation, "Songs, Chiefly From the German,"
which has the rare merit of recreating both the body and the
soul of the originals, and by the illuminating and inspiring
"God and the Soul" that no thoughtful man would willingly
let die.
But thus far his literary fame will rest on his series of es-
says on education. In these four volumes, "Education and the
Higher Life," "Things of the Mind," "Thoughts and Theories
of Life and Education" and "Opportunity and Other Essays,"
there is the crystallizing in brilliant expression of his pro-
foundest thought. No more stirring appeals to higher man-
hood have been uttered in these latter days.
His latest writings, "Religion, Agnosticism and Educa-
tion" and "Socialism and Labor and Other Arguments" show
that the sympathy of a man may be united to the genius of
a thinker. At the beginning of this new century Bishop Spald-
ing stands prophet-like apart to remind men of the nobler
purposes of living.
Of THE
ST. MARY'S CATHEDRAL
John Lancaster Spalding 13
Cfte Consecration of bt Jftat#$ Cathedral
[From the New World.}
St. Mary's Cathedral was consecrated Tuesday morning
according to the elaborate and impressive form prescribed by
the Church. The service began at 6 o'clock and was concluded
at ii o'clock. The public was excluded until the ceremony
was nearly completed, Rt. Rev. P. J. O'Reilly, auxiliary bishop
of the Diocese of Peoria, was the consecrator, and was assisted
by Father Edmund, deacon; Father Cornelius, subdeacon;
Father Greve, archpriest; Fathers Durkin and O'Neill, assist-
ing priests, Fathers Sammon, Cummings, Fennan, Walters,
Otto, Sullivan and Mainville.
Promptly at 6 o'clock Bishop O'Reilly presented himself
at the chapel of the cathedral which contained the relics, be-
fore which candles had been burning all night, and upon en-
tering directed the candles, twelve in number, and in scones
against the walls of the cathedral, to be lighted.
Going to the entrance of the church the Bishop knelt at
the door reciting, with the clergy, the antiphon and the litanies
of the saints. After having laid aside the crozier and doffing
his mitre he prayed aloud, and the prayer being finished, began
the exorcism of the water.
Having repeated the formula prescribed by the Church, the
Bishop cast the salt into the water and traced the form of the
cross above the vessel, repeating: "Be this salt and water
mingled together. In the name of the Father, and of the Son,
and of the Holy Ghost," making the sign of the cross at each
name. Then with an appropriate prayer the water was blessed
and the Bishop sprinkled it upon the surrounding clergy and a
group of th,e parishioners who had gathered, as well as upon
himself, intoning meantime the Antiphon.
While the choir continued to chant the Bishop resumed
his mitre and preceded by two acolytes bearing lighted tapers
he turned to the right, and accompanied by the assisting
clergy and parishioners, made a complete circuit of the church,
14 Episcopal Silver Jubilee
sprinkling the upper part of the walls and the ground below
with the water.
When the circuit was complete the Bishop stopped in front
of the church doors again and laid aside the mitre and sprink-
ler, while the sacred ministers joined him in responsive prayer.
Resuming the mitre and crozier, with the end of the latter he
knocked at the church door, repeating the closing stanzas of
the Sixty-fourth Psalm, the deacon inside chanting the re-
sponses. For the third time the round of the church was
made, the Bishop sprinkling the walls, while the choir chanted
Benedic Domine domum istam.
Upon returning, the mitre and sprinkler were put away,
and taking up the crozier the Bishop knocked at the door for
the third time, again chanting the Sixty-fourth Psalm, while
the deacon responded. At the close Bishop O'Reilly, in a
loud tone, said, "Lift up your gates, O Princes," and with
the crozier knocked on the door. The deacon from within
asking, "Who is this King of Glory?" The Bishop and the
clergy respond, "The Lord of Hosts; He is the King of
Glory," adding, "Open, open, open."
Accompanied by the assisting clergy the Bishop then en-
tered the church, followed by the workmen who were to close
the sepulchre of relics, and said: "Peace be to this house."
The responses were followed by the singing of the Pax
Aeterna by the choir. Having laid aside the mitre and
crozier, kneeling before the faldstool the Bishop intoned the
Veni Creator. To the concourse of people who had gathered
on the outside as the door closed the moment was full of im-
pressiveness. The soft, bright sunshine shedding its peaceful
light over the massive gray walls seemed to carry forward the
benediction in progress inside, and the chanting of the priests,
now and again drowned in the bursts of glorious music from
the organ and the choir, lifted the imagination above even the
glories of sun and beauties of the bursting buds and springing
grass.
In imagination one could see the devout acolyte as he
traced the form of the cross in ashes upon the church and the
Bishop in the center while the choir chanted the litanies of the
saints. Then came the wonderful canticle of Zacharias, and
John Lancaster Spalding 15
the mind's eye saw the Bishop trace the letters of the Greek
and Latin alphabets in the ashes of the cross.
Following the elaborate sanctification of the altar, the
Bishop traced the sign of the cross in the center and in each
of the corners, making a circuit of the altar seven times,
sprinkling it with the water and using hyssop, while the Mis-
erere was being chanted by the choir. Then making the cir-
cuit of the interior of the Cathedral he thrice blessed the walls
and floor. The cement to be used in closing the sepulchre of
relics having been blessed the Bishop and the clergy proceeded
to the chapel where the relics are in keeping in the sacred
casket.
The return of the procession with the relics is headed by
two acolytes bearing lighted tapers. After them comes the
cross bearer and then follow the priests bearing the bier upon
which rests the casket, while the thurifers constantly sway
the incense over and around it and the Bishop, fully vested, in-
tones the Antiphon.
At this point Bishop O'Reilly returned to the door of the
church, and, seated upon the faldstool, there repeated the con-
secration address, after which Archpriest Greve read two of
the decrees of the Council of Trent concerning any attempt
to subvert the use of the property, and at the conclusion the
choir chanted the Erit mihi Dominus while the Bishop re-
mained seated.
The chant being concluded the clergy returned to the
church, where again the imagination must picture the placing
of the relic bier within the altar and the sealing of the stone
with the consecrated cement, the Bishop placing the first
trowel ful in place when the closing stone has been set by the
assisting clergy. Again the Antiphon is chanted, while the
assisting priests clear away the last vestige of mortar, and
then the Bishop blesses the altar once more.
It was now about 10 145, and a considerable number of the
parishioners had gathered at the church. These were now
admitted, while the Eighty-sixth Psalm was chanted. The
Bishop formed five crosses of incense in each corner and in the
center of the altar, and having placed wax tapers upon them,
lighted the latter. While they were being consumed he laid
16 Episcopal Silver Jubilee
aside his mitre and intoned an alleluia. When the ashes
had been removed by the assistant priest, the Mass for the
dedication of a church was celebrated, and the Bishop gave the
solemn blessing to the congregation.
THE SOLEMN PONTIFICAL MASS.
[Prom the Peoria Journal^
Right Reverend John Lancaster Spalding's Silver Jubilee
as Bishop of the Roman Catholic Diocese of Peoria is being
celebrated today, this being the twenty-fifth anniversary of his
consecration. The exercises began with a grand procession
of the local and visiting clergy from Spalding Institute to St.
Mary's Cathedral at 9 145 this morning, followed by the cele-
bration of Solemn Pontifical High Mass by Bishop Spalding
at the cathedral, and the jubilee sermon, preached by Cardinal
Gibbons.
No more ideal day for the celebration could have been
wished, and long before the hour set for the procession to
move from Spalding Institute, Madison avenue was thronged
with sightseers from Fayette to Green streets. Promptly at
9 145 the great entrance door of the institute swung back and
the crossbearer and the acolytes stepped forth into the light,
the sun glancing from the golden crucifix and reflected by the
lamps of the acolytes. Behind them came the priests two
hundred and fifty in number in cassock and surplice, walking
two by two. Then followed the members of the hierarchy,
each attended by a chaplain, and finally Cardinal Gibbons
with train bearers. The rich robes of the Archbishops and
Bishops, in purple and white and gold, were set off by the
somber and severe dress of a company of monks, who walked
two by two, their heads reverently bowed. The hum of voices,
and the gay laughter which had echoed up and down the street
died away with the appearance of the head of the procession,
and during the march to the cathedral no sound was heard
save the steady tramp of reverend feet.
John Lancaster Spalding 17
PONTIFICAL HIGH MASS.
Crowds assembled at the cathedral doors long before the
services began. Pewholders and those having tickets entitling
them to seats in pews were the first admitted, and the large
force of ushers had all they could do to take care of the im-
mense throng who had admission tickets only. These were
obliged to stand till after the entrance of the procession.
The splendid blending of color in the banners of richest
yellow, significant of the papal power, and the long draperies
of bishop's purple, the red, white and blue of the flag, the yards
upon yards of festooned smilax and the flower bedecked altars
formed a fitting setting for the most gorgeous ceremony ever
witnessed in Peoria. A beautiful picture was the chancel, the
high altar ablaze with light, backed by masses of lilies and
delicate traceries of smilax. To the left the altar of the Blessed
Virgin was covered with roses and carnations, all in pink, and
at the right the deep crimson of roses was artistically mingled
with the white of the lilies on the altar of St. Joseph.
It was after ten when the acolytes leading the long pro-
cession of priests entered the great doors J;o the inspiring
strains of the organ and orchestra. After the long line of the
young attendants in their cassocks of purple and collars of
white came the priests of the diocese, more than one hundred
of them. Following them entered the Franciscan Fathers,
their plain habits being the one dark spot in the procession,
the purple of the robes of the Bishops and Archbishops, whom
they immediately preceded, looking all the richer by contrast.
Bishop Spalding entered the cathedral, whose splendid pro-
portions are an eloquent tribute to some of the work the
Bishop has accomplished in his twenty-five years here, at-
tended by three priests of the diocese. These three attendants
wore chasubles of cloth of gold and were striking figures in
the long line. At the last came Cardinal Gibbons robed in the
brilliant scarlet of his office, his refined and intellectual face a
benediction in itself. It took some minutes for the reverend
fathers to reach their places in the chancel, and during the
interval between their being seated and the beginning of the
mass, Bishop Spalding was robed for the celebration of the
i8 Episcopal Silver Jubilee
mass. As he approached the altar the choir began the
Kyrie Eleison. After the singing of the gospel Cardinal Gib-
bons was escorted to the pulpit by two of the priests, where
he read the gospel for the day, before beginning his eloquent
address. The Cardinal's voice is not a strong one, but the
beauty and clearness of his tone made every word distinct to
the very limits of the walls.
THE SERMON
Isaias Ix. 1-5. "Arise, be enlightened, O, Jerusalem,
for thy light is come, and the glory of the Lord is risen upon
thee. For behold darkness shall cover the earth, and a mist
the people; but the Lord shall arise upon thee, and his glory
shall be seen upon thee. And the Gentiles shall walk in thy
light, and kings in the brightness of thy rising. Lift up thy
eyes round about, and see : all these are gathered together, they
are come to thee; thy sons shall come from afar, and thy
daughters shall rise up at thy side. Then shalt thou see, and
abound, and thy heart shall wonder and be enlarged, when the
multitude of the sea shall be converted to thee, the strength
of the Gentiles shall come to thee."
In these words the great Prophet Isaiah foreshadows the
future expansion and glory of the Christian church. Let us
briefly sketch the history of this marvelous development.
Let us transport ourselves in spirit to the dawn of the
Christian era, and let us stand in imagination on one of Pagan
Rome's seven hills. We see at our feet the immense city
teeming with a population of about three millions of inhabi-
tants, according to the estimate of Gibbons. We observe that
metropolis dotted here and there with idolatrous temples, and
niches of false gods erected in the corners of the streets.
Those people are given up to every species of idolatry. They
worship the sun and moon and stars of heaven. The seas and
rivers, the mountains and groves have their tutelary divinities.
They worship every striking object in nature. They worship
every being except God alone, to whom alone divine homage
is due. In the words of the Apostle of the Gentiles, "they
changed the glory of the incorruptible God into the image and
UBMRV
Of THE
Of
His EMINENCE JAMES CARDINAL GIBBONS
Archbishop of Baltimore
John Lancaster Spalding ip
likeness of corruptible men, and of birds and beasts and creep-
ing things, and they worshipped the creature instead of the
Creator who is blessed for evermore."
Rome was the focus of idolatry of the empire. Every di-
vinity that was adored throughout the vast dominions of
Rome had his temple or his shrine in the imperial city.
What I say of Rome, I might affirm of the Roman Empire,
and what I affirm of the Roman Empire, I could assert of the
civilized world, for Rome was mistress of the world. Her em-
pire extended into Europe, as far as the river Danube; it
extended into Asia as far as the Tigris and Euphrates, and
into Africa as far as Mauritania. The whole world, with the
exception of Palestine, was buried in the darkness of idolatry.
Such was the condition of society when our Lord appeared
on the theatre of public life. He calls around Him twelve in-
significant men men without wealth, destitute of human
learning, men without the prestige of fame, men without po-
litical, or social, or family influence, men without any of the
elements which are considered at all times essential for the suc-
cess of any great enterprise. He commands them to effect the
most mighty moral revolution that has ever occurred in the his-
tory of the world. He commands them to uproot idolatry from
the face of the earth, and to substitute in its stead the worship
of the one, true, living God. He commands them to eradicate
the most darling and inveterate passions from the hearts of
men, and to plant in their stead the peaceful reign of Jesus
Christ.
Well might the gospel which these men went forth to plant,
be compared to the little grain of mustard seed, small and
imperceptible in the beginning, but expanding into a luxuriant
tree, spreading its branches far and wide, so that the nations
of the earth, might be sheltered beneath its ample foliage, and
be nourished by its perennial fruit. And well might these
Apostles be compared to twelve little streams, deepening and
broadening as they advanced, and not inundating the earth
as of old, with the waters of destruction, but refreshing it with
the rivers of eternal life.
The Apostles had implicit faith in their Divine Master
when He commanded them to preach the gospel to all nations.
2O Episcopal Silver Jubilee
They knew He was God. They knew that His word was
truth, that His word was power and omnipotence. They had
been witnesses of His miracles. They knew that He who
said in the beginning: "Let there be light, and there was
light" let the earth bring forth fruit, and it came forth
they knew that He would now, through their instrumentality,
cause the light of faith to shine on the darkened intellects of
men, and the fruit of santification to grow abundantly in their
hearts. And therefore they go forth, nothing hesitating, and
resolved to communicate the saving knowledge of Jesus Christ
to every portion of the Roman dominions.
They parcel out the Roman Empire among themselves.
Their only weapon is the cross ; their only credentials, the gos-
pel of Christ. St. Peter commences his apostolic ministry in
Jerusalem, where his first sermon is followed by the conversion
of three thousand souls, some of whom had, no doubt, wit-
nessed the crucifixion of our Savior, and perhaps even had a
hand in His death. He afterwards established his see in An-
tioch, and finally suffers martyrdom in Rome.
St. Paul, the indefatigable teacher of the Gentiles, traverses
through various parts of Europe and Asia, everywhere bear-
ing the torch of faith. St. Andrew preaches in Syria and
Greece. St. John evangelizes Ephesus and Asia Minor. St.
James announces the glad tidings in Judea and Galilee. St.
Thomas carries the light of the gospel to the remote Indies,
and traces of the Christianity that he there established, were
discovered by St. Francis Xavier when he visited that country
in the sixteenth century. And so on of the other Apostles.
In the words of St. Paul, "their sound hath gone forth to all
the earth, and their words to the ends of the whole world."
But if we are amazed at what I might call the pious au-
dacity of the Apostles and their immediate successors in under-
taking the herculean task of converting the nations, we are still
more astonished when we contemplate the result of their la-
bors. St. Paul, about thirty years after our Lord's crucifixion,
writes these words to the Romans: "I give thanks to God
through Jesus Christ, that your faith is spoken of throughout
the whole world," and, of course, spoken of by men who were
in sympathy and communion with the faith of Rome.
John Lancaster Spalding 21
St. Justin, whose death occurred sixty-six years after the
death of St. John the Evangelist, says : "There is no race of
people, whether Greeks or barbarians, among whom prayers
and the Eucharist are not offered to God the Father and Maker
of all things, in the name of Jesus Christ crucified."
Tertullian, who was born about the year 160 of the Chris-
tian era, does not hesitate to address these words to the Roman
Emperor : "We are but of yesterday, and we have filled your
empire. Your cities, your towns, your islands, your forests,
your army, your senate, your palace and forum swarm with
Christians. We have left nothing to you except your empty
temples."
St. Irenaeus, who lived in the same century, bears wit-
ness also of the marvelous growth of the Gospel in his day,
and he is careful to tell us that the faith of these times was
everywhere identical. "As the light," he says, "which illumines
this world is everywhere the same because it proceeds from the
same great luminary of day, so is the light of faith that shines
on the intellects of men everywhere identical, because it pro-
ceeds from Jesus Christ, the eternal Sun of Justice."
What a contrast presents itself to our minds between the
peaceful conquests of the Apostles and their successors, on the
one hand, and the bloody victories achieved by the great gen-
erals of antiquity on the other, whether we consider the wea-
pons with which they fought, or the battles which they won,
or the duration of their victories. Alexander the Great, who
may be considered one of the greatest generals of ancient
times, subdued nations by wading through the blood of his
fellow-beings. By the sword he conquered, and by the sword
he kept his subjects in bondage. But scarcely was he con-
signed to the grave, when his empire was dismembered, and his
subjects shook off the yoke which had been imposed upon
them.
The Apostles conquered kingdoms for their Divine Master,
not by force, but by persuasion; not by the material sword,
but "by the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God;"
not by shedding the blood of others, but by the voluntary shed-
ding of their own blood ; not by enslaving the bodies of men,
but by rescuing their souls from the bondage of sin. And
22 Episcopal Silver Jubilee
the spiritual republic which they founded exists unto this day;
is constantly extending its lines, and is kept together, not by
frowning fortifications and standing armies, but by the divine
influence of religious and moral sanctions.
What does this prove? It proves that the pen and the
voice are mightier than the sword. It proves that "peace hath
her victories no less renowned than war/' aye, victories more
substantial and more enduring. It proves that all schemes
conceived in passion and fomented by lawless ambition are
doomed, like the mountain torrent, to carry terror before
them, and to leave ruin and desolation after them; while the
actions of men laboring in the name and under the inspiration
of God, are destined, like the gentle dew of heaven, to shed
silent blessings around them, and to bring forth abundant fruit
in due season.
No rational and dispassionate mind can review the history
of the infant Church without discerning the stamp of divinity
impressed upon her brow. When we consider the rapid
growth of the Christian religion, and the feeble instruments
that were employed to produce such results ; when we consider
the hostility which the Apostles encountered in the whole
course of their ministry ; when we consider the opposition they
met with from the learned and from the populace, from the
priests of the pagan superstition and from the established gov-
ernment itself; above all, when we reflect on the sublime and
austere moral code which they proclaimed to a people whose
religion tolerated and even sanctioned the most dissolute mor-
als, we are forced to admit that Christianity was divine and
miraculous in its origin.
Well did St. Paul sound this keynote when he exclaimed :
"The foolish things of the world hath God chosen that He
might confound the wise, and the weak things of the world
hath God chosen that He might confound the strong, and the
things that are contemptible, and the things that are not, that
He might bring to naught the things that are, that no flesh
should glory in His sight."
And, indeed, the wisdom of God is specially manifested in
the adoption of means utterly disproportioned to the end to be
attained, so that the world might be convinced that Christian-
John Lancaster Spalding 23
ity was the work of God and not of man, and that all the glory
should redound to God.
For, if Christ had appeared in all the pomp and splendor
of a temporal sovereign, if He had associated with Him the
power of Caesar, if He had impressed into His service the
armies of imperial Rome, the world would justly exclaim :
There is no miracle here, for Christianity was propagated, not
by the finger of God, but by the arms of the flesh. Or, if
our Lord had employed in the service of His religion the
poets and orators, the historians and other literary men of his
age; if he had inspired a Virgil and an Ovid, a Cicero and a
Tacitus to wield their pen and raise their voices in attestation
of the new religion, then the world would cry out : There is
no miracle here, for the Christian religion was propagated not
by the folly of the cross, but by "the persuasive work of hu-
man wisdom." Or, if our Savior had appeared as the pos-
sessor and distributor of immense wealth, if He had lavished
bribes and bounties to induce men to embrace His religion,
then the world would say, there is no miracle here, for men
were drawn to the Christian religion, not by "the pearl of
great price," but by the gold which glitters. But when we be-
hold Christianity established by the weapons of weakness, hu-
mility and poverty, we are forced to exclaim : "The finger of
God is here."
The historian Gibbon, the author of "The Decline and
Fall of the Roman Empire," was obliged to admit the won-
derful growth of the Christian religion in the first three
centuries. But he endeavored to divest this achievement of its
miraculous character, and to explain the phenomenon on
purely rational grounds. He ascribes the spread of Chris-
tianity to these five great causes: ist. The indomitable zeal
of the primitive Christians; 2d. Their pure and blameless
lives; 3d. Their unshaken belief in the immortality of the
soul; 4th. Their alleged power of working miracles; 5th.
Their admirable organization.
There is no doubt indeed that these causes exerted a pow-
erful influence in the propagation of Christianity. But I main-
tain that these causes were totally inadequate to accomplish
the results which followed; they were secondary, not primary
24 Episcopal Silver Jubilee
causes. They were the effects of a great first cause. If, in
your travels through Switzerland or the Adirondack moun-
tains, you behold a beautiful placid lake, your curiosity may
lead you to discover the streams that feed it. Your investiga-
tion is rewarded by finding five rivulets flowing into it. In
pursuing your investigation still farther, you find that these
streams have their source in the snow-capped mountain in the
distance. Let us apply this illustration to the present subject.
Who inspired the primitive Christians with their unquench-
able zeal and enthusiasm? an enthusiasm enduring for cen-
turies and extending over the known world an enthusiasm
in an unpopular and hated cause. Who raised them to that
high plane of moral rectitude? Who impressed them with that
undaunted faith in the immortality of the soul and in a future
destiny? Who imparted to them the power of working mir-
acles? Who gave them that indissoluble organization ce-
mented, not by force, but formed by the golden bonds of
love?
Who was it but the Lord of hosts ? It was He who said :
"Go teach all nations, and behold I am with you all days,
even to the consummation of the world." It was He who
said: "Fear not, I have conquered the world." It was He
who said : "The race is not to the swift, nor the battle to the
strong." It was He who said: "Ye have not chosen Me,
but I have chosen you, that ye should go and bring forth fruit,
and your fruit should remain."
My Brethren, imitate your forefathers in the faith, by
your undaunted belief in an immortal destiny. Imitate them
by the rectitude of your lives. Imitate them by your zeal
for the honor of God and of His church. Imitate them, above
all, by working miracles of grace and mercy, by your charity
and compassion for the sufferings of your fellow-beings. "Re-
ligion," says the Apostle, "pure and undefiled before God and
the Father is this : to visit the orphans and widows in their
tribulations, and to keep one's self unspotted from the world."
I beg to congratulate you, Right Reverend Bishop, on the
double festivity we are celebrating to-day the Consecration
of this Cathedral Church, and the Silver Jubilee of your own
Consecration as first Bishop of the See of Peoria. It was
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John Lancaster Spalding 25
my good fortune to be present at your Episcopal Consecration
five and twenty years ago, to this very day, and it was my
privilege to be one of the assistant consecrators on that oc-
casion.
I have watched your career as Chief Pastor of this diocese
with profound interest and gratification, not only on account
of my personal friendship for yourself, but also because of
my filial affection for your venerable uncle, the illustrious
Archbishop Spalding of Baltimore, whom I loved and revered
as my father in God.
The splendid talents with which God has endowed you
have been employed not only in instructing the faithful of
your own diocese, but also in enlightening your fellow citizens
throughout the land. Your zeal for God's Church has been
made manifest by the steady growth of religion here, during
the last twenty-five years. Churches and clergy, institutions
erected in the cause of education, of religion and humanity,
have unceasingly multiplied during your administration.
When I survey the field and see what has been accom-
plished in a quarter of a century; when I consider the
thousands of families coming to our shores from various
parts of Europe, and settling in this fruitful State of Illinois;
when I contemplate the thousands of their children growing up
at their sides, and assimilated into one homogeneous body,
inheriting the faith of their fathers; when I behold their rep-
resentatives assembled before me in such large numbers, may
not such a spectacle vividly recall to my mind the Prophet's
words, and may I not exclaim with him in joyous accents:
"Arise, be enlightened, O Jerusalem, for thy light is come, and
the glory of the Lord is risen upon thee. The Gentiles shall
walk in thy light, and kings in the brightness of thy rising.
Lift up thine eyes round about and see. All these are gath-
ered together, they are come to thee. Thy sons shall come
from afar, and thy daughters shall rise up at thy side. Then
shalt thou see and abound, and thy heart shall wonder and be
enlarged, when the multitude of the sea shall be converted to
thee, the strength of the Gentiles shall come to thee."
You have been ably seconded by a loyal and devoted
clergy, upon whom you have impressed the character of your
26 Episcopal Silver Jubilee
own zeal and activity. Above all, you have been cheered and
sustained by the generous aid and co-operation of a pious
and enlightened laity, without whose support a Bishop can
accomplish little or nothing. An edifying and instructed laity
is the glory and ornament of the Church of God.
When the bishop, the clergy, and you, beloved brethren of
the laity, are united in the cause of God and humanity, you
are invincible. There is no such word as fail. You are an
impregnable phalanx. You form a triple chord that cannot
be broken. You constitute a triple alliance, more formidable
than the triple alliance of Germany, Austria and Italy, because
yours is an alliance not sustained by armed hosts, military
prowess, and the material sword, but an alliance upheld by the
cohesive and enduring power of divine love.
And why, my brethren, should you not co-operate with
your Bishop and clergy? Have you not the same God and
Father in Heaven? Were you not all redeemed by the blood
of the same Blessed Savior ? Are you not all sanctified by the
same Spirit? "There are diversities of graces," says the
Apostle, "but the same Spirit. There are diversities of min-
istries, but the same Lord. There are diversities of operations,
but the same God who worketh all in all." You are in the
same bark of Peter, tossed about by the same storms of life,
and steering towards the same eternal shores, prospective citi-
zens of the same heavenly kingdom.
And surely there is no country on the face of this earth
where you can worship God according to the dictates of your
conscience with more freedom than in these United States,
where there is liberty without license, and authority without
despotism. In 1870, when returning from the Vatican Council,
Archbishop Spalding and myself were guests of a Bishop in
Savoy. The Bishop resided in a splendid palace, and a sen-
tinel was pacing in front of his residence, stationed there by
the government as a guard of honor. I congratulated the
Bishop on his magnificent appointments, and the distinction
that was paid to him. The Bishop shook his head, and replied
to me: "All is not gold that glitters; I cannot build even a
sacristy without the permission of the government."
Thank God, no military satrap can stand between you and
John Lancaster Spalding 27
your Bishop. Here the government holds over you the segis
of its protection without interfering with you in the exercise
of your sacred functions.
May the happy conditions of things now existing among
us always continue, when the Bishops and clergy will have di-
rect relations with the people, when prelates and priests will
bestow on their spiritual children their apostolic labors, their
tender solicitude and fatherly affection, and pour out their
heart's blood, if necessary, and when they will receive in return
the free will offerings, the devotion and affection of a grateful
people.
Be loyal to your country and to your religion. No citizen
of the United States should be a drone in the social hive. No
citizen should be an indifferent spectator of the social, political,
and economic events occurring around him.
As we are all protected by the strong arm of the govern-
ment, so should we all unite in sustaining the burden of the
commonwealth. Above all, take an abiding and a vital per-
sonal interest in the welfare of your holy religion. Let the
language of the psalmist be your inspiring watchword on this
solemn occasion : "If I forget thee, O Jerusalem, let my right
hand be forgotten. Let my tongue cleave to the roof of my
mouth, if I do not remember you, if I make not Jerusalem
the beginning of my joy."
After the sermon the cardinal resumed the official cape of
ermine and the celebration of the Mass was resumed. During
the offertory the choir sang an "Alleluia," the Grier quartette
carrying the solos, and supported by the splendid choir under
Professor Plowe's direction.
Too much praise cannot be accorded the choir and those
having the music in charge. The musical part of the celebra-
tion was in every way worthy of the great occasion. Espe-
cially beautiful was the "Sanctus," the violins adding much
to the impressiveness and beauty of the number.
During the few moments of absolute silence that followed
the singing of the "Sanctus," the scene was one never to be
forgotten. The chancel with its gorgeous background of color,
thronged with kneeling priests; the vast congregation in
28 Episcopal Silver Jubilee
prayer; the banners, the flags, the flowers, the candles, and
"God's own sunshine, that shines for all," streaming through
the beautiful windows, made a picture of marvelous and most
impressive grandeur.
To the inspiring strains of the "March of the Priests"
from "Athalia," the priestly procession retired from the
chancel. As it came and took its way back to the institute,
Cardinal Gibbons, his long robes supported by six train-
bearers, retired at once to the episcopal residence, preceded by
the other members of the hierarchy and clergy.
THE BANQUET.
Immediately following the services at the cathedral the
dignitaries of the church and the clergymen were entertained
at a grand banquet served in the recital hall of Spalding In-
stitute. The decorations were elaborate and the tables were
beautifully decked with smilax, American beauty and bride's
roses banked about the walls, with stately lilies nodding here
and there. When the menu had been disposed of, Bishop
O'Reilly, who acted as toast-master, arose and spoke as fol-
lows:
Eminent and Respected Prelates and Fathers:
There is one in the midst of us today, whose presence is
not only a personal tribute and greeting to our great Jubilarian,
but a supreme joy to the Priests and people of the Diocese,
and an honor that our fair city fully appreciates. I allude to
our own revered and popular Cardinal Gibbons. Whenever
he speaks from the chair of the Primatial See of Baltimore,
whether proclaiming the gospel of peace and good will to the
faithful, or requests the whole Nation to give thanks for abun-
dant blessings, or touches a minor chord when sorrow bows
down the national heart, and his words are carried on the
wings of the press, into the millions of homes; we all feel
that it is not only good, but a priceless privilege to belong to
a church that crowns such noble and worthy men with the
insignia of the Cardinalate. I have the honor of introducing
John Lancaster Spalding 29
to you His Eminence our beloved Cardinal Gibbons, who has
kindly consented to respond to the toast, "Our Holy Father."
As His Eminence arose he was most cordially received.
The Cardinal expressed the reverence and affection of the
Roman Catholic hierarchy in the United States for the head
of the church, and the hope that he might be spared to the
service of mankind for many years to come. He has labored
during the long years of his reign for the betterment of human-
ity. There has been no good cause that has not enlisted his
sympathy. His encyclicals have been towers of defence
against the attacks of evil, notably those on "The Condition of
the Working Classes," "The Christian Constitution of States,"
"Human Liberty" and "Christian Marriage." Not Catholics
only, but all civilized peoples pray that his years may be
lengthened.
THE TOAST-MASTER.
Your Eminence and, Esteemed Fathers:
Among our guests on this beautiful May-day, I notice a
life-long friend and classmate of our Host, the popular and
eloquent Prelate Archbishop Riordan of San Francisco.
We have known him as a zealous and enlightened Pastor in
our own State, loved and admired by all, for his noble qualities.
His Grace rules a Diocese replete with sacred traditions and
historic interest, and the prayers and good wishes of his old
friends in Illinois ever follow him to the land of sunshine, and
fruits and flowers. His presence here, as a testimony from
the far West will add much glory to this occasion, and we
invite him to respond to the toast "Our Country."
ADDRESS OF ARCHBISHOP RIORDAN.
"OUR COUNTRY."
The toast proposed is a theme far too vast for an after-
dinner speech, and so sacred that its introduction amid the
joyous incidents of this celebration may seem incongruous and
out of place. Yet, loving children never meet in sorrow or
in joy without some tribute to the mother who bore them, who
SO Episcopal Silver Jubilee
gave them their life and who carries them in her thoughts and
affections, even to their graves. So, as loving and devoted
sons of the great country in which we live, we feel that the
celebration of to-day would be incomplete did we not speak in
words of love of this mother land of ours and pledge her a
loyalty and devotion that shall never fail. The great Apostle
of the Gentiles, though living amid the corruption of the
Roman Empire, that at last cast him out as unworthy to live,
claimed and exercised his privilege as a free born citizen oi
Rome and entreated his fellow-Christians to give obedience to
the State. There is a patriotic ring in his words when he pro-
claims himself the citizen of no mean city, though poor and
wretched beyond description, viz. : Tarsus of Cilicia, and the
Blessed Lord Himself was moved to tears as He beheld the
city of Jerusalem and knew of its impending doom, because it
had not known the time of its visitation.
That man is to be pitied who can view this magnificent
domain, extending from ocean to ocean, capable of producing
everything needful or useful for man's life and comfort, with
a system of government so gentle in its application to the
individual that we are hardly conscious of its existence, the
well being of the great majority of its citizens, the general
intelligence of the people, the ample means provided for the
highest culture, the happy homes in every State of the Union,
the obedience to law, the respect for religion, the munificent
contribution to the institutions of education and charity that
prove, while vast fortunes are easily accumulated, their
possessors have the grace to distribute them in aid of worthy
objects ; the large personal liberty accorded to all and protected
in its exercise by law ; the inestimable boon of perfect freedom
in the domain of conscience not a privilege granted by the
country, not a right held from the State, but a right of con-
science so that any law abridging that right so long as in its
exercise it does not subvert public order or public decency, is
unconstitutional, and hence null and void : I say the man who
has all these benefits before his mind and does not feel a thrill
of the most intense love for the country is incapable of appre-
ciating the highest and best things of life; his mind is in
darkness, his heart is in the dust.
John Lancaster Spalding 31
We cannot, with any degree of intelligence, read the history
of God's dealings with the human family as manifested in the
history of nations without being convinced that this is a chosen
land, reserved in the design of an all-loving Providence, as the
home of a race of men who, under a system of government
hitherto untried, might develop, under the least possible re-
straint, whatever is good and praiseworthy in their nature;
might attain to the highest perfection in the temporal and
spiritual order. Here the ideal manhood, so tersely yet so
luminously traced by the great Apostle, was to be realized.
"Where there is neither Gentile nor Jew, circumcision nor
uncircumcision, Barbarian nor Scythian, bond nor free; but
Christ is all in all," to which all men are welcome, no mat-
ter where from. Here was to be a city of refuge which all
might enter who were tired of the galling yoke of oppression
and the trammels which tyranny wound about every sphere
of their lives, where merit would be recognized, and man
simply because he is man receive full recognition as a man.
The republics of the past were republics only in name.
Their territory was small, frequently only a single city. The
republics of modern times, outside of our own, are not much
better. Military despotisms, for the most part, in which a
successful soldier holds power over his fellow men and wields
it without any restraint upon its exercise. Here, for the first
time in the history of the world, was organized a system of
government, on a large scale and capable of indefinite expan-
sion, "of the people, by the people and for the people," the
culmination of a movement that began with the first preaching
of the Christian religion, that aroused the fierce opposition of
the Roman Empire, not because it was a religion, but because
Rome saw in it a principal of government destructive to
its own. It slowly but continuously leavened the thoughts
of men during the Middle Ages, and here and there put forth
a flower in small free communities until at last, on a fresh
soil under more kindly skies, almost unexpectedly, with-
out preparation, as Minerva sprang from the brain of Jove
full-armed, it took its place among the nations of the world, and
its message to men was a message of liberty and equality, and
that conscience is subject only to God. For that we thank God
$2 Episcopal Silver Jubilee
and love our country, and pray for its prosperity. None are and
none have more reason to be grateful than Catholics. Indeed,
Catholics throughout the world owe it a debt of gratitude.
Every government, from the day it came down from the upper
chamber in Jerusalem an organized body instinct with divine
life, the indwelling of the Holy Spirit its informing principle
and the pledge of its indestructible life, has lifted its hand
against the church. "You shall be hated of all men," has re-
ceived its fulfillment in the history of every nation except one,
and that solitary exception is our own. Individuals have at-
tacked us ; the people at large have condemned them. Aggrega-
tions of individuals, sometimes out of malice, more frequently
through ignorance, have striven here and there to light the fires
of persecution ; the nation at large has cried shame. We have
always felt from the time when only one Bishop from his See
in Baltimore governed a small and scattered flock of a few
thousand Catholics along the Atlantic shore, down to this hour,
when eighty Bishops rule over as many millions as the first
did over thousands once within the precincts of an United
States Court and under the protection of the general govern-
ment, or even State government, our rights, our liberties and
our properties were secure; that the promise made to the world
by the founders of this republic, that while the government
should set up no church of its own, it should protect all men
in the free and untrammeled exercise of their religious liberties
and God-given rights of conscience. We have always felt that
that promise was in force and most sacredly kept. There is
not in all history a nobler act recorded than the conduct of those
who drew up the Constitution and of those who added to it its
first amendment, who sprung from a nation that for three
hundred years had been bitterly hostile to the Catholic religion
and whose penal laws still disgraced its legislation, at a time
when all Europe had risen against the Holy See, whose
venerable Pontiff was prisoner, came together in the city of
Brotherly Love, organized this government, and in its defense
pledged their fortunes, their lives and their sacred honor, and
sent across the seas the invitation to the oppressed of every
clime to come and build upon a new soil their tabernacles, and,
beneath the protection of a new flag, work out their temporal
LIBRARY
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RT. REV. JAMES RYAN, D. D.
Bishop of Alton
John Lancaster Spalding 33
and eternal destinies, subject only to just laws made by them-
selves, and responsible in all that belongs to the soul to God,
and God alone.
I repeat, that this action of the government at the very
beginning of its history, coming at the time it did and under
the circumstances that confronted it, stands unique in the
history of the world and should be remembered with gratitude
by Catholics throughout the entire Church. Such has been its
attitude in the past, and such is its attitude at present. It leaves
us free. If we fail to build up a strong, active and progressive
church, the fault will be ours, and a proof that we are unequal
to the mission confided to us by God, and lack the qualities
which the country looks to us to possess, well stored minds,
Apostolic zeal and the self-sacrificing spirit of the spiritual man.
To do our work well, we must love the land in which we live,
and the institutions that place no hindrance in our way. Of
all citizens we should be the most patriotic, and patriotism does
not consist in paying taxes and in external obedience to the
laws. It has its root in a loving and grateful heart. The
country is still young. It is laying a foundation of a mightier
empire than the most vivid imagination can conceive. Surely
it is not for any man worthy of the name to stand idly by and,
with the sneer of a cynic and the criticism of a pessimist, refuse
his co-operation in the mighty work. It is the duty of every
Christian man, while helping to lay the foundations of a
mighty civil commonwealth, to lay side by side with them the
foundations of the City of his God. The field that spreads
itself before our gaze is as broad and promising as the greatest
activity could desire; the work that we are called to do is as
high, as noble and inspiring as ever fired the loftiest ambition.
Permit me a few words of a more personal character. I
feel that, having come so far, I may lay claim to your indulg-
ence. Some years ago I listened to an eloquent discourse by
the Bishop of this See. Among other things, he uttered the
prediction that the typical American of the future would be
born in the Valley of the Mississippi. I do not know what
the future may bring forth. I cannot say that the man of the
future will be of greater stature or better equipped mentally
and spiritually than the man of the present. I do know, how-
34 Episcopal Silver Jubilee
ever, that a typical American citizen and a typical American
Bishop has had his home in this city, the very center of the
Mississippi Valley, for the past twenty-five years. He has
labored strenuously and successfully "Pro Deo et pro Patria,"
for God and country. He has done his part as a workman
of whom we need not be ashamed, to strengthen the institu-
tions of our beloved country. His words, so often and so
eloquently spoken, have carried inspiration and life to thou-
sands. We are gathered about him to-day from all parts of the
country, and we speak our congratulations in words of heart-
felt sincerity, and we ask that many years may still be his to
work Pro Deo et pro Patria.
THE TOAST-MASTER.
Your Eminence and Honored Friends:
It gives additional joy and splendor to this day to witness
the first Rector of our great and promising Catholic Uni-
versity extend hearty greeting to its chief promoter and de-
voted patron. The whole life of the devout and erudite
Metropolitan of Dubuque is a series of lessons on the great
Christian virtues, accentuating in a high degree kindness, for-
bearance and good will. There is a feeling of delight which
we cannot repress or conceal in beholding the first sponsor and
regent of our greatest school of learning extend personal
felicitation to its founder and benefactor. It is my privilege
to introduce to you His Grace, Archbishop Keane, who will
respond to the toast "The Church in Our Own Country."
ADDRESS OF ARCHBISHOP KEANE.
"THE CHURCH IN OUR OWN COUNTRY."
He does the best service to both Church and Country who
keeps us in mind of their ideals.
We are too prone to be mere statisticians. We think and
speak of both Church and Country in terms of what we can
count or measure. This makes us boastful, and it leads us to
deceive not only others but ourselves as to the great realities.
John Lancaster Spalding 55
We expand our facts and our figures to the vastness of a
balloon filled with gas.
Every now and then, Providence gives us a man gifted
to pierce through mere externalities to the inner life of things.
His mission is to teach his generation that bigness is not
excellence, to place in their true light the ideals without con-
formity to which size and show are but sham.
Such was the gift and such the vocation of Carlyle. We
love him for his hatred of shams. But he lacked the knowledge
of the truth which alone gives us the ideal. He knew that there
must be "an intelligence at the heart of things;" but he
knew not the word which that intelligence has spoken to His
creatures, and so he became a pessimist and a scold.
Such, too, was the gift and such the mission of Emerson.
We honor him for his discontent with external things, for his
aspiration after the transcendental realities. But he, too, had
been robbed by heredity of the treasure of the truth ; and so
he comes sadly near to being simply a pantheistic dreamer.
Such is the gift and such the mission of Bishop Spalding.
To a philosophic penetration and an artistic genius fully equal,
in my opinion, to those of Carlyle and Emerson, he unites a
profound knowledge of the fullness of truth bestowed on man-
kind by the Savior of the world. Together with the genius
of critic, poet, and philosopher; he possesses the heart of a
Priest. No wonder, then, that he has done truer and nobler
and more useful work than either Carlyle or Emerson. He
had not, like them, the misfortune of being hampered from
the start with an inheritance of political, social and theological
fetters which it cost their best energies to escape from, and
which had scarred and crippled them for life. America gave
him unfettered limbs, and the grand old Apostolic Church
endowed him with the liberty of the children of God. And
so, without hindrance, his genius has expanded in the full, free
light of the true, the beautiful and the good, and therefore,
when from the fullness of his heart he has utterd words of
wisdom to his fellow-Catholics and his fellow-Americans,
there has been in them no sound of intellectual uncertainty,
no bitterness of the heart, no despair of the soul, but teachings
of light and love, of wisdom and joy.
jd Episcopal Silver Jubilee
He views all things in the light of their ideals. To him,
the Church is simply what it is in the mind of God, that is,
the Body of Christ, the external organization of religion, the
embodiment in the life of mankind of faith and hope and love.
This alone is to him the living Church of Christ ; the practical
realization of this the only thing that churchmen can rightly
boast of, or rather give thanks for. With mere addition of
church members and multiplication of church means he has
been nobly impatient. In words of matchless force and
eloquence he has reminded us of the ideal, warned us of the
ideal, scourged us with the ideal. Few men have possessed
to such a degree the power of scorn. May he continue to use
it, and with redoubled force, until the last remnant of mere
statistical boastfulness, of mere externalism and phariseeism
shall have disappeared from among us.
In like manner he has upheld and insisted on the ideal of
our country. To him it has meant not a geographical area,
however rich in nature's treasures, nor the gathering of so
many millions of men under a certain flag of a certain govern-
ment, nor the incomparable multiplying of productions and
piling up of wealth.
It has meant the promotion of human welfare under the
fullest influences of the best civilization, under the untram-
meled reign of freedom, of civil quality, of even-handed
justice, of popular comfort and well being; of enlightenment,
culture, refinement, religion. Any boasting of American prog-
ress which did not mean all that has been to him mere empty
bombast, and the boasters have oft times smarted under the lash
of his indignant eloquence. May the lash lose none of its
weight or its sting, for the days of humbug are not yet
ended.
To his clear intuition, religion and culture are two outpour-
ings of the Divine Life into the life of mankind; and man's
chief duty is to welcome them and respond to them. Hence
no one in our day has spoken so persistently, so truly, so beau-
tifully concerning life and the duty of right living. Life has
been to him the summing up of all powers and opportunities,
right living the summing up of all duties, the higher life the
summing up of all aspirations. To live for the best has been
John Lancaster Spalding 57
his own aim ; to make it the aim of all whose minds and hearts
he could reach has been his constant endeavor. As priest, as
poet, as philosopher, he has striven unceasingly to bring
religion and culture into closer relationship in the life of his
generation, to make religion more cultured and culture more
religious in the thought and action of our age. 'Twas this
that made him the first and strongest influence for the founding
of the Catholic University of America, and only the constant
inbreathing of that same spirit can make the institution a vital
and uplifting potency in our country's life.
To fit him for so lofty a mission, Providence has endowed
him with a marvelous gift of artistic expression. To my mind,
no American has equalled Bishop Spalding in the power of
uttering beautiful and noble thoughts in beautiful and noble
language. And I know of but one other American who can
compare with him in breadth and loftiness of view and in force
of noblest inspiration. That other is Father Hecker, and
therefore at one period Providence brought them together.
Side by side they stood and looked out on the wondrous pano-
rama of God's ways with men. Then Providence separated
their paths, that they might tell mankind of the glorious vision,
one in the thrilling tones of the model missionary, the other
in the loftier eloquence of the philosopher and the Bishop.
That grandest of works Bishop Spalding has done untir-
ingly and well these twenty-five years. And his last sweet
utterances, in "God and the Soul," prove that his wings show
no signs of weakness or weariness. May they long continue
to soar to sublimer heights. From my heart I pray, long life
to the sage of Peoria, who has done more than any living man
to make us appreciate and love the ideal of our Church and the
ideal of our Country.
THE TOAST-MASTER.
Respected Fathers:
It is well that the story of this Diocese should be told by
one who was on the ground when our Host took charge of the
field. He has witnessed the initiative, and he knows present
conditions. I introduce to you Dean Keating of Ottawa, a
38 Episcopal Silver Jubilee
strong, earnest and brilliant advocate of the cause we preach
and plead, vigilant and painstaking, and ever ready to con-
form to the wishes of our great Jubilarian, in those things
that make for the interest of the Church, and the progress and
advancement of Catholic education. The subject of his remarks
will be "The Diocese of Peoria."
ADDRESS OF DEAN KEATING.
"OUR DIOCESE."
With good reason we rejoice today. Our Diocese and
her illustrious head have journeyed together for twenty-five
years, and their company-keeping has been mutually satis-
factory. The past has been one of triumph ever-continued
success ; the future, abounding in promise, will be an incentive
to never-ceasing exertion.
In dealing briefly with this subject it would seem that bare
submitting of facts is infinitely preferable to any mere elegance
of diction.
When separation took place from the grand old Diocese
of Chicago, and the present Ordinary came amongst us, I
would not say the outlook was uninviting, but it most certainly
showed the necessity of earnest, patient work with a wise, intel-
ligent, executive to point out the way, and the Lord smiled
upon Peoria and sent as her first Bishop the man of the hour,
the man of the day John L. Spalding.
The Priests were few, three or four schools had a sickly
existence, and the Churches, with scarcely an exception, were
mere make-shifts, built in missionary times to keep alive the
Faith amongst a scattered and moving people. They had
answered their purpose and should now give way to Temples
more seemly and in keeping with the worship of the Living
God.
The new Head was indefatigable. He seemed to be
everywhere, and by advice and example electrified Priests and
people.
His Omnipresent Ideal, upon which his whole life has been
molded, was presented with thrilling effect to all classes, "Seek
John Lancaster Spalding jp
ye first the kingdom of God and His justice, and all things
shall be added to you." Like the Divine Master, he denied
himself the ordinary comforts of life, was ever humble and
considerate, and during his first years lived in a dingy house,
little better than a shanty, and seemed ill at ease, wholly non-
plussed, when his thoughtful, loving Priests presented him
with a home more worthy of his position.
Can you wonder that headway has been made that the most
optimistic could not conceive?
We have now a Catholic population of 120,000, one
hundred and eighty-one Priests, two hundred and fourteen
churches, three colleges and academies for boys, nine academies
for young ladies, sixty-one Parochial schools, two orphan
asylums, seven hospitals, one home for aged poor, and one
industrial and reform school.
There is manifest on every hand striking evidence of a
splendidly organized Diocese. Magnificent, imposing churches
greet us on all sides, and large, commodious school structures,
well equipped with the modern appliances, make provision for
the rising generation. The old, the orphan and the wayward
are cared for, and the number of ecclesiastical students is suffi-
cient for all the demands upon the Holy Ministry.
The very best of good feeling and brotherly spirit prevails
in the Priesthood, and the Bishop is the recognized Father of
all. Where he might readily command, it is more pleasing to
him to suggest, and it is the pride and ambition of his devoted
Clergy to anticipate his every wish, believing implicitly in the
soundness of his judgment and the absolute disinterestedness
of his motives.
We are full of supreme happiness to have so many eminent
Ecclesiastics, distinguished princes of the Church, join with
us in the Silver Anniversary of the founding of "Our
Diocese" and consecration of its first head, and with all respect
and deference we assure them we will continue in a course not
unworthy of the name already won by the gifted Prelate in
charge.
With Bishop Spalding in the van, there can be no failure;
at the sound of his clarion voice the best energies are aroused,
noblest thoughts stimulated and sacrifices welcomed with joy.
40 Episcopal Silver Jubilee
We are deservedly proud of Our Diocese and its zealous
Priesthood.
In behalf of every Priest and the whole Laity I tender to
our Bishop the deepest, sincerest respect of all. He possesses
our unlimited confidence, our unswerving fidelity, and may a
beneficent Providence grant many, many years of health and
happiness to the thoughtful educator, practical ruler, ideal
ecclesiastic and peerless Christian gentleman, John Lancaster
Spalding of "Our Diocese."
THE TOAST-MASTER.
Honored Guests:
The German Catholics Priests and laity of this Diocese
have worked side by side with us for the best interests of
Church and School. They can, however, claim unstinted praise
and deserve special mention in the building up of our Hospitals
and other Institutions of mercy. In behalf of this zealous and
progressive nationality, Dean Greve has been chosen to offer
felicitations to our Host. He is a man known to all for his
great virtues and attainments and his exemplary life. He has
accepted the invitation to speak on the subject "A Tribute
From the German Element."
ADDRESS OF DEAN GREVE.
"A TRIBUTE FROM THE GERMAN ELEMENT."
The air, it seems, is still vibrating from the echo of the
speakers who were gleaning in the fields of eloquence and
carried off golden sheaves. The reapers have left, with
exquisite delicacy, a small gleaning for me.
It gives me very sincere pleasure to address, with a cordial
and heart-felt delight, this illustrious assemblage, as it repre-
sents in an eminent degree that friendly feeling which exists
among the respective members of the Clergy. A kind forbear-
ance I know I shall have from you in my most inadequate
efforts to speak of the Clergy of German parentage worthily.
I am thankful for the opportunity afforded to express their
sentiments.
John Lancaster Spalding 41
We all are proud we are Americans. We are in a country
that we call the best on the habitable globe, because there is
more liberty here than there is anywhere else. We are undei
a system of government where the avenues to distinction are
open to all. Opportunities are so universal, the laborer of
today may become a capitalist of tomorrow, that those who
could not well succeed in their native land are living under
the most favorable circumstances here in this country. This
land has done more for all races than all other countries under
heaven. Nobody should forget that America is kinder to him
than his native land, no matter what place he comes from.
Throwing to the winds all prejudice, all partisanship, we are
working as men, as Americans, as lovers and friends of justice,
as patriots, as Christians, as Priests for the weal of the country,
for the welfare of the Church, for the glory of God. This
country is an asylum for every race, where the members of
families can sit with happy faces and tender eyes at peace by
their own firesides, under the segis of the glorious banner of
liberty. We all, as Americans, hate nationalities, but we cher-
ish patriotism; we all have the best interests of the people in
common at heart.
The American citizens of German blood, whether born in
this country or whose cradle stood upon German soil, inhaling
the air of sweet freedom, participate in the development of the
intellectual and material resources of the land. Their great
achievements upon all the fields of human activity, whereby
they enrich the civilization of the human race, are well known.
In all the walks of life you meet traces of their zeal and labor
both to establish our republic and to sustain it in time of war
as well as in time of peace. Germans lent their service to
America when it struggled for its freedom and independence.
German heroes of the war of the rebellion are glorying in
the array of the brave chiefs of our nation, and many a cour-
ageous soldier has shed his blood for the land of his adoption,
to whom the Nation owes a debt of gratitude. They always
put their shoulder to the wheel to promote the general welfare
of the community, be it in agriculture, industry, trade, com-
merce, statesmanship, art or literature. Our own city owes
a fair percentage of its healthy and steady growth to the
42 'Episcopal Silver Jubilee
German element. The amalgamation of the various races with
their best natural gifts and under the inspiration of a great
future, changed a nation of weakness and poverty into one of
might and opulence that all the powers of the earth have to
respect and consult.
But this country is more than an asylum for us all. It is
the land of promise to us Catholics. Religion and Church
enjoy full freedom here. A large proportion of the Ger-
mans are Catholics, they have worked faithfully and zeal-
ously with their co-laborers for the interest of the Mother
Church. They are, I think, not unjustly classed among the
pillars of Church, school and home. They are not slow to build
and decorate houses of worship. They are also proud of the
schools which they erect and run at their own expense to im-
part the essential principles of good citizenship, religion and
morality to their children. Church and school are linked
closely in their view. Nor are benevolence or charity strange to
them. By means of orphanages they save the little ones from
temporal misery and eternal ruin; they prove themselves good
and true Samaritans by -their hospitals and other charitable in-
stitutions, wherein their faithful sons and noble daughters sacri-
fice their lives to alleviate the burden of human misery, pain and
malady, and to prepare the dying for a happy eternity. All these
nurseries of science and benevolence attest the immense achieve-
ments of Christianity in this country, no matter what nation we
belong to. From a little spark thrown here and there into this
world desert, it grew to a mighty flame, whose light and lustre
are spread all over the land to encourage the good, to instruct
the ignorant, to aid the needy, to nurse the sick, to those that
are outside the pale of Catholicity to spread its benediction
within and without. Let it go on then with increased zeal and
redoubled activity and be assured that as long as union and
harmony prevail between clergy and laity, the Catholic Church
will march on triumphantly under the guidance of heaven in
America. We, as priests of the Diocese of Peoria, ci* 1 ebrating
the Silver Jubilee both of the diocese and of our Bii )p, look
with solemn pride upon the Ordinary given to us by ine hand
of the Divine Providence as a man of refined culture and as
a master of the German tongue. In his study of the world of
LIBRARY
Of THE
UNJVEflSW Uf
RT. REV. P. J. O'REILLY, D. D.
Auxiliary Bishop of Peoria
John Lancaster Spalding 43
literature he transcended the narrow limits of race and coun-
try and entered the rich mines of German science, both in
poetry and philosophy. He has gathered some select flowers
from the German garden of song and translated them into his
mother language without sacrificing their original melody.
He came across precious stores in our much admired Goethe.
In his life object to spread higher education both by word
and deed, he places before us our poet as educator. With the
same easy mastery wherewith he tests poetry, he also takes up
the current of German philosophy, the shrine of philosophy.
He finds great interest in the direction in which the younger
German school is moving. Where are those men with counte-
nances serene and majestic, with dignified port and noble at-
tire, with polished language and classical air, if not within the
precincts of tender religion, that harmonious instrument which
pitches the tone of their eloquence. No loftier ideal can be
held up to the emulation of ingenuous youth than our good
and dear Jubilarian. With such a chief I think we cannot be
wholly ignoble.
Ad multos annos !
THE TOAST-MASTER.
My Friends:
Not the least among things that give delight and unbounded
satisfaction on this Day of Thanksgiving, is the Consecration
of the Cathedral. To make this possible the right man was
needed. He must be a man who had the courage and ability
to meet a lingering debt and cancel it in short order, a man
earnest and forceful, and who could enlighten and persuade
and marshal forces; and these conditions were met and ful-
filled by the Rev. Francis J. O'Reilly, Chancellor, who is
invited to respond to the Toast "Our Jubilee Day."
44 Episcopal Silver Jubilee
ADDRESS OF CHANCELLOR O'REILLY.
"OUR JUBILEE DAY."
In celebrating the Silver Jubilee of its Bishop, the Diocese
of Peoria offers itself today for measurement While it would
turn away from everything that might savor of boastfulness,
it does feel pardonable pride in vigor and strength that find
expression in other than twenty-five years of existence. From
whatever point of view one cares to consider the years, they
have been characteristic of the growth of the American Church
and are replete with real interest.
We celebrate this day because we feel we are citizens of no
mean country. We do not claim all the excellences of Amer-
ica. We have not the hill scenery of the East, with winding
streams and fertile valleys, wildwood brooks, sudden vistas
of fretful fell and purple cliff; we have not the massive
plateaus and grim canons of the Colorado; neither have we
leagues of dead sand where no green things grow, and no
birds build; nor have we on the yon side a "Sea of Peace"
awaiting us just Iowa and Missouri. Ours the opulent life
of prairies rich in the exuberance of their golden harvests.
Had our visitors come to us a few weeks later we had shown
them the waving corn chased by mingled sunshine and shadow,
wooed by dew of night and carol of the lark, tossing itself like
ocean waves, restless at restraint; to many shores its yellow
grain is borne and many tables bend beneath its wealtk In a
land whose very fruitfulness makes us necessarily close to the
earth, that voice is akin to divine which calls us to things of
the mind and higher life, and we have been made to feel, in
Emerson's thought, at least, that "Wherever a man stands the
whple arch of the sky is over him," and that even here not
small things can be done.
The foundation of the Catholic Church in these parts was
laid in the heroic. The first settlement in the Middle West
found a halting place just across the river. The name given
the beginning of the white man's dwelling here tells us that La
Salle's journey ings brought him many disappointments and
disasters, remembering which, he called the place Fort Creve
Coeur. On the same stream, a few miles further up, Father
John Lancaster Spalding 45
Marquette celebrated Mass a hundred years before this nation
was born. Hard by Father Gabriel de la Ribourde offered up
his life in martyr-fate. When finally the struggle for liberty
came, Father Gibault, going even beyond his sturdy confrere,
Father Farmer of Philadelphia, who had refused to help the
recruiting service of the English by declining to become chap-
lain of a regiment, to be known as the "Roman Catholic Vol-
unteers," Father Gibault rendered such active service in
dislodging the Royalists in the Northwest that the Legisla-
ture of Virginia voted him public thanks in 1780. McCarthy
and Charleville, captaining two regiments of Illinois volun-
teers in the same war, tell us how the shamrock and the lily
found their way to the banks of the Mississippi.
All this an augury that as heroic souls wrought then for re-
ligion and liberty, others not less resolute though less stim-
ulated by environment, would be found not inactive nor silent
in the later and more peaceful surroundings. By nature we
have been set down here in the heart of the continent for
peaceful pursuits. "The citizen, standing in the doorway of
his home, contented on his threshold, his family gathered
about his hearthstone, while the evening of a well spent day
closes in scenes and sounds that are dearest, he shall save the
republic, when the drum tap is futile and the barracks are ex-
hausted."
An American traveler tells us that the lake country of
England is not finer than the lake district of Wisconsin. But
in its time it has been the home of great minds and hearts.
Wordsworth, Coleridge, Southey, DeQuincey, Christopher
North, Charles Lamb and Harriet Martineau lived along the
road that winds among the hills and lakes. There is, after all,
nothing great in the world but man real contributions to the
heritage of the race center round the names of men and
women. If, then, we are to have any place among cherished
memories, is not that to come through men who, though living,
yet, are so rich in gifts that many become sharers, and if such
dwell here may we not lift out voices in joyous acclaim? Some-
how, I think of St. Francis Assissi entering Rome. It was
evening the rays of the setting sun were slanting on the
Campagna and flooding the lofty terrace of the Lateran Pal-
46 Episcopal Silver Jubilee
ace, where a group of splendidly attired churchmen were walk-
ing, drinking in the balmy breath of the evening air. One
walked apart, simply clad, but with the mien of a monarch;
on his lordly brow sat gravely the care of the great world's
affairs. Philip Augustus of France, John of England, Otho
of Germany, Pedro of Arragon, had all been humbled to the
very dust before his footstool. Frederick, the young, the bril-
liant Emperor, the last of the great Hohenstauffen line, was
his ward, while the conquest of Constantinople by the Cru-
saders brought the whole East under the control of his hands.
Innocent, immersed in care, had few words to waste upon
the tattered, stained traveler. One finds it difficult to be harsh
with Innocent for the scant courtesy bestowed upon Francis.
That night Innocent's sleep was haunted by a vision. He saw
a palm tree slowly growing beneath his feet and rising into a
beautiful tree; he saw the Lateran Basilica falling into ruins
and a certain poor man of humble and despised aspect stoop-
ing beneath the burden and sustaining it "Truly," cried the
Pontiff, "this is he who by labor and doctrine shall sustain the
Church of Christ," and Innocent granted Francis' request for
the establishing of his order. Commenting upon this act, an
English writer says : "Innocent by that day's work added 200
years to the dominion of the Roman Church."
Whether we accept the statement as true or not, the view
is in the main correct. The Church stands or falls, it makes
progress or it recedes; it is vital or cumbers the ground ac-
cording as she finds captains and rulers, leaders and wise
Bishops to guide her destiny.
And if you to-day with me but recall Pericles standing by
the blue Mediterranean and pronouncing words of eulogy over
Greeks who had fallen in defense of their country, and if you
go to Athens and listen to the unarmed eloquence of Demos-
thenes, and know that they have lived again in an awakened
and cultured mind, and if you could hear the shout of liberty
going up even in dark continents and know that not one
syllable but has been heard by that liberty loving ear, and if
you could hear that voice raised in warning against our wan-
dering in untried fields and reckless breakings asunder of
bonds written for our guidance, and if you could hear the
John Lancaster Spalding 47
calls to a noble and nobler priesthood amid it all, if you could
see the fraternities grow around us, you would still more won-
der that to literature there should have been added a single
line, since on all sides under his guiding hand there has arisen
a growth of school and church that to-day marks a trans-
formed city a diocese made new. This is why we celebrate,
and this is why the May days of 1877 an< i I 9 2 are inseparably;
linked with the name of John Lancaster Spalding.
THE TOAST-MASTER.
Brothers of the Episcopate and of the clergy With
friends to cheer and the multitude acclaiming, yet there is
always special joy and delight in the greetings that come
from home. The scenes of childhood and especially in the
country, the Church and school, however humble, the neigh-
bors and friends of our fathers, the scenery that while it may
not enchant, is to us of priceless value all these form a sacred
picture and inspire a theme, that will always find a place in
song and story. I have the pleasure of introducing to you
Dean Hogarty of Kentucky, the popular and estimable pastor
of Bishop Spalding's native parish. He comes here to present
the good wishes and undying friendship of a people that
never forget to honor the illustrious names that shed lustre on
a grand and faithful colony. His subject will be "Congratu-
lations From Home."
ADDRESS OF DEAN HOGARTY.
"CONGRATULATIONS FROM HOME."
Right Reverend Bishop Spalding:
On this, the Silver Jubilee of your consecration as Bishop,
when so many princes and prelates of the Church have assem-
bled to proclaim the achievements of twenty-five years of ardu-
ous labors, and by their appreciation of the glorious work
already accomplished to inspire your heart with new courage
for the yet greater work before you, may we hope that a hum-
ble tribute from your childhood's home will not be wholly
unwelcome?
48 Episcopal Silver Jubilee
Amid the plaudits of the hierachy, of those who- have
shared with you the labor and the honors that are due to a
long and eminently successful career as worthy successors of
the Apostles, the congregation of St. Augustine's in Lebanon,
Ky., can only hope that a heartfelt greeting from the friends
and companions of your childhood, who have sympathized with
your every effort, and rejoiced at every successive triumph
of your zeal and of your genius, will be acceptable as an as-
surance that, in your case, the prophet is not without honor in
his own country.
When thrilled with joyous pride at each recurring evi-
dence of your zeal and eminent abilities, and of the recognition
so fully accorded them throughout the Christian world, we
have at all times claimed you as our own the product of our
own Kentucky home, toward which, we feel assured, your
heart ever turns, in such moments of leisure as may be per-
mitted, from the engrossing labors of your busy life.
There are the friends and companions of your youth; in
the veins of many of whom the life blood flows from the same
common source ; who, with you,.ar,e descendants of those hardy
pioneers of St Mary's County of Catholic Maryland, and who
recall, with affectionate detail, your youthful trials and tri-
umphs, the friendships of boyhood's days, and the intimate as-
sociations of budding manhood. They proudly dwell upon the
fact that there, amid the beautiful scenery and in the bracing
air of that favored land, within sound of the bells of St. Au-
gustine's, the faculties of your youthful mind expanded, and
the aspirations of your heart were directed and ennobled by
the glorious traditions of a Nerincx, a Badin, a Fournier, an
Abell and other zealous priests, whose devoted labors yet bear
abundant fruit in the lives of our people, long after they have
been called to their reward.
When, as a young man, you left the scenes of your boy-
hood to procure the thorough equipment then obtainable only
in Europe, you had already given such evidence of strength
and symmetry of development that the congregation of St.
Augustine's had bright anticipations of a brilliant and useful
career, and their prayers attended you on your journey.
When you returned to your native state, an anointed priest
Of THE
C/3
O
Hrl
HH
H
in
John Lancaster Spalding 49
of God, an ambassador of Christ, filled with holy zeal, en-
dowed with untiring energy, with mind matured and exquis-
itely trained for the work that was before you, we knew that
the fruition of our hopes could not be long delayed, that your
efforts would compel, unsought, the admiration and applause
of the world. We knew that your capacity for useful and ef-
fective work would grow with the expanding opportunities
for its exercise, and that the field of your influence would cor-
respondingly increase.
Onward and upward has ever been your motto, and with
that boundless energy that is characteristic in your race and
country, with an unquenchable thirst for knowledge, and a
capacity for unremitting labor, that, if not genius, is its in-
separable companion, you have accomplished results that are
the wonder and admiration of America and of Europe, and
have added glory and renown to the cause of the Church.
We leave to others the task of recounting those deeds ; they
are part of history ; from your building of the first church for
colored Catholics in the city of Louisville, yet standing as a
monument to your priestly zeal, to the successful foundation
of the great Catholic University of America. But in that his-
tory, we feel special pride, and claim the privilege of present-
ing this testimonial of our affectionate esteem, with the as-
surance that, as heretofore, our prayers will ascend to the
throne of the Most High that you may long be spared for yet
greater triumphs in His service, for His greater glory, and
that of His Holy Church throughout the world.
V. REV. J. A. HOGARTY,
HON. J. P. THOMPSON,
HON. H. W. RIVES,
Committee on Behalf of Congregation.
"What I have done, to me is nothing now,
Or but a vantage ground, from which I see
My task still widening to infinity,
While o'er the past sinks the horizon's brow."
A letter from Spalding Council, Knights of Columbus,
was then read.
50 Episcopal Silver Jubilee
LETTER FROM SPALDING COUNCIL
KNIGHTS OF COLUMBUS.
Right 'Reverend John Lancaster Spalding, D. D., Bishop of
Peoria:
Right Reverend and Dear Bishop :
Spalding Council, No. 427, Knights of Columbus of
Peoria, 111., having honored itself, with your approval, by the
adoption of your distinguished name, and fully appreciating
you as a man, as a citizen, and as a gentle but firm spiritual
adviser, avail themselves of this opportunity of expressing to
you hearty congratulations upon this, the twenty-fifth anni-
versary of your spiritual guardianship over us.
We devoutly pray to Almighty God to keep you in His
tender care and extend to you many years of health and happi-
ness. As a slight evidence of our high esteem, we beg leave
to present to you, in the name of our council, our certified
check for one thousand dollars, to be used by you in furnishing
a permanent scholarship at Spalding Institute in Peoria, 111.,
the same to be known as Spalding Council, Knights of Colum-
bus Scholarship. Having full confidence in your judgment, we
leave it to you to adopt such rules and regulations for the gov-
ernment of this scholarship as you may deem right and proper.
We beg leave, Right Reverend Sir, to subscribe ourselves
your obedient servants.
P. A. DONAHUE,
Grand Knight.
WM. BOURKE,
GEORGE KENNEDY, Financial Secretary.
Treasurer. ',
May i, 1902.
John Lancaster Spalding 51
THE TOAST-MASTER.
Your Eminence and Revered Guests.
Any great occasion or grand festivity in this diocese
would seem incomplete without the presence of Dean Mackin
of Rock Island. Of broad and generous views, spontaneous
impulse, genial and hospitable; he instinctively brightens a
Jubilee Day, and diffuses sunshine and good cheer. The Dean
is an ardent admirer of our great and illustrious Bishop, and
predicts for him a lofty and conspicuous niche in the temple
of the world's best and most famous men. In behalf of the
priests of the diocese, he has been requested to present
"Greetings to Our Jubilarian."
ADDRESS OF DEAN MACKIN.
"GREETINGS TO OUR JUBILARIAN."
Assembled to honor and greet Right Reverend John Lan-
caster Spalding, Bishop of Peoria, on this, the twenty-fifth an-
niversary of his Episcopal consecration, we obey an injunc-
tion of human nature which prompts all people to respect and
reverence distinguished men.
Few men in this or any country can be accredited with
brighter fame than Bishop Spalding has earned. By his learn-
ing and tact he has reconciled people widely at variance with
Christian teachings. His masterly lectures, delivered in
thronged halls throughout this country, have riveted upon him
the attention of the American people and disposes them to read
his books.
With "Thoughts and Theories of Life and Education,"
"Means and Ends of Education," "Education and Higher
Life," "Opportunity and Other Essays," "Aphorisms and
Reflections," "Songs from the German," "God and the Soul ;"
with these books and other writings the Right Reverend
Bishop entertains numerous classes of readers in every part
of this vast republic. He thus enters into the heart of the
peasant, into the work shop of the artisan ; he is in the hands
of the school children ; on the desks of teachers and professors.
52 Episcopal Silver Jubilee
Priests and scholars read him; besides his eloquence sings all"
over the land, is heard in Paris and resounds in Rome.
The people of this country, jealous of their institutions
and believing that a knowledge of the principles on which they
are based is necessary to their perpetuity, go to great extrava-
gance in building schools and endowing colleges so that means
and opportunity may be everywhere at hand to enable them to
be thoroughly trained. That this laudable intent might have
full sanction of the American Hierarchy, Bishop Spalding
used his pen and tongue at home and abroad and continued this
agitation for higher education until success crowned his ef-
forts in the establishment of the Catholic University at Wash-
ington, the seat of government. Behold this center of learn-
ing, the extension of Rome who has civilized the world
Rome who has seen the rise and fall of nations and still lives
on in undiminished splendor to guide the destinies of men and
to hold on high the lamp of learning, burning as of old with
brightest effulgence. Witness this achievement and witness
the man who was chiefly instrumental in its accomplishment
Pass we now from this broad scope of public interest in
which we have seen Bishop Spalding play successfully a dis-
tinguished part to the narrower confines of his own diocese to
see the effort of his great activity. Twenty-five years ago this
Diocese of Peoria was founded. It contains eighteen thousand
five hundred and fifty- four square miles of territory, enough to
make several San Marino republics. In the period of twenty-
five years you can see the great wealth of population and ter-
ritorial extension acquired by the United States ; in a less pro-
portion, but in a degree not less astounding, in the Diocese of
Peoria under the rule of Bishop Spalding, increased churches,
schools, institutes, colleges, hospitals, asylums, and convents.
These institutions distributed among one hundred and
twenty thousand Catholics justify the addition of an auxiliary
bishop. It is very fortunate that a man eminently qualified
for the position and most acceptable to the priests was chosen.
Fellow soldiers in the trenches, be not discouraged, we have
a valiant and noble captain, who will in time reward us all.
One auxiliary does not suffice, Bishop Spalding therefore re-
lying on our loyalty counts on each of his one hundred and
John Lancaster Spalding 55
eighty priests to prove as far as possible in every emergency
a faithful auxiliary. So we are all in a position of honor
and trust. This reciprocity of mutual interest and confidence
makes the life of Bishop Spalding and his priests happy and
the growth and development of Peoria Diocese marvelous.
Unity of co-operation between Bishop Spalding and his priests
is not the work of chance. Of the one hundred and twenty
thousand Catholics spread over an area of eighteen thousand
five hundred and fifty-four miles square there is not one child,
one man or woman who has not seen or heard Bishop Spald-
ing.
Despite long journeys through heat and cold, Bishop
Spalding is in every village, town and city in every part of
his diocese, lecturing and instructing his people. It is his con-
stant practice before administering the sacrament of confirma-
tion to examine each child in turn and explain the meaning of
the words which the child may use in answer. Parents and
children, seeing the interest thus taken in their enlightment, at
once love him and with tears pray for his speedy return. When
subsequently it is announced the Bishop will be here in May to
give confirmation there is joy in the hearts of all. The priests
likewise, with whom Bishop Spalding associates as a tender
father with his sons, long to see him again and again and, like
Peter and James on the mount, would fain live with him for-
ever.
With hearts aglow with delight, Right Reverend Bishop,
at your triumphs at home and abroad, we, your devoted priests,
tender you our homage, our loyalty, our obedience and our
love, and we pray that God may spare you length of days to
celebrate your golden jubilee. To mark this event and to
prove the sincerity of our words we herewith present you a
token of our appreciation of your great learning, great service
and unbounded merits.
In reply to this greeting of his clergy the Bishop, who
was visibly affected, spoke as follows:
Episcopal Silver Jubilee
Whatever stirs emotions disturbs judgment. This most
beautiful May time, a great concourse of people, a throng of
bishops and priests in symbolic vesture; music, pleading for
power to utter the thought and love of the Eternal, or burst-
ing forth in swelling volumes of sound that roll and rise,
borne on viewless wings, to the throne of God ; rites and cere-
monies, hallowed by association with the divinest faith and
the noblest memories, with the heroic sufferings and triumphs
of millions of men and women the fine flower and fruit of
humanity who century after century for more than fifty gen-
erations have taken their stand on the world-wide battlefield,
steadfast until swallowed in the vortices of visible things, to
relive in the ever-enduring universe of pure spirit all this
exalts the imagination and lifts to spheres where feeling is
spontaneous and deliberation difficult.
For most of us who are gathered here the day itself brings
thoughts which for each one are tender and moving, as with
varying shade and circumstance they twine around the found-
ing of parishes, the building of churches and schools and
homes of mercy and beneficence, that in more than a hundred
towns and villages, and on wide prairies amid the growing
corn and the ripening harvest, have risen at the call of faith
and at the promptings of a generosity that seems to annul
selfish impulse, so long as there is good to be done recollec-
tions of youthful courage, high hope and pertinacious labor
undertaken for what each one believed to be most divine, and
endured for the love of what is holiest. It is inevitable, there-
fore, that emotions swell within us which dispose us to accept
as truth words which sober reason is reluctant to approve.
But best reason rests in Love from which the universe has
sprung, of whose deepest heart certainly our religion is born;
and since from this same source the sentiments which inspire
us to-day rise like a fountain's pure, light-seeking waters, why
may we not believe and affirm that what such emotion has
John Lancaster Spalding 55
awakened and bodied forth in word and deed, is very truth?
Not indeed, logical or scientific truth a skeleton of formulas
and facts but the truth which is borne in upon the soul when
mothers sing their children to sleep, when lovers sitting side
by side watch the sun, sinking beneath the horizon, and the
stars as one by one they smile from infinitude on the homes
of men ; such truth as the flowers speak, when from their lowly
beds they look up and laugh before us ; such as children reveal
and impersonate when heaven is mirrored in their pure eyes
and innocent faces.
If truth were but the naked fact, where should there be
room for the ineffable charm which interfuses itself with the
glow of dawn and sunset, with the light that falls from starlit
skies and from the countenances of those we love; for the
passion and patience, the trust and longing, the sacrifice and
aspiration, which impel the soul to transcend the limitations
of time and space and which give to human life its power and
blessedness ?
When we recall the years that are no more, the paths we
trod in childhood, the concert of voices that in the long ago
made the woodland ring with music, the quick current of
youthful blood athrill with high hopes and noble resolves, and
suddenly are made aware that it has all dissolved into empti-
ness and become as though it had never been, it is not possible
to remain cold and impassive. When we turn to the begin-
ning of our early manhood, as issuing with sublime self-con-
fidence from the portals of our Alma Mater, we vowed to
walk and work for Christ, to illumine, to guide, to strengthen,
to console and to save men, and are made deeply conscious
how little our purposes have fulfilled themselves in deeds, we
are softened and sobered, grow lowly minded and meek, like
those who contemplate ruins which the centuries have
wrought. In such mood all vanity and self-complacency die
within us, and words of praise and commendation sound like
mockery.
The achievements of even the genuinely great, if they be
considered in the light of the Eternal, are insignificant.
Were God not, the whole race of man would be no bet-
ter than the parasites that batten on decay. But God is, and
5<5 Episcopal Silver Jubilee
they who have best insight best know that man's worth is
measured by the degree of his kinship with Him, without
whom he would be but a semblance and unreality.
If in any one of us there be aught that may win approval
or awaken admiration or thankfulness, whether it be truth,
or honesty, or mildness, or intelligence, or strength of mind,
or rectitude, or courage, or perseverance, or humility, or love,
or piety, or unselfishness, it is of, through, and for God, from
whom all life springs, to whom all hope looks, toward whom
all yearning moves, on whom all faith rests, in whom all
hearts find repose.
In the twenty-five years on which we now set the seal of
eternity, whatever may have been well done by any of us,
has been done for Him and by His help. The field is His, the
seed is His; His, the rain and sunshine; His, the vital force
that has built unto itself a body and brought about the har-
monic play of all the members of the organism. We have but
been His servants, and had we not been at all, He, had He so
willed, would have found others and better. Our only merit
is that of servants and true service is our only blessedness.
The service we have chosen is that which the Eternal
stooped to earth and wore human flesh to perform. It is the
most beneficent, the holiest, the helpfulest, the most needful
which it can fall to the lot of man to do. The task set us is
to make ourselves and others Christ-like and God-like.
If those who profess to lead a religious life have the
morals of the crowd or worse, they are the most contemptible
and are, in fact, the most despised of men; but they who
have the soul, and not merely the name of priest, are divine
men are, in word and deed, God's faithfulest witnesses to the
Truth that liberates, to the Love that saves and beatifies.
" Whoso has felt the Spirit of the Highest
Cannot confound nor doubt Him nor deny;
Yea, with one voice, O world, though thou deniest,
Stand thou on this side, for on that am I."
No unworthy thought has impelled us to commemorate
this day with solemn rites and grave words. Few of us are
so immature as to attach importance to a mere demonstration.
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None of us are so frivolous as to imagine that what is said of
a man has meaning or value other than that derived from what
he is; and what he is, not himself even, but God alone knows.
There may be merit in collecting so many thousand dol-
lars and in paying mechanics for fitting together so many
stones and so many pieces of wood, but where the aim and
end are spiritual, praise for doing such things is not to the
purpose. Neither the heart nor the proper work of such a
one is in matter, which has meaning for him only in so far as
it is made to serve higher interests, by becoming the nourish-
ment or the symbol of the soul. He knows that what each
one, and the social body as well, most needs is not wealth,
nor privilege, nor cunning, nor favor, but larger, braver,
holier, sweeter life more sympathy, more courage, more wis-
dom, more love. They prevail who are stronger than their
fellows stronger through faith and desire, through knowl-
edge and virtue, through self-control and devotion to truth
and justice. God is a Spirit, and they whose character is built
on the principles which faith and hope make certain, which
best reason approves, are the powers by which His reign is
established and made perpetual. His servants conquer, not
with the sword, not with money nor with the things money
can buy, but by the soul, which enrooted in Him, contemplates
all things in the light of Eternity, and is calm and unmoved,
while the pomp and pageantry pass by, to sink forever beyond
the reach of all-penetrative thought. Men, like children, are
attracted by a world of shows ; they are busy with vanities, and
attach importance to trifles. But from the central heart of
religion the divine voice declares that only the things which
minister to the soul's welfare have worth; that there is no
genuine life but that which unfolds itself heavenward, and,
like the tendril for the solid stem, reaches after God. Had we
temples built of gold and adorned with every kind of precious
stone; though the music of the masters, uttered by masters,
appealed to us ; though from canvas and stone and high-raised
pulpit genius spoke to us, it were all but show and sound if
it did not lift the soul nearer to our Father in heaven. God's
men are spiritual men, and the only religious progress is prog-
ress in faith and love, in wisdom and virtue.
5# Episcopal Silver Jubilee
What we commemorate today, we of the Diocese of Pe-
oria, bishops and priests, brothers and sisters, and the people
whose servants we all are, what this company of distinguished
men have come from many Sees to help us to celebrate worthily,
is our labors for the moralization of human life, is our devo-
tion to the things that make for righteousness and peace and
life everlasting.
If we have built churches, it is that the people may gather
there, and through worship and the reception of the sacraments
and the hearing of the Word, may be refreshed, nourished and
renewed in their innermost being. If we have established
schools, it is that the little ones, whom the Blessed Savior loved,
who are our joy and our hope, may grow up in an atmosphere
in which learning blends with piety, knowledge with faith,
true thought with chaste life, love with obedience. If we have
founded homes for those whom loss or sin or age or poverty
has made helpless or miserable, it is because we know they
are our brothers and sisters, and that we do best for Our
Heavenly Father and for ourselves in serving them.
This is what we cherish most and most love. If Peoria
and the Diocese of Peoria are dear to us and God and we all
know they are it is so not chiefly for the beautiful site, the
healthful climate, the fertile soil from which the corn bursts
like song from happy hearts ; it is so, above all, for the spirit
of freedom, of good will, of helpfulness which breathes here as
unhindered as the gentle wind that kisses the prairie into life
and bloom; they are dear for the opportunity which is given
here to all alike to upbuild character, to confirm will, to culti-
vate the mind, to follow after the better things of which faith
and hope are the heralds.
If today for a moment, even in thought, I may separate
myself from any one of those who, during the twenty-five
years that have now become a part of the unchangeable past,
have gathered about me in still increasing numbers, and with
hearts ever more willing, I will say that the affection I bear
them, the joy they give me, which like the ripening fruit and
the mellowing wine, grow more precious as time lengthens,
are born, not so much of the success with which they have
accomplished whatever they have been asked to do, as of their
John Lancaster Spalding 5P
spirit of disinterestedness and self-sacrifice, of their courage
and ability, their magnanimity and singleheartedness, their
never-slumbering watchfulness over the good name of the
diocese and that of its priesthood. When the office of bishop
was offered to me, if I hesitated to accept the burden and the
honor, it was largely, if my memory deceive me not, from a
dread lest my opinion of man's high estate, as revealed in the
lives of priests and nuns, should be lowered by the more in-
timate knowledge of them which necessarily comes to those
who are placed in authority over them. A personal expe-
rience of twenty-five years is a broad basis for the judgment
of an individual, and it is a source of inner strength and free-
dom to me to be able to feel and say, in perfect sincerity, that
though priests and nuns be not exempt from the infirmities
which inhere in all that is human, I have found them to be
the kindliest, the most unselfish, the most loyal, the most pure-
minded and the most devoted of men and women. Never
have I appealed to them in vain, when I have appealed to the
god-like in man. They have confirmed my faith in human
nature, and in the worth and sacredness of life.
They have made me more certain that we are all the chil-
dren of an Almighty and all-loving Father from out whose
thought and care we can never die.
Let me conclude, in my own name, and in that of the
whole diocese, with the expression of sincere thanks to his
eminence the Cardinal Archbishop of Baltimore, to the most
reverend archbishops and bishops, and to the reverend clergy-
men who have done us the honor to be our guests to-day and to
heighten by their presence and sympathy the significance and
the joy of this occasion.
l&egolutiong StoopteD by tl)t
Cft? Conned
Whereas, The supreme authorities of his Church twenty-
five years ago recognized the sterling worth of Reverend John
Lancaster Spalding, as a citizen and churchman, and elevated
him to the exalted position of bishop of the Diocese of Peoria,
and
60 Episcopal Silver Jubilee
Whereas, The entire membership of his Church throughout
the world joins today in congratulating him upon a more than
successful career as Bishop of Peoria ;
Therefore Be It Resolved, That we join in this most proper
expression of love and congratulation. For twenty-five years
Bishop Spalding has been a worthy citizen of our community,
leading in every movement for the material as well as the
spiritual advancement and uplifting of our citizens. His elo-
quent words and ennobling example in behalf of education and
temperance, in behalf of the poor and lowly and those suffering
from wrongs and oppressions, have planted in our religious
opinions a love and veneration for him that can find but feeble
expression in mere words.
Be It Further Resolved, That we congratulate the Right
Reverend John Lancaster Spalding on this, the twenty-fifth
anniversary of his elevation to the dignified position he holds,
and join the civilized world in praying for his continued good
health, and for those fuller and greater honors which his life
and genius bespeak for him.
ALDERMEN.
Thos. N. Gorman, Chas. N. Louis,
George Harms, G. F. Simmons,
J. E. Stillwell, Thos. O'Connor,
Stephen Wolschlag, E. N. Woodruff,
J. J. McDonald, Charles Proctor,
A. B. Tolson, David S. Long,
W. F. Benson, J. J. Jobst,
J. D. Carey, W. R. Allison,
WILLIAM F. BRYAN, Mayor.
ROBT. M. ORR, City Clerk.
Among the distinguished visitors were His Eminence, Car-
dinal Gibbons, of Baltimore ; Archbishop Ireland, of St. Paul ;
Archbishop Keane, of Dubuque; Archbishop Kain, of St
Louis; Archbishop Riordan, of San Francisco; Bishops Ga-
briels, of Ogdensburg, N. Y. ; McQuaid, of Rochester, N. Y. ;
Byrne, of Nashville, Tenn. ; Foley, of Detroit, Mich.; Mess-
mer, of Green Bay, Wis. ; Shanley, of Fargo, S. D. ; Cotter of
John Lancaster Spalding 61
Winona, Minn. ; Scannell, of Omaha, Neb. ; Burke of St. Jo-
seph, Mo.; Dunne, of Dallas, Tex.; Cosgrove, of Davenport,
la.; Glennon, of Kansas City, Mo.; Muldoon, of Chicago;
Ryan, of Alton ; Janssen, of Belleville ; Moeller, of Columbus ;
Conaty, of Washington, D. C. ; Rt. Rev. Innocent Wolf, ab-
bott of St. Benedict's abbey, Atchison, Kans. ; Rt Rev. Mon-
signor Legris, of St. Viateur's College, Kankakee, 111.; Rt.
Rev. Monsignor J. B. Murray, president of St. Mary's Semi-
nary, Cincinnati, Ohio; Very Rev. J. Z. Zahm, provincial of
the Order of the Holy Cross, Notre Dame, Ind. ; Very Rev. M.
J. Marsile, president of St. Viateur's College, Kankakee, 111.;
Rev. Joseph H. McMahon and Rev. M. A. Cunnion, of New
York city ; Rev. Father P. Gavin, chancellor of the archdiocese
of Baltimore, who accompanied Cardinal Gibbons.
Besides these visiting dignitaries there were present some
three hundred priests from this and the surrounding states.
Cfcening
The evening service was beautiful. The great Cathedral,
magnificently decorated and brilliant with the glow of hun-
dreds of lights, presented a gorgeous appearance as the
bishops and priests entered for the service. At the close of
the service and the musical program, Archbishop Ireland, of
St. Paul, delivered the sermon. His subject was "The Chris-
tian Priesthood," and his sermon was as follows :
"He said therefore to them again : Peace be to you. As
the Father hath sent Me, I also send you." John xx., 21.
The mystery of mysteries in dealings of the infinite with
the finite, the mystery of love and power ineffable, is the in-
carnation of the eternal Word. "In the beginning was the
Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.
* * * And the Word was made flesh, and dwelt among
us; and we saw the glory, the glory as it were of the only-
begotten of the Father, full of grace and truth."
The infinite the first cause, the all-pervading mind, the
all-vivifying will, alone gives life and light to all that is finite,
62 Episcopal Silver Jubilee
and alone is its ultimate term. From God and to God
behold man's sublime origin and man's sublime destiny.
Man is necessarily a seeker of God, a religious being. In
the long history of the race there is discernible always a re-
ligion, a reaching out under one form or another toward the
supernatural. Man is restless until he lies upon the bosom of
the Infinite.
But the despair of man's upward journey ! God, so much
needed by him, is yet distant from him ! And God is all spirit-
ual, while in man the spiritual is so clogged, so dulled by
sense, that what has not bodily shape is but dimly descried,
and but feebly laid hold of. Hence in his reaching out toward
God, pure and beauteous as was ever in itself this motion of
mind and heart, numberless were the devious ways which poor
man mistook for the straight road, numberless were the de-
ceiving and fateful glares which shone to him as truth and
goodness. What then? Shall God be always inaudible to
humanity's ear, always invisible to humanity's eye? The ap-
peal was to God's eternal love; and from God's eternal love
the answer came: "Then, said I, behold I come." Omnipo-
tence was tasked that the infinite put on the form of the finite,
that God be made a child of humanity. "And the Word was
made flesh and dwelt among us, and we saw the glory as it
were of the only-begotten Son of the Father, full of grace
and truth." Humanity through its bodily senses saw and
heard its God, and through these senses its spirit was flooded
with His truth and His love.
The Incarnation, so to speak, made the supernatural; it
concreted in human form the invisible and inaudible ; it brought
God under the very eyes and near to the very ears of men.
The distance between the infinite and the finite vanished; re-
ligion, the exaltation of man to the embrace of the Most High,
became so easy, so sweet, that no peril lay in its pathway, no
effort was felt in its flight.
And, now, I speak another mystery the extension and
perpetuation of that of the Incarnation, lesser only than that
of the Incarnation itself in power and love.
The day came when Jesus, returning to the Father, with-
drew from visible nearness to men His divine personality and
John Lancaster Spalding <5j
the sensible concretion of the supernatural wrought in the In-
carnation. Is the vast chasm opened again between God and
man ? Is man in his searching for God turned again back upon
himself, alone and unaided, doomed again to grope his way
amid the dim regions of the purely spiritual world ? Not so ;
the great gifts of God to humanity are without recall, and
the Incarnation but puts on another form.
Do I overstate the divine dispensation ? Remember, I pray
you, the omnipotence embodied in Jesus, and hearken to His
institutional words.
He was speaking not to the body of His disciples, but to
the chosen few, the Apostles. To these, not to others, He
said : "Peace be to you. As the Father hath sent Me, I also
send you." The self-same mission intrusted to Him, when
first in the eternal counseling of the Triune Majesty He ex-
claimed : "Behold, I come," is now intrusted by Him to His
Apostles. The mission is the self-same. "As the Father hath
sent Me, I also send you." And, again : "All power is given
to Me in Heaven and on earth; going, therefore, teach ye all
nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and the
Son, and the Holy Ghost * * * and, behold, I am with
you all days, even to the consummation of the world." To
substitute for Christ mere men is what omnipotence alone
could do; therefore it is that in this instance He invokes His
omnipotence. "All power is given to Me in heaven and in
earth" and so in virtue of His omnipotence He is with them
while they teach and baptize, and so, when they teach and bap-
tize, they teach and baptize in His name and with His power,
even as if He Himself taught and baptized. And furthermore :
"He that receiveth you receiveth Me ; he that despiseth you de-
spiseth Me." So thorough and complete, in the mind of Christ,
is the identification of His mission with that of His Apostles!
Specific delegations of divine power appertaining to His mis-
sion were made by Christ on given occasions to the Apostles ;
that of remitting sin, when He said : "Whose sins you shall
forgive they are forgiven them ; and whose sins you shall re-
tain, they are retained ;" that of renewing the mystic wonders
of the Last Supper, when He said : "Do this in commemora-
tion of Me." That the several delegations, whether general or
64 Episcopal Silver Jubilee
specific, were to be enduring in their effect, and, consequently,
were made to the Apostles, not merely to them as individuals,
but to them as a corporate body, to them, and to their succes-
sors in office, is evidenced from the words: "And, behold, I
am with you all days, even unto the consummation of the
world," as, also, from the Apostles' own action, in associating
with themselves from time to time others of the disciples and
communicating to those their own powers and authority.
Christ came for the salvation of men in all ages. When He
withdrew from earth His visible presence the Apostles took
His place; the Apostles, therefore, as the representatives of
Christ, were to subsist in all ages.
And thus, through Christ's love and power, the Christian
priesthood was created, Christ's tabernacling upon earth was
made to endure, the visible incarnation of the infinite was con-
tinued among men. Rising toward His ethereal home Elias
cast down his mantle upon the shoulders of Eliseus, and in
the person of Eliseus, Elias still lived upon earth. In like
manner, but with efficacy, far greater and far more lasting,
Christ cast His mantle upon- the shoulders of His Priests, and
in the persons of His Priests, He still walks among men.
The Catholic Church is vitally sacerdotal. It sees in its
ministers a body of men separate in character and endowment
from their fellows, bearing a divine commission, charged with
supernatural powers that are derived directly and imme-
diately from Christ. In this it gives evidence of its affiliation
with Christ. Its sacerdotalism, which enemies would fain
turn into a reproach, is the proud inheritance of the Catholic
Church, because it is the Church of Christ. To disown sacer-
dotalism were to disown divine origin. Christ plainly set the
Apostles apart from others. Christ plainly spoke to them
words not spoken to others, words pregnant with supernatural
power and authority. A church that is of Christ must of
necessity present to the world a divinely endowed priesthood.
Let churches that date from recent years, that never
touched the hand of the God-man, that never thrilled at the
sound of His voice, disown, as they may, sacerdotalism; they
are from men, and naught save what men can give them do
they possess. Not so the church of nineteen centuries, whose
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John Lancaster Spalding 6$
first ministers were Peter, and John, and James, which stood
at Christ's side on the Galilean mountain and hearkened to
the words: "All power is given to Me in heaven and on
earth. Going, therefore, teach ye all nations." The current
of supernal power, flowing from those sublime words, vibrates
henceforth over the world to sanctify and deify the souls of
men.
"But thou, O man of God," wrote Paul to the priest Tim-
othy. The priest of the Church of Christ is "the man of God,"
the token to the world that God lives and reigns, the represen-
tative before it of the supernatural and the divine. What
Christ was by nature, the priest is by the appointment of
Christ ; and thus he has, as Christ had, the mission to concrete
in a manner before men the invisible, that the invisible be not
forgotten by men. A priest is seen; it is a reminder of the
supernatural. A priest is seen; a testimony is given to the
higher life, to things better and purer than earth owns. A
priest is seen ; God is seen in visible symbolism. In this realm
of matter and of sense, where earth so fiercely drags down the
soul, where clouds so dense hide from it the vision of things
supernatural, how precious is this symbol of the divine ! How
precious the priesthood of Christ's Church, ever living among
us, walking with us low upon the ground, while still pointing
upward, so that we cannot but see it, and seeing it, cannot but
remember our exalted destinies.
"For Christ we are ambassadors," said Paul of himself
and his fellow-priests. Another Christ, "alter Christus," by
this name were the rectors of the Church wont to call the
priest. The priest personifies Christ; he puts Christ under
our eyes; he compels us to see Him, to think of Him. And
this is to us a supreme blessing. Were Christ to remain a
mere historic personage, cut off by nineteen centuries, how
easy to forget Him ! But with a body of men reaching back,
in uninterrupted continuity, to Christ himself, ever present
among us, wearing His robes of office, holding aloft His
standard. Christ is never out of sight, Christ does not fall back
among the dead. If the priesthood were nothing else than the
unceasing reminder that Christ was, that Christ taught men,
loved them and died for them, it were to earth a boon inestim-
able. How senseless the clamor away with all priesthood;
66 Episcopal Silver Jubilee
let each one go directly to Christ, directly to God! Christ
removed by nineteen centuries, God driven back into the dim
regions of the abstract, both Christ and God would be little
thought of. Why, we ask, was there a Christ? Why was
not humanity left to seek God without even Christ as an inter-
mediary ? Is it not that humanity needed the visible and the
sensible in order to apprehend the more readily the invisible
and the spiritual? And as Christ was needed to bring near
unto men God, so the priest is now needed to bring near unto
them Christ.
"Let a man so account of us," writes Paul, "as of the min-
isters of Christ and the dispensers of the mysteries of God."
"But thou, O man of God" thou are not only the chosen sym-
bol of the divine and the supernatural, not only the official
representative of Christ the teacher and the Saviour thou
art, even as Christ was, the minister of heaven's gifts, the
bearer and distributor of divine treasures.
The priest teaches the doctrines of Christ the eternal coun-
sels of the divine mind, revealed to men through Christ. He
teaches those doctrines officially, in the name of Christ, and
by authority from Christ. And, so far as he teaches those
doctrines in union with the general apostolate and its supreme
head, he teaches them under Christ's own direction, and de-
livers them pure and undefiled to his hearers. The commis-
sion is most formal, the promise most explicit: "All power
is given to Me in heaven and in earth ; going, therefore, teach
ye all nations * * * teaching them to observe all things
whatsoever I have commanded you, and behold, I am with you
all days even unto the consummation of the world." How
different the priest of Christ's Church from the spokesmen of
churches made by men, or the self-authorized philosopher,
whose voice is only human, whose words bring but their own
weight into the scales of judgment !
The priest of Christ's Church pours upon souls the blood of
Calvary, redeeming them from the slavery of sin, cleansing
them from its stain, beautifying them into God's own image.
So plenary is the priest's agency, held immediately from
Christ, that through the words spoken by him in the name of
Christ, there goes out in unstinted force the omnipotence of
John Lancaster Spalding 67
Christ. "Going, therefore, teach ye all nations, baptizing
them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the
Holy Ghost" the priest baptizes; a soul is born again "of
water and the Holy Ghost," made radiant of the smile of God's
countenance. "Whose sins you shall forgive, they are for-
given" the priest repeats the sentence of forgiveness over
the penitent sinner; the prodigal child is pressed again upon
the Father's bosom.
The priest of Christ's Church renews the mysteries of the
Last Supper and of Calvary. "Do this in commemoration of
Me," said Jesus to the Apostles when He had changed bread
into His body, and wine into His blood, anticipating in mystic
form the bloody drama of the morrow, when He had fed unto
them His own self as the nutriment of their souls. "Do this,"
and as over the elements of bread and wine the priests speaks
the words of Christ, "This is My body," "This is My blood,"
Christ is offered anew in sacrifice ; and as the priest distributes
to the faithful the food spread upon the altar, the body and
the blood of the Crucified, the faithful absorb into their souls
their Saviour, their God.
Lest you think, brethren, I wander into dreams, recall, I
again beseech you, Christ's institutional words and Christ's
omnipotence.
But what, you ask, does all this mean? What can have
been the design of the Incarnate in awarding to children of
men the power of God ? What reason is there for such prodi-
gality of supreme gifts?
Brethren, all that is done for the priesthood and by the
priesthood is done through God's love for souls. The priest-
hood is not an end to itself; its end is your deification. The
priest is not endowed supernally for his own honor and glory ;
he is but the minister of God's mercies to you, he is your server
unto your spiritual aggrandizement. God so loved you that
He destined you to supernatural life and felicity; to merit for
you graces that lift to such heights, the "Word" was made
flesh, suffered and died ; and now, in the distribution of those
graces, as the instrument must be proportioned to the fruits
it is to produce, the priesthood, Christ's instrument for the
regeneration and sanctification of souls by the application to
68 Episcopal Silver Jubilee
them of His very blood, is invested with supernal dignity, and
vibrates with supernal life and energy.
In presence of the priesthood of Christ's Church we bow
in wonder and gratitude; we admire the mysteries of God's
dealings with souls; we accept the priesthood as the sequence
of the Incarnation, and the Incarnation as the sequence of
God's love for men.
Priests of Christ's Church, dreadful it is not? the re-
sponsibility made to weigh upon us by the divine element in
the priesthood. The priesthood is divine, and we are human ;
and to us, in co-operation with the grace given to us in our
ordination, it is left to put the human in harmony with the
divine, so that one be worthy of the other, so that one work
fitly with the other.
In Christ the divine and the human were clasped together
by the one divine personality; the harmony of the one with
the other, as the necessary result of the hypostatic union, was
perfect. Not so in us; through us, indeed, there courses the
current of divine life and power; but in us, in nature and in
person, the human retains full independent control ; and, as our
will decrees, either adapts itself to the divine or sets itself in
opposition to it.
Understand me well, brethren. It makes no vital differ-
ence to those who receive the ministrations of a priest, whether
in him the human is, or is not, attuned to the divine ; whether,
indeed, he is a saint or a sinner. The essential efficacy of the
ministrations of the priest depends upon the divine within him,
not upon the human; upon the powers communicated to him
at the moment of his aggregation to the priestly body in
Christ's Church, not upon his manner of life, or his co-opera-
tion with the favors that were then showered upon him. Christ,
in instituting the priesthood, held in view the souls that were
to be saved, and for their sake He willed that the ministerial
power of the priest be effective of its own virtue, whatever
be the personal moral status of the priest himself.
Yes, there is the human in the priesthood ; and, alas ! here
and there it shows itself in unmistakable colors. Is there here
an argument against the divine in the priesthood? None what-
soever. The faithful Christian will always deeply regret that
John Lancaster Spalding <5p
one bearing the name of priest should, Judas-like, betray the
Master and dishonor his sacred vocation. He will pray fer-
vently that all priests be what the Holy Church exhorts them
to be, and, so far as he is allowed, he will do earnestly his part
to build up an ideal priesthood. But if faults are discernible,
and even scandals do occur, he is not moved in his faith;
he wonders the more that God is so merciful to souls as to
make of the sons of men His ministers and agents, that souls
be reached by His graces in readier and more efficient manner ;
and turning quickly from isolated cases, which the Almighty,
in order to make manifest the play of free will, allows to stand
in the holy of holies, he fixes steadily his regard upon God's
priesthood, as it lights up the moral world in all Christian ages,
under all skies. Brethren, look out upon God's priesthood.
It sparkles with the rays of heaven in its myriad virtues. Is
it not pure and holy? Does it not impel upward the lowly
human unto heights sublime ? Is not the divine within it trans-
lucent even through its human vesture? No; the priesthood
of the Church does not in its human manifestations deny a
divine origin, or a divine mission.
What the individual priest should be, to be worthy of his
priesthood, to what degree he should make the human in him
conform with the divine, is easily told.
The priest should be holy ; no moral stain should rest upon
him; the spirit of Christ should vivify his thoughts and acts;
every virtue should accompany his daily steps.
"But thou, O man of God, fly these things (the things
of earth) ; and pursue justice, godliness, faith, charity, pa-
tience, mildness."
The priest is the symbol of the supernatural. The purity
of the skies must adorn his countenance; the loftiness of the
skies must permeate his mind ; the love of the eternal must be
his source of life and action.
The priest is the representative, the ambassador of Christ :
"For Christ we are ambassadors, God as it were exhorting by
us." Therefore let Christ be so seen in the priest that to those
whom he would bring to Christ he can say with Paul: "Be
imitators of me, as I also am of Christ." The first apprehen-
sion that is had of Christ, as His figure projects itself across
/o Episcopal Silver Jubilee
the ages of humanity, is that of the all-holy : "Holy, innocent,
undefiled, separate from sinners, made higher than the
heavens." O Christ, to be Thy ambassadors, to speak for
Thee, to show Thee to men what a challenge to sacerdotal
sanctity !
The priest is the treasurer, the distributor of the merits of
Christ, the graces of regeneration and holiness. Shall he
hold in hand those graces, and not be himself enriched by
them ? Shall he deal out to others the life of the angel, and
refuse it to himself? This the malediction of the prophet;
"Thou shalt sow, but shalt not reap; thou shalt tread the
olives, but shalt not be anointed with the oil: and the new
grape, but shalt not drink the wine."
The priest is the teacher of men ; his mission is to draw men
to Christ, to plant in their minds the faith of Christ. But
will teaching be efficacious, unless it be spoken with boundless
sincerity, and that sincerity be translucent in the whole life
of the speaker? Will the power of Christ to sanctify souls be
admitted, if it has not plainly sanctified the soul of him who
is its chosen mouthpiece? Mere teaching, even though upheld
by strongest argument, is sterile, unless it carries with it the
magnetic fire that burns into the soul of the hearer; such fire
this is as issues from the soul of the teacher, whose blazing
flames are the examples given by the teacher. Mere teaching,
however noble and pure in itself, is vague and abstract until
it takes visible form in facts. The eternal law did not impress
the world until it lived in Christ; Christ's historic law will
not impress the humanity of to-day until it lives in the priest
of to-day. Miracles are quoted as the groundwork of priestly
teaching; but miracles of nineteen hundred years ago are too
remote, unless they revive in a miracle of the present time.
Let this be the moral miracle, a man built up upon the model
of Christ a preacher of Christ who acts out in daily life the
teachings of Christ.
To sanctity in the priest there must be superadded knowl-
edge. "The lips of the priest," says the prophet, "shall keep
knowledge ; and they shall seek the law at his mouth, because
he is the angel of the Lord of Hosts."
The mission of the priest is to plant divine faith in the souls
John Lancaster Spalding fl
of men. This is done by an appeal to intellect, by a victory
over intellect. "Faith cometh by hearing, and hearing by the
word of Christ." God's grace is, indeed, at work, aiding the
preacher to speak and the hearer to believe; but God's grace
presupposes the play of intellect both in preacher and in
hearer.
The priest steps into the intellectual arena of the world,
saying: I bear a message from Christ. Dare not attempt to
speak, unless you know well what the message is that Christ
has confided to you. Ignorance of it is an injury to Christ, an
insult to the listener. Know well what the message is, know
it in its entirety, know it in all its power and beauty. And be
ready, when the right of Christ to send a message, or your
right to be his spokesman, is disputed, to unfold the roll of
Christ's gospel, and with logic resistless, and language that en-
forces respect, to extol Christ, the prophet, the Lord, the Sa-
vior, and His Church, the mistress and queen of the ages
so that it indeed may be said: verily, what we hear is from
God.
Vast is the field of knowledge with which the priest ought
to be familiar ; for few are the departments of thought across
the borders of which Christian faith in its dogmas or its pre-
cepts does not pass. History and philosophy, science and
sociology, draw light for their own teachings from revealed
truth, and assist in explaining and illustrating the teachings of
faith. Art is wrought by religion into its highest forms,
and in turn lends its splendors to bring within reach of the eye
and ear the beauties of religious aspirations; and literature
it is that provides the fitting garb by which religion's truths
and hopes may be served out to men. With all such matters
the priest should have long tarried, learning well to rein them
into the service of the Most High.
Knowledge in the priest exalts the priest's soul; it en-
riches his mind with lofty ideals, mellows his heart to love
and sacrifice, and bears him onward to sacred ambitions,
whence spring great designs and the heroic courage to pursue
them. Knowledge in the priest wins for him the esteem and
respect of the world, silences distrust and cavil, and of its own
fame adds untold strength to his religious teaching.
?2 Episcopal Silver Jubilee
The world reveres intellectual power; and strong, for the
glory of God and the salvation of souls, is the priesthood that
possesses it.
To sanctity and knowledge in the priest I would lend the
wings of holy zeal, that upon them they fly over plain and
mountain, over sea and continent, in search of souls to en-
lighten them with the faith of Christ, and warm them with the
love of Christ. "I am come," said Jesus, "to cast fire on the
earth; and what will I but that it be kindled?" And how
Jesus labored and suffered that this fire be kindled in souls!
And so must the priest labor and suffer, if he is a lover of
Jesus, a lover of souls. Earnestness is the condition of victory
on all fields of human effort; sloth and routine everywhere
mean shame and defeat. But if ever there were work, noble
and sublime, challenging all the ambitions, all the energies of
the soul, that work surely is the spreading of Christ's faith,
the exaltation of Holy Church, the salvation of souls. If ever,
then, there be the workman hating sloth and routine, and
earnest in his vocation, be he the. priest.
The priest of God the human and the divine the human
responding to the harmonies of the divine, and the divine unit-
ing with the human what power to do and conquer !
"And behold I am with you all days, even unto the con-
summation of the world." God is ever faithful to His promise.
Priests, shall we do our share?
Building up the priesthood endowing it with sanctity,
knowledge and zeal is of all works of religion and charity the
highest and the best, the most fruitful in results, the most meri-
torious before God. I must tell briefly the faithful laity of the
part they may have in it.
Brethren of the laity, to you is given the privilege to dedi-
cate your sons to the service of the sanctuary. The priesthood
is recruited from the youth of the land; the best, the fairest
of them are invited to be God's ministers, the ambassadors of
Christ, the savior of souls. Could there be opened to them
a more sublime calling? Could there be offered to them a
holier, a nobler opportunity to accomplish great things for
God and for humanity, to put to profit the talents they have
received from nature and grace, to win glorious and enduring
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John Lancaster Spalding 75
victories ? Catholic youths, why not be ambitious for the honor
of buckling upon your breast the armor of Christ, grasping in
your hands the sword of His truth, to conquer with Christ and
for Christ? Catholic fathers and mothers, why not rejoice in
the holy thought of seeing one day the child of your love offer-
ing at the altar the sacrifice of Calvary, and distributing to you
the graces of the redemption? Shall I speak a complaint of
Catholic fathers and mothers in America? It is this: that
they do not, as much as they should, nurture in the souls of
their children a vocation to the priesthood, and especially is
this true of Catholics whose worldly careers have led them to
wealth and social prominence. What is the cause? Is it weak-
ness of faith in the supernatural, on the part of the laity, or is
it the mere fact that the leaders in the church have not been
sufficiently careful to direct attention to this most important
matter? Whatever the cause, the truth is that until vocations
are more numerous in America than they heretofore have been,
religion will not prosper in the country as we should wish it
to prosper.
Brethren of the laity, to you is given the privilege to help,
with your temporal wealth, the bishops of the Church to give
to candidates for the priesthood the thorough training which
their high vocation makes necessary. We have in America
ecclesiastical seminaries ; but they are neither in sufficient num-
ber, nor are they sufficiently endowed, to furnish to the Amer-
ican Church the priesthood which it needs. We have a Catholic
University, one of the prime purposes of which is to open to
levites of superior talents opportunities of attaining to high
scholarship, so that here and there be at least a few fit to be
special leaders in the great movements to which the Church is
committed, fit to be, as it were, princes of thought and action;
but this university controls scarcely two million dollars, where
thirty or more millions should be at its disposal. Why this?
It is not that all our American Catholics are poor. It is not
that they are without examples of liberal giving among their
fellow-citizens, as a hundred instances of rich donations to
other institutions and other causes bear continuous witness.
Nor is it, can I believe, that Catholics are insensible to high
ideals, or devoid of generous heart-beatings. It must be that
74 Episcopal Silver Jubilee
enough is not said and done to instruct them in their duty in
this respect, and to quicken them to a realization of the great
need of religion a learned and well trained priesthood.
Brethren of the priesthood, brethren of the laity, the twen-
tieth century dawns upon the world. Never in history was
there another age to challenge such intelligent and zealous
work in the cause of religion as does the present. For us, the
twentieth century dawns in America ; nowhere else, in no other
country, are the aspirations and the hopes of the age so high
born, so promising, as in America.
Nature is wrought up to highest intensity. Earth has
yielded its most hidden secrets, and put its wealth with un-
stinted liberality at the service of men. Science has unraveled
deepest mysteries and enriched humanity with forces hereto-
fore undreamed. The human mind was never so ambitious,
the human heart never so quickened and so hopeful. In all
departments of life stupendous triumphs have been obtained,
and the future is pregnant with triumphs yet more astounding.
Is not the age worthy of the best effort of the army of the
supernatural ? The age, once conquered to Christ, will harness
to his chariot its forces, and dedicate to His service its power-
ful ambitions and then, as never before, will Christ reign,
the Supreme Master of humanity's highest evolutions.
We cannot but love the age for its conquests and its aspira-
tions, and should we not, for its sake, work to our utmost to
bring to it that which alone will satisfy all its longings, that
which will fitly crown all its labors the flood of supernal life
from God's own skies, and, in this manner, make it the truly
beloved, not of men only, but of God also, and His angels!
A superficial observer will say that the age is hardened to
appeals from the supernatural, that efforts to lift it above
matter must needs be vain, and indolence and cowardice on
our part will take pretext from such language to withdraw
in despair within our tents and leave the field to unbelief and
moral misery. They who speak or act in this manner mis-
judge and calumniate the age. The age is, indeed, often
wrong, for it is not wisely directed. But sound it to the very
core. Study it in the essential elements of its ebullitions of
life and you must confess that it loves truth and loves good-
John Lancaster Spalding 75
ness, covets the glory of doing great and noble things. Let
the religion of Christ be made known to it, in all its power
and loveliness, and the age will bow before it and will rec-
ognize in it that which it needs, and which it has been seeking,
even in its wanderings and its mistakes.
What is it, then, that is needed to bring the twentieth cen-
tury into the arms of Christ? What is it that is needed? A
faithful priesthood and a faithful laity.
Do I call for a new priesthood? By no means. I call for
the old priesthood the priesthood of the first Apostles, who,
going forth from the Master's presence, won quickly into alle-
giance to Him legions of disciples throughout the Roman
Empire and carried His cross far beyond frontiers which
Roman eagles had never passed over the priesthood of Remi,
Patrick, Augustine, Boniface, who built up, so strong and en-
during, the foundations of modern Christendom and modern
civilization the priesthood of Ferrer, Xavier, de Paul and
De Sales, whose fiery zeal renewed the faith and the charity
of whole provinces and nations. If, as this priesthood, saintly,
learned and earnest, appears to us as new new in its ardor,
new in its methods of work, new in its courage, it is because
we have in our times fallen below the true type of the priest-
hood, and forgotten the best traditions of our fathers; it is
because our present priesthood no longer possesses the noble
attributes with which Christ willed the priesthood of all ages
to be ceaselessly endowed. O Christ, we pray Thee, enrich us
with the old priesthood, the priesthood of the saints.
Faithful laity, do your part, not only in building up the
priesthood, through which Christ's graces flow directly upon
souls, but also in contributing by your own manner of living
to the work of the priesthood. You, too, can present to the
world moral miracles miracles of Christian virtue. You, too,
can preach the gospel of Christ, by word even, but especially
by giving practical demonstration of the power of the gospel
to regenerate and sanctify men.
You can easily divine why I chose as the subject of my
discourse the priesthood of Christ's Church. It is that the
festivities amid which we are rejoicing put vividly before us
the priesthood, such as we wish to see it in America, in the
twentieth century.
7<5 Episcopal Silver Jubilee
Right Reverend Bishop Spalding, I speak not to praise or
flatter you; praise or flattery you would not allow. I speak
for the honor of our common priesthood, for the edification of
the children of the Church.
I am entitled to speak. Over many years our friendship
has been extended. It has been such that I know you well
as few others could have known you. Often we have met in
converse; often soul was poured into soul, and heart revealed
to heart. Your manner of life, your priestly and episcopal
works have been constantly before my eyes. To-night I speak
aloud what have been always the conviction of my mind you
have been the true priest, the true bishop.
Twenty-five years in the episcopate, twelve or more years
previously spent in the priesthood without stain or blemish
this, my brethren, is what we praise to-day; this is what we
are proud to extol. Your bishop's priesthood is a saintly
priesthood. It is pre-eminently, too, a learned priesthood. In
an unusual degree has knowledge adorned his brow; in an
unusual degree he has been willing and able to defend God's
Church with eloquent tongue and polished pen. The whole
priestly body in America are grateful to Bishop Spalding for
the intellectual glory which his talents and his assiduity in
making them bear fruit have cast upon it. And has not his
priesthood been marked by exemplary zeal ? The first bishop
of the diocese of Peoria, he offers it to-day to the Church of
America a model diocese, a diocese rich in institutions of
learning and of charity, rich in the virtues of its clergy, rich in
the treasures of faith and of devotion that characterize its laity.
And far beyond the limits of his own diocese, throughout the
whole land, wherever work was to be done for God or for
humanity, Bishop Spalding has gone forth with powerful word
and act to serve the cause of truth and virtue. The whole
Church of America owes to Bishop Spalding a singular debt
of gratitude ; and to pay this debt bishops and,, priests have
congregated to-day in Peoria from all parts, even the most
remote, of the continent.
And who, as much as the bishop of Peoria, has worked to
endow America with a worthy priesthood ? The Catholic Uni-
versity is the pride, as it is the hope, of the American Church.
John Lancaster Spalding 77
And the Catholic University was born of his intelligent under-
standing of the needs of the times and his zeal in meeting
those needs. He is the founder of the university, and since
its beginnings he has been its vigilant guardian and its sturdy
defender. As it grows in strength and usefulness, so will the
glory of the name of Bishop Spalding and the debt of gratitude
which America owes to him.
Bishop Spalding, ad multos annos. The silver jubilee of
your episcopate finds you in the prime of manhood, rich in
physical health, rich in the freshness of matured thought and
zeal. Many coming years be with us ; for many coming years
labor for us. The jubilee celebration is the morning of a new
career, more illustrious and more fruitful than that which
closes. We are sure you will respond diligently and ener-
getically to the opportunities that open before you. Hence
I rejoice this evening; hence the priests and the laity of the
diocese of Peoria rejoice with me ; hence priests and Catholic
people of all America rejoice with us and pray to heaven with
us ad multos annos.
B.S732S C001
SOUVENIR OF THE EPISCOPAL SILVER JUBILEE
