O ' T£> >S Jf.JfflL ST. ANTHONY'S GUILD, PATERSON, N. J. “®tyou lift Wi)tn —91 Eins?”— THIS WAR IN GOD'S PLAN BY ISIDORE O'BRIEN O. F. M. ST. ANTHONY'S GUILD PATERSON, N. J. Copyright, 1942, by St. Anthony’s Guild, Paterson, N. ). Imprimi potest. Fr. Jerome Dawson, O. F. M., Minister Provincial. Nihil obstat. Henry J. Zolzer, Censor. Imprimatur. f Thomas H. McLaughlin, Bishop of Paterson. August 1, 1942. PRINTED IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA A SONNET FOR THE KING A King Thou art, then? Pilate queried Him Who stood alone on the Lithostrotos, Alone and in the grip of that law grim Which from the sands that Nile and Tigris cross To Tiber’s banks held sway; nor to the whim Nor claim of local kings gave ear or right Who could not with their challenge muster might The Roman Eagle’s outstretched wings to trim. I am a King, the quiet Claimant spoke. But not an earthly kingdom do I lease From time, nor found a worldly throne. My Yoke On hearts of men I place to bring surcease From pain. To Kingship was I born and trod The Way of Truth: the freeman’s way to God. Isidore O’Brien, O. F. M. © ST. ANTHONY'S GUILD, 1937 rr His Kingdom was not of this world,” but was a spiritual, universal Kingdom. Time and again He had to deal with this misconception of His Kingship. On the one hand, when His followers went so far as to plot seizing Him by force and making Him King, He fled from them into the mountains. Yet on the other hand, when during His trial Pilate asked Him, "Art thou then a King?” He answered "Thou sayest it, I am a King.” “®l)ou Urt ®(jcn a lUug?” ®2lar tn (Sob’s $Jlan World Domination ORLD-DOMINATION has been the £27 aim of military conquerors from the beginning, and also their disappointment. Until a few years ago the world was simply too big for any one man to subjugate. Alexander thought he had done so, and is reported to have pleaded rhetorically for more worlds to conquer; but in reality he had conquered only a patch— a large one, it is true, but still only a patch— of the earth’s surface. The Caesars ruled a sizable portion of it, but millions upon millions of square miles remained not only beyond their rule but beyond their knowledge. Jenghiz Khan with his "grey-eyed people” subdued probably more territory than any other in- dividual conqueror, possessing as he did vir- tually all of habitable Asia and a fringe of 1 Europe; yet his own sons and successors pressed on into the as yet unannexed terri- tory of Russia and Poland. Napoleon brought Europe to his feet, but was halted at Cairo and Moscow, and never crossed the English Channel except as a pris- oner on his way to St. Helena. The British Empire comes nearest to world-wide domi- nation, for it differs in three significant ways from preceding empires: 1) it is not a personal empire such as Alexander’s or Napoleon’s but one of national and there- fore continuous effort; 2) it made itself mas- ter of the seven seas, thereby controlling the business of countries which it never actually conquered; 3) it is an economic empire. Yet though it is a familiar boast that "the sun never sets” on the British Empire, neither does the sun shine on it exclusively. Now just as sea-supremacy made the strik- ing and ruling power of England more ex- tensive than that of any previous nation, so supremacy in air power will make its pos- sessor the actual conqueror of the world. For in the future no city, hamlet or habitation on earth will be safe except by the purchased grace of the air-conqueror— and he will know what to ask as his price. And it is worthy of note that the possibility of total 2 world-domination by one man and the nation he heads was brought into being, not by the super-genius of any military leader, but by the quaint ideas of two totally different men: one a gentle philosopher who wondered whether lightning could not be harnessed, and the other a Franciscan missionary priest who thought that the crude black oil which he saw Seneca Indians dipping from a hole in the New York hills to apply to burns, might be inflammable. It is a far cry indeed from Benjamin Franklin with his kite and key, from Father de la Roche with his Indians squatting around a scummy oil well, to an airplane motor; but without an electric spark and a jet of gasoline, the Wright brothers’ plane would still be sitting at Kittyhawk. In other words the possibility of world-domination comes from the laboratory rather than from the would-be world-conqueror and his board of military strategists. These merely use the weapon that the ideas of quiet-minded think- ers fashion for them. For it is ideas that rule the earth. Now this pamphlet is concerned with mili- tary conquest only indirectly, insofar as that possibility bears on another kind of world- dominion: namely, the universal spiritual 3 Kingdom of God on earth under the King- ship of Christ. But it is true that the con- quering of the whole earth by one nation would profoundly affect the actual spread of Christ’s Kingdom at this time. We might express the situation in these very human but (we hope) respectful words: that Christ’s chances for at last beginning His personal rule over the hearts of all men on this earth, are both good and bad. Without attempting the statement that Christ is on the political side of this or that nation or group of na- tions (for nations easily change political sides) , it can be said with every show of reason that His chances for establishing His universal Kingship would be better with that world-conqueror who did not explicitly deny Him a place in human affairs than with that one who did. We know, of course, that, absolutely speak- ing, Christ could take the lead and establish His Kingdom in defiance of all earthly rulers. This He would do if His Kingdom were designed along political lines; in fact He said so to Pilate when questioned about His alleged political ambitions for the kingship of Palestine. "My Kingdom is not of this world,” were His words. "If My Kingdom 4 were of this world, my followers would have fought that I might not be delivered to the Jews” (Jn. 18:36). These "followers” were His earthly com- pany, but not His earthly company alone; for in another place He confidently re- minded Peter, drawing the sword in His defense: "Dost thou suppose that I cannot entreat My Father, and He will even now furnish me with more than twelve legions of angels?” (Mt. 26:53). Twelve legions by actual count would be 72,000 warrior angels, but Christ of course meant that He could call on armies innumerable to effect His purpose. And even that is another figure, for as God He would have needed no armies at all, possessing as He did supreme power over the lives of all men. * But Christ’s is not a political Kingdom, nor will He use force to establish it. He will wait upon the affairs of men. During His earthly life, except in the case of His close friends, He awaited invitations to banquets and gatherings; He is still to be made wel- come by nations. If the world-conqueror of the present global war will give Him place, He will extend His rule over the hearts of earth’s two billion souls. But even if those win who have denied Him a place in the 5 hearts and affairs of men, the very nature of this war has already made His access to all men easier. It has destroyed those boun- daries which so far have excluded Him; and with the man-made boundaries down, all men will eventually find Him. He can afford to wait. The Kingship of Christ in Scripture Macaulay once wrote that "the proudest royal houses are but of yesterday when com- pared with the line of the Supreme Pontiffs.” It is a fine figure; but both terms of the comparison exist in time which, after all, makes for easy suggestion. Just what figure anyone would use to compare a time sequence with one of eternity I know not. If, judged by the long shadow of Peter’s chair, the thrones of earthly monarchs cast a scarcely perceptible shade, how are we to appreciate the brevity of temporal reigns in contrast with the eternity of Christ’s? For time itself breaks in pulses on the shore of eternity, as the waves of the sea collapse on the beach and crawl back featureless into the foam. Moreover, the supremacy of Christ’s King- ship over all others in the matter of duration is matched by the measure of its degree. To 6 see that this is so, we need but look at Holy Scripture for a moment. The idea of divine Kingship runs through the whole Jewish conception of God. "The Jews love to meditate on and proclaim this idea, so deeply acknowledged in all parts of the Old Testament. They take pleasure in re- peating in their prayers: 'God is King; God hath reigned, God reigns, God shall reign’ ” (The Ruins of the Temple, Bonsirven, p. 47) . And for them God’s Kingship contains two sublime ideas, expressed again and again in their ancient liturgies and prayers: first, God’s authorship of and absolute dominion over all things visible and invisible; and second, His just claim to the worship and loyalty of reasonable creatures. The Jews ever saw God’s Kingship as total, complete, extending to every part of the heavens, to the core of the earth, over the body of man and its powers and over his soul and its faculties. The morning prayer of the ancient Jewish world was: "Sovereign of all worlds! Not because of our righteous acts do we lay our supplications before Thee, but because of Thine abundant mercies. What are we? What is our life? What is our piety? What our righteousness? What our helpfulness? What our strength? What shall we say be- 7 fore Thee, O Lord our God and God of our Father?” Thus every morning did the Jew take on himself "the yoke of the King- dom of heaven.” It was not suddenly, but only by degrees, that God revealed «to the Chosen People the mystery of the Blessed Trinity. For God does not force the human mind, but is content to await its fuller development, national and individual, before revealing further aspects and mysteries of His nature. Every normal parent does the same. To a boy of four or five his father, be he a king or the world’s foremost conqueror or genius, is just a man. And the father accepts that appraisal on the part of the child. But as the boy grows older he learns more and more about his father’s place in the world, until on his coming of age the father makes of him a full confidant and takes him on as an asso- ciate or partner. That is the natural proce- dure. The father reveals the whole truth when the son is able to grasp it. It would merely confuse the child to have it forced upon him earlier. In a similar way, God awaited the re- ligious development of the Jewish race be- fore revealing fully to them many of the mysteries of faith. It might be better to 8 say that through a gradual revelation of Himself and the truths of religion He edu- cated them step by step to accept the next phase of His instructions. He taught the Jews necessary truths and the rule of moral conduct first, for they had to grasp these and believe and obey them if they were to rise above the pagan world around them. And since the pagan world was cluttered with deities, the first great truth which God taught His people was that He was their One True God, and that there were no other gods. He taught them well, for, as we have seen, the Jews worshiped God as their Crea- tor and King. But it might be said (and I hope it will be correctly understood) that for a time, because of the multiplicity of pagan gods in the nations that surrounded the Jews, God stressed the aspect of His Oneness; and that it was only later and by degrees that He revealed the existence of Three distinct Persons in the One God. But God did reveal this truth in due time, and the supernaturally enlightened intellect of those through whom He made it known proclaimed that God the Father had given to His Son, the Second Person of the Blessed Trinity, the Kingship of the world. This was 0 the Messias Whom the Jews expected. That many of them misunderstood the true na- ture of Christ’s Kingship was not the fault of the revelations concerning it, for many others reading the same prophecies under- stood them correctly. Space permits us to quote only a few of the prophecies here, and that without much comment. God Himself, beside the first cradle of humanity, gave the first promise, or prophecy, of the Messias in the Person of the Redeemer of mankind. Noe, beside the second cradle of the race, gave the sec- ond Messianic prophecy. Centuries later Abraham, the father of the Jews, uttered the third. These were followed in quickening succession by the prophecies of Isaac and Jacob. Each prophecy adds a new feature to the picture of the coming Messias. Jacob makes His Kingship clear. Following proph- ecies repeat it. And David for the first time gives our Royal Redeemer the name by which we know Him, Christ, and sets forth in full glory the idea of His Kingship: "The kings of the earth stood up, and the princes met together, against the Lord, and against His Christ The Lord hath said to Me: Thou art My Son, this day have I begotten Thee. Ask of Me, and I will give Thee the Gen- 10 tiles for Thy inheritance and the uttermost parts of the earth for Thy possession” (Ps. 2:2, 7, 8). Again, "His power shall be from sea to sea, and from the rivers even to the end of the earth” (Zach. 9:10). The prophet Isaias, the "Evangelist of the Old Testament,” gives us a full description of Christ the King: "A Child is born to us, and a Son is given to us, and the government is upon His shoulder; and His Name shall be called Wonderful, Counsellor, God the mighty, the Father of the world to come, the Prince of Peace. His empire shall be multiplied and there shall be no end of peace: He shall sit upon the throne of David and upon His Kingdom: to establish it and strengthen it with judgment and with jus- tice, from henceforth and forever . . .” (Is. 9:6-7). Later we shall note the words of Christ Himself regarding His Kingship. The Feast of Christ the King The timeliness of God’s acts is as deep a source of wondrous contemplation as is the timelessness of His being. The six days, or rather periods, of creation show on grand scale the close-knit and orderly sequence of 11 His actions. Nothing is created until the proper place is prepared for it. No creation is delayed whose postponement would hinder the preparation for the next step. Each suc- cessive creature finds its perfect place in the scale of things which preceded its appear- ance. In fact, so exactly and so seamlessly does each phase of creation fit into the pre- ceding and following that some scientists have denied separate acts of creation and claim one continuous stream or thread for the whole, namely evolution: an interesting but as yet unproved theory. And this timeliness which God displayed in the creation of all things in the beginning He has manifested toward mankind through- out the latter’s existence. One phase of his- tory ripens to seed the next. The history of the Jewish race demonstrates this. God made Abraham the father and founder of this race. This He did by covenant, or contract; and He did it for a specific purpose, namely that from this race Christ should be born in the fulness of time. To this end He gave to Abraham and his descendants a certain country and protected them in special ways. The contract was made about 2000 B. C. Now, as might be expected, the experience of the Jewish nation was vast and varied. 12 It had to grow up and establish itself in an already populous world. Its beliefs made it totally different from and openly opposed to its powerful and pressing neighbors. It knew internal strife. At first its government was of necessity patriarchal, all the people living as one fam- ily. Then, as the family grew, its govern- ment of equal necessity became tribal, each branch living immediately under its own head and all under a national leader. This form passed, and a monarchy followed which, with interruptions and changes of dynasty, lasted till the time of Christ. The point we wish to note is that through all these national phases and experiences the "one unerring purpose” of the Jewish race runs, namely, that from it Christ would be born. When that should be accomplished, the Jews would have fulfilled their racial destiny. And this timing and sequence which God directed in the creation of the world and in the fortunes and purpose of the Chosen People He has continued in the life of the Church. It is arrestingly evident in the life of Christ Himself. "Did you not know that I must be about My Father’s business?” He asked of Mary and Joseph when they 13 found Him in the Temple after three days’ search. "My hour has not yet come,” He replied to Mary when she requested Him, by implication, to provide wine for a wed- ding. "Behold, we are going up to Jerusalem, and the Son of Man will be betrayed to the chief priests and the Scribes, and they will condemn Him to death,” He said to His Apostles when the time came for Him to die. In all His acts there is order, se- quence, an unalterable plan. The same characteristics prevail in the long history of the Church. Before His Ascension Christ commanded His Apostles to remain in Jerusalem for the coming of the Holy Ghost. He even gave them the schedule of the expanding field of their labors: they were to preach first in Jeru- salem, then in the immediate province of Judea, then in more distant Samaria, and then throughout the world. There were to be no sudden and whimsical adventures, no unpremeditated departures. All the activity must be orderly, all the undertakings accord- ing to plan. The Church must follow the mind of Christ; the faithful must follow the mind of the Church. The Church would make no error in timing or defining her dogmas, and Christ would await her de- 14 cisions to pour out the grace necessary for the spreading of any newly defined doctrine. The definition of the dogma of the Im- maculate Conception is a case in point. The- ologians argued the pros and cons of it for centuries, yet through all the discussions no sign appeared from heaven to assist the learned and saintly debators. But four years after the definition of the dogma Mary her- self appeared to little Bernadette Soubirous and said to her: "I am the Immaculate Conception.” Lourdes and its miracles are a result of this visible confirmation of the doctrine. These instances of God’s timeliness, or timing, as the idea has come to be expressed, are mentioned here merely to make easier of understanding the central point of this pamphlet, namely, the universal Kingship of Christ as it would seem to be related to the present world-conflict. That at first glance is a vast, complex and long-range thesis; but when broken down into its various parts it reveals itself as not only a possible solu- tion to the present earth-encircling upheaval but one that gives a meaning to it and an added motive for engaging in it. For it is easier to don a uniform and offer ourselves for sacrifice and death if we can genuinely 15 feel and sincerely believe that we are fight- ing and dying for the universal establishment of Christ’s Kingship over the hearts of all men, whatever their color or country or pres- ent brand of paganism. Being sure of our motive, we can be sure of our reward. It is a glorious duty to die for our flag; but it does not detract from our patriotism to feel cer- tain that we are also dying to seat Christ on His throne as King of all hearts. Let us enumerate the facts regarding the Kingship of Christ of which we are certain. First, Christ officially proclaimed Himself King during His trial before Pilate. Second, some nineteen hundred years later Pope Pius XI, as head of the Church, officially estab- lished the feast of Christ the King; that is, the Church proclaimed Christ’s to be a world-wide, universal Kingship. A third fact is that fourteen years later the first actual global war in the whole history of the human race broke out. Can we establish a correlation among these facts? One of the chief errors which Christ had to correct in the Jewish mind was that He, the Messias, had come as their political king or national deliverer. As He said, "His King- dom was not of this world,” but was a spir- 16 itual, universal Kingdom. Time and again He had to deal with this misconception of His Kingship. On the one hand, when His followers went so far as to plot seizing Him by force and making Him King, He fled from them into the mountains. Yet on the other hand, when during His trial Pilate asked Him, "Thou art then a King?” He answered, "Thou sayest it, I am a King.” (He had already told Pilate that His King- dom was not of this world.) Christ con- sistently made this distinction. He proclaimed that He was truly a King, and He pointed t)Ut that His was not a local, temporary or political throne. It is necessary to keep this distinction in mind. Now, one of the chief characteristics of Christ’s speech was that He never abused words. Frequently their full content and promise were far beyond the understanding of His immediate hearers; but the content, when He was not openly and manifestly speaking in parables, was literal and precise, and He fully intended to fulfill it to the letter. He wrought many of His miracles, in fact, to prove to His hearers that He had the power to redeem the full promise of His words. The multiplication of the loaves and fishes near Capharnaum was a miracle of 17 such purpose, preceding as it did by a day His promise of the Eucharist. His cure of the paralytic in the house of Peter was an- other, following immediately as it did His forgiveness of the man’s sins. And His own Resurrection, by proving He was divine, proved that He had the power to fulfill all His promises and establish all His claims, no matter how far into the future these might be deferred. Now the statement, "I am a King,” is a literal statement, meaning just what it says. And if there could be any misreadings of it, the circumstances in which Christ made it would remove these. He was on trial for His life; on trial, moreover, on the very charge that He had proclaimed Himself a king. If His previous claims to Kingship had been metaphorical, this was the place, surely, to correct the misunderstanding. In- stead He reiterated His claim, and was cruci- fied in consequence. His was a spiritual King- ship, but it was a true one, as He would die within the day to maintain, and as the very title on His cross would proclaim— not an accidental title, but a deliberate one, and one which the Roman Governor though pressed hard would not change. 18 Since Christ’s Kingship, then, was to be eternal, it was with divine logic that He re- jected a throne that was local and temporal and claimed one that was spiritual. For no earthly king or conqueror has ever yet ruled the whole earth even for an hour, nor has the longest dynasty ever existed more than a few centuries at most. Only the spiritual can be eternal and universal. Only a King- dom that is not of this world can be broader and older than this world. Only a throne that does not belong to any one nation or age can accommodate a King capable of ruling the hearts of every nation and age no matter how varied or prolonged. Regarding the second and third facts noted above, namely, the establishment of the feast of Christ the King and the existence of the present war— why did the Church wait nine- teen centuries before proclaiming officially what Christ had so literally and determinedly announced at the key point in His trial? It is not given to man to know the com- plete answer to that question. Why did God wait for a given time to set aside a Chosen People? or to deliver the Jews from bondage? Why was Christ born just when He was? Why were not all the dogmas of the Church defined by St. Peter? The only answer we 19 know is that all these events awaited God’s appointed time. And so the feast of Christ’s Kingship awaited a time just preceding by a few years the first totally universal war in history, when every national boundary on earth is either down or threatening to fall. This condition of war, seen from where the whole human race is now standing, is dreadful beyond calculation in its conse- quence of blood, agony, hunger and death. Yet, as the war-smoke hangs low over all mankind, is it possible to discern any good that can come of it all? If we could sin- cerely believe this, if we could trust that good, real, universal good for mankind, would somehow emerge from this stunning disaster, we could bear the general burden more easily and do our part in it more hope- fully and courageously, even if that part called for us as individuals to die. I believe that the feast of Christ the King, established in 1925, is the key to our hope. And I be- lieve that its establishment was deferred for nineteen hundred years according to a timed plan of God for the express purpose of giv- ing us a motive and a hope in this the first total upheaval, the first world war. The world-Kingship of Christ is a rounded, per- fect, positive, uplifting and regenerating ob- 20 jective designed by God to replace in the mind of the individual and in world-continua- tion the chaotic, destructive, despair-inducing cataclysm which has shaken apart, and is still shaking apart, whole political continents and age-old groups of nations. Total world domination has always been the dream of conquerors and emperors. But, as we have mentioned, simply because of the size of the world in relation to the speed of war prosecution and transportation at their disposal, they failed. But since planes and tanks and the radio have relatively reduced the size of the earth, it has come easily within the realm of possibility for one man to conquer the earth. With the aid of radio this solitary earth-ruler could speak to his lieutenants throughout the world more quickly than Alexander or Caesar or Napo- leon or even Foch could have sent a message to the left or right flank of their armies. And the struggle is still for world domi- nation, a grim, real contest now with actual world domination as the prize. The dictators are clutching at it. The democracies are fight- ing for it. There is a vast difference in the motives of the two, of course: the dictators would dominate the world so that they could 21 enslave mankind. The democracies would rule the world that mankind might be free, free to live as men, with all that that means, free to worship God. One evident result of this war, no matter which side wins, will be a leveling of na- tional boundaries, as history so far has known them. Isolation with its walls and barriers will be as dead as feudalism with its moats and turrets. And this will make for the more facile spreading of universal ideas and ideals. It is not that the vast area of, say, India with its three hundred and fifty million souls is going to stop being India, or that China with its even greater population is going to merge noiselessly into Russia or Japan to form a heterogeneous mass of mongrel peo- ples. But the economic, cultural and religious barriers that set India and China apart for thousands of years will be lowered to the point of permitting other systems of thought easier access. And the conqueror will carry with him his full kit of ideological tolls for making such changes. This is an old idea. Alexander attempted the change and exchange of culture: he planted Greek colonies in the lands he con- quered and sent back native groups, espe- cially Jews, to form nuclei of trade in the 22 Mediterranean basin. And we might say parenthetically, that he was on this account an instrument in the divine plan of spread- ing to Europe a knowledge of the coming of Christ, for the Jews brought their proph- ecies with them. As we have said, many of Europe’s na- tional barriers are already gone; they cannot any longer either include their own set na- tionalisms or exclude others as they have done since time immemorial. It is true that treachery and brutality were used to accom- plish this; but the fact is that it happened. Moreover, whole groups have been trans- planted from one nation of Europe to an- other. This process works a profound change on both the transferred exiles and on the peoples amid whom they are set down. Nationalism, when it is neither frothing jingoism nor turtle-like isolationism, is a workable way of life; but when carried to these extremes it can unbalance the world by invasion, on one hand, or make whole con- tinents impregnable to new ideas, on the other. At any rate, for better or worse, old boun- daries are gone; and as a result Christ’s Kingship will extend — not in a year, or perhaps in a century, or perhaps in a thou- 23 sand years, for the ways of God are slow. We know that Christ died for all men and made His Church the dispenser of the graces of redemption. But we also know that during the nineteen hundred years that have gone since He did so, the teachings of that Church have scarcely penetrated, except in trickles, those great national boundaries of Asia be- hind which live two-thirds of the world’s population. It would seem that the time for change has come, that a new era is in the making, with the agony and travail that at- tend all births, and that in the future, be it near or far, the Kingship of Christ will extend over boundaries that excluded it here- tofore. And if the result of all this present suffering shall have been the establishment of Christ’s throne over the hearts of all men, of men made free by our sacrifices, then surely we have a glorious reason for fighting. The Unity of Mankind The essential unity of the human race is such that neither wars nor hatreds nor per- secutions can break it. When God created mankind He so reflected His own Oneness in it that no power on earth can destroy it. Almost countless proofs could be given for 24 this, but one, a very evident one these times, will suffice: namely, the blood-bank. Everyone knows that this modern miracle is based on the unity of the human race, for persons of every color and class can give their blood to it, and persons of every na- tionality will receive blood from it. It would be possible for a man on his way to public execution for some shocking crime to donate his blood to a saint lying wasted on his bed and thus prolong his life, or for a member of the most uncivilized of equatorial tribes to save by a blood-transfusion the life of the most intellectual and cultured man on earth. Yet the blood of the most highly developed animal could not be given in transfusion to the least civilized member of the human race. For blood, that stream by which men live, knows no boundaries of color or religion or nationality. Citizenship papers do not change its composition. Centuries of climatic con- dition may alter somewhat the shape of the human features and turn man's skin black or brown or red or yellow, or even white; but they leave his blood basically unaltered. And the boundaries, therefore, which men set up around racial color are as superficial as those which they set up around portions of the earth which they called countries. 25 The present world conflict seems to be the machine destined to level both enclosures. And it would be a strange turn of fate if this war, which was started by one man to stamp the alleged supremacy of one people on the rest of mankind, ended up with all men being declared equal. That would be a great and glorious result and worth the suffering needed to bring it about. For it is enough of honor on this earth and in the world to come to be just a man, with all man’s native powers and faculties, and con- sidered in the light of his immortal destiny. Thus viewed, man had enough majesty, no- bility and dignity to make it possible for the Son of God to take flesh and become, like him, a Man, without losing His own Divine Royalty, Majesty and Person. That, to be sure, is a broad view of man’s worth. But it is the correct view. In it there is no nonsensical notion of race supremacy, no people worthy of another’s contempt. Christ Himself contradicted these errors by becoming a member of what was termed a despised race. Had He recognized race su- premacy, He would have come as a Greek philosopher or, more in keeping with the mood of modern supermen, a Roman general of ability far outshining Caesar’s. 26 But Christ, "Who knew what was in man,” that is, knew him for his innermost quali- ties, both of strength and of weakness, his possibility of greatness and his proneness to debasement— He who knew man so well, knew that there is no such thing as a super- man, or nation of supermen. Saints there are in all nations, while nations in general are made up chiefly of good people, kind and generous and neighborly people, with their small quota of the ambitious, the depraved and the treacherous. But the idea of super- men is the idea of pride incarnate. God con- demned such monstrosities long ago. His judgment is: "For everyone who exalts him- self shall be humbled, and he who humbles himself shall be exalted.” The Kingdom of Christ cannot extend over all nations and all hearts while one portion of His creatures look down on another and keep them in chains. No, Christ’s Kingdom must embrace all men, and all men made free. It will comprise poor men and dull men and even bad men, but they must be free men. The boundaries of race and color must be leveled so that the Gospel which St. Paul carried to the West may be brought to the populous East. How long this will take no one can tell, but the official establishment of 27 Christ’s Kingship by that representative of His who was known as the Pope of the Missions, Pius XI, would seem to indicate that Christ the King is ready to advance into those countries where boundaries have excluded Him for nineteen hundred years. And if this war promotes His Kingdom, then those who died and suffered in it shall not have died and suffered in vain. The causes of war may have sprung from a quite different purpose, and the suffering it has brought may be horrible beyond understand- ing; but it has been said: "The omnipotent hand of God weaves the pattern of His own design into the calculations and machinations of human affairs to the end that His glory may be made manifest.” 28 GUILD 5-CENT PAMPHLETS By Most Rev. R. J. Cushing A Damien of Our Day By Francis J. Greiner, S. M. Mary’s Work in the World By Most Rev. William A. Griffin Peopling Heaven: A Thought on Vocations By Marion A. Habig, O. F. M. Contardo Ferrini Man of Peace St. Francis Solano By Rudolf Harvey, O. F. M. What Is Man? By Augustine Hennessy, C. P. God’s Troubadour and His Lady By Gordon Krahe, O. F. M. What the Mass Is for You By Valentine Long, O. F. M. The Last Supper Every Day On Using the Head Who Believes in Sin Any More? By Boniface McConville, O. F. M. Peace for Troubled Souls A Picture of the Man By Owen F. McCormack, O. F. M. The Catholic Family By Very Rev. Msgr. James H. Murphy The Bread of Life Matrimony The Church When You Go to Confession Who Are Catholics? By Isidore O'Brien, O. F. M. Blessed Are the Pure of Heart Brides of Christ Christ the Physician The Church Our Mother Compensation Consolation The Father’s Shadow The Gospel Parables — God and Justice Man’s True Friend Understanding the Message of Christ Our Moral Life Half the Young Men Hands Let Us Look at Life Light of the Cross Our Dead Our Father Who Art in Heaven The Plain Truth Resignation The Sacraments— Parts I and II St. Anthony of Padua Sculpturing Truth Shadow of the Cross Soldiers of Christ The Ten Command- ments of Reason Thou Art Then a King! List continued on outside back cover List continued from inside back cover By Rev. John A. O'Brien The Christian Home '* Falling in Love Happiness! But Where? Until Death Do Us Part By Conall O'Leary, O. F. M. What It Means to Be a Tertiary Why the Third Order of St. Francis? By Leonard D. Perotti, O. F. M. St. Salvator of Horta „ . r »>/ By Very Rev. Thomas Plassmann, O. F. M. The Seven Words of Mary By Francis J. Remler* C. M. A Bank Account in Heaven Catholics and Sin Is v Life Worth Living? By Edgar Schmiedeler, O. S. B. Concerning Parents Concerning the Family Concerning Your Children * By R. Southard, S. J. , Reporter in Heaven By Rt. Rev. Msgr. Fulton JA Sheen Communism, the Opium of the People The Lord’s Prayer on the Cross By Rev. Joseph Stang ^ Margaret Sinclair By Sebastian Weber, O.F. M.Conv. Butcher, Baker, Candlestickmaker— and Christ Complete Religion Divine Art of Living The Inside Story of God The Mystery Inside Catholic Churches Superman and the Sacrament of Confirmation By Alfred Williams Frederick Ozanam and Social Reform By Alexander Wyse, O. F. M. St. Francis, Lover of the Christ-Child Shall Heaven Be Filled? Why Penance? Indulgence of Portiuncula; Little Treasury of St. Jude; Little Treasury of St. Philomena ST. ANTHONY'S GUILD, Paterson, N. J. ecial prices on quantity lots Postage extra