THE Roman Catholic view of the proper solution of the religious problems raised by the coming of the Philippine Islands under the authority of the United States is presented in a late issue of the Catholic World, by “Father” Doyle. This papal spokesman wants Protestant missionaries to keep out of the Philippines, and plainly hints at his regret that he has not the power to give his wishes in the matter the force of a command. He says moreover that the passing away of the old Spanish system is a fortunate thing, because with that out of the way the Philippinos will become more attached to the priests—as if it were not a fact that the Spanish government and the Catholic Church are in close alliance, each one giving its sanction to the principles and deeds of the other. We quote the following:—
“The coming of the American system at this time is very providential to the native Filipinos. The loves and the religious associations of their childhood, not that they are stripped of all tyrannous exactions from the civil order, will revive, and the devotion they have always had for the padres will assert itself. If in the next few years the administration of affairs is conducted with wisdom, we may hope to win the entire native population to our side. We must learn a lesson from our ‘century of dishonor’ with the American Indians. If we send among the Tagals ‘swaddlers’ and politicians to sow corruption and degradation, we shall reap the whirlwind in dissension and revolution. The possession of the Philippines will become a very costly experiment, and what is worse than mere loss of money, our influence, which has been given to us to uplift and free, will be perverted to debauch and enslave. Were I in authority I would persuade every Protestant minister to stay away from Manila. [Italics ours.] I would select the most thorough Americans among the Catholic priests of the country, and establish an entente cordiale between them and the civil authorities. I would appoint as governor-general a broad-minded military man—one who understands the inner workings of the Catholic religion. He need not be a Catholic, but he should have no antipathies against the church, and should strive to gain the sympathetic adherence of the ecclesiastical authorities. He should proceed in the establishment of courts and tribunals on the American plan, he should look out for the sanitation of the cities, suppression of rampant vice, and, as he is in duty bound, leave religion to its own devices. Proceeding on these lines, we shall not conquer the Philippines so much as we shall win them to our way and methods, and not many years will have passed before we shall have planted among the Orientals the seeds of the freest and best government on the face of the earth.”
But the “freest and best government on the face of the earth” would not be where all other religions are excluded except the Roman Catholic. Where such exclusion has been maintained, the governments have been at the very opposite extreme of the freest and best, as witness some of the governments in South America. The purposes of Rome are evidently not changing upon this point.
The statement by “Father” Doyle that a whirlwind of “dissension and revolution” will follow in the Philippines unless care is taken to leave the people under Catholic influence and control, hardly accords with the claim that five-sixths of the people have been converted to Christianity, as is claimed by Catholic authorities. It does not speak very favorably for the Roman Catholic idea of conversion. True Christians are not thus led into raising whirlwinds of violence and crime.