# Der Lutheraner_St. Louis Missouri_1853 11 23_S50
# AI translation — CHI Digital Archive (demonstration)

50

of some scenes from the Jesuit history of life and doctrine must necessarily put it. But the dear 'Herold' does not consider that black on white, that facts, that what has already happened is of a very stubborn nature, and that little or nothing can be accomplished against it with all manner of sophistical arguments (sly inferences) and even with merry, amusing farces and capers.

The first testimony against the Jesuits which we hereby hold before the 'Herold' is one which even the 'Herold' will allow to count: it is the testimony of a Pope. We have already mentioned that the Jesuits once made such wicked intrigues that even the whole Roman Christendom rose up against them. So in the second half of the last century, since the Pope would not or could not put a stop to them, they were gradually driven out of nearly all strictly Catholic countries as corrupters of doctrine, as seducers and destroyers of morals, as legacy-hunters, as agitators, as regicides, etc., namely out of Portugal, France, Spain, Parma, Malta, etc. Louder and louder everywhere rose the complaints about the pernicious order. From all countries of the Catholic world men rose against them as enemies of ecclesiastical and civil peace and welfare, and besieged the Popes to use their power against them. So it happened at last that Pope Clement XIV. Ganganelli in the year 1773, on the 21st of July, issued a Bull which begins with the words: "Dominus ac redemptor noster," that is, "Our Lord and Redeemer," in which, since he despaired of a mere reformation of the Jesuit order, he declared it, as he says, for everlasting times†) dissolved and abolished. We shall now first give some of this papal Bull.

†) The Popes, as is well known, do not take the decrees of their predecessors quite so strictly, but one Infallible corrects the other afresh every time; hence Pope Pius VII. also cared nothing about the abolition of the Jesuits "for everlasting times" by Clement XIV., but, since he needed such a guard again, restored them in 1814 by another Bull to their old rights.

As an introduction to his pronouncement that the Jesuit order is hereby to be abolished, the said Pope first makes the remark: "It cannot indeed be doubted that among all that contributes most to the welfare of the Catholic commonwealth, the regular orders are to be accorded almost the highest place. "But," he continues, "when it came to pass that the Christian people no longer drew from any regular order such exceedingly rich fruits and desirable advantages as those for which they were originally founded, or when it appeared that they served more to the injury and disturbance of the peace of nations than to their advancement: then this very apostolic See, which had labored for their planting and had interposed with its authority on their behalf, did not by any means refrain from guarding them either by new laws, or from recalling them to the old strictness of life, or even from rooting them out entirely."

After Pope Clement has then mentioned the many liberties and privileges with which the Roman See has from time to time generously endowed the order of the Jesuits, he adds: "From the contents and the words of the apostolic Constitutions themselves it appears, however, manifestly that in this Society almost from its beginning the seed of all manner of discord and envious jealousy sprang up, not only among its members themselves, but also with other regular orders, with the secular clergy, the academies, the universities, the public literary gymnasia, and even with the princes in whose territories the Society had been received; and that these very disputes and divisions were aroused now over the nature and character of the vows, etc., now over the unlimited power which the superior General of this Society assumed, etc., now over various chief points of doctrine, etc. And finally there was by no means any lack of very grave accusations which were brought against these members, and which disturbed not a little the peace and quiet of Christian states. Hence many complaints have arisen against the Society, which have been confirmed even by the authority of princes and brought to our predecessors in office."

Thereupon Clement shows what had already been done by his predecessors to meet the ever farther spreading evil, and continues: "Far from all this having been enough to quiet the loud outcry and complaints against the Society, the most dangerous disputes rather spread more and more through almost the whole world over the doctrine of the Society, which most branded as contrary to the orthodox faith and good morals. Quarrels also broke out within and without, and ever more frequent became the accusations against the Society, chiefly on account of too great a craving for temporal goods. Hence it happened that this Society, in order to obtain a new confirmation of its Constitution (Institutum) from Pope Paul V., was compelled to ask him to confirm certain decrees (in the year 1606) in which it is read in clear words that both inner enmity and disorder among the members, and also complaints and grievances against the Society from without, have moved them to determine the following: . . 'Since especially in these very dangerous times in several places and with various princes, perhaps (?) through the fault of some, and either on account of their ambition or on account of their unintelligent zeal, our order stands in ill repute, . . . therefore the Congregation strictly and earnestly forbids all our members to let themselves be entangled in such public affairs (worldly and political). . . We have nevertheless," Clement continues, "seen with greatest grief of our heart that both the said and many other means applied accordingly have accomplished almost nothing*), to quiet and to disperse the so numerous and so grave disorders, accusations and complaints against the oft-named Society, and that our other predecessors have tried in vain, who sought to restore the so desired peace of the Church by the most wholesome Constitutions; both in regard to worldly affairs not to be undertaken, and in regard to very grave quarrels and strifes stirred up by the Society against all kinds of communities in Europe, Asia and America, not without terrible ruin of souls; further also in regard to the interpretation and practice of certain heathen customs, which had been applied here and there in various places,**) with the exception of those which have been duly confirmed by the universal Church, further in regard to the application and interpretation of such opinions as the apostolic See has rightly proscribed as scandalous and manifestly injurious to good morals."***)

*) How could a law, for example, against interference in worldly affairs help at all, which the Jesuits, as the Pope himself says, only "under compulsion," that is, for show, took into their Constitution and had confirmed?

**) It is well known that the Jesuit missionaries permitted their new converts (?) in China, at first even in spite of the objection of the Popes, permitted still on and on to pay to their heathen founder of religion, Confucius, and to other deceased persons a certain worship with incense and the like, because only by this means could they attain their end.

***) Pope Innocent XI. had already condemned in the year 1679 sixty-five "propositiones laxorum moralistarum," that is, propositions of lax teachers of morals, most of which were drawn from Jesuit writings.

Therefore Clement says further that the papal letter of his predecessor, Clement XIII., in which the constitution of the Jesuits was recommended and confirmed anew, had been "more extorted from him by force than obtained." But, it goes on, the misery caused by the Jesuits had grown ever greater, so that even the most Christian "kings of France, Spain, Portugal and of both Sicilies were compelled to dismiss and expel the members of the order from their realms, territories and provinces, convinced that only this extreme means was left and absolutely necessary against so many evils, in order to prevent the Christian peoples from tearing one another to pieces in the bosom of the holy Mother, the Church."

Clement continues: "Since we moreover recognized that, if the aforesaid Society of Jesus retained its existence, a true and lasting peace of the Church could either hardly or not at all be restored, we will, out of these weighty