| Primary Source |
| 20th Cent. | Germany | World War I | [P|S|M] |
| 20th Cent. | Belgium | World War I | [P|S|M] |
Cardinal Mercier, Pastorals, Letters, Allocutions 1914-1917 An Appeal to Truth |
An Appeal to Truth (p.39)
November 24, 1915
To Their Eminences the Cardinals and Their Lordships the Bishops of Germany, Bavaria, and Austria-Hungary
Your Eminences and Your Lordships
For a year, we Catholic Bishops - you, the Bishops of Germany on the one hand, and we, the Bishops of Belgium, France, and England, on the other - have presented a disconcerting spectacle to the world.
Hardly had the German armies trodden the soil of our country, when the rumour spread among you that our civilians were taking part in military operations; that the women of Vise and of Liege were gouging out the eyes of
your soldiers; that the populace at Antwerp and at Brussels had plundered the property of expelled Germans.
In the first days of August, Dom Ildefons Herwegen, Abbot of Maria Laach, sent a telegram to the Cardinal Archbishop of Malines, begging him, for the love of God, to protect the German soldiers from the tortures which our
fellow citizens were supposed to be inflicting on them. (p.40)
But it was common knowledge that our Government had taken all necessary measures to insure that all citizens were instructed in the laws of war; in every parish the inhabitants were obliged to leave their weapons at the town hall; the people were warned, by means of notices, that the only citizens authorized to bear arms were those regularly enrolled in the army; and the clergy, anxious to second the authority of the State, had given circulation to the instructions, published by the Government, orally, by parish notices, and by posting bills on the church doors.
Having been accustomed for a century to a reign of peace, we had no idea that anyone could honestly impute violent instincts to us. Strong in our integrity and in the sincerity of our peaceful intentions, we replied to the
slanderous charges of francs-tireurs and "gouged eyes" by a shrug of the shoulders, convinced that the truth would not be long in manifesting itself.
The Belgian clergy and episcopate were in personal relations with many priests, monks, and bishops of Germany and of Austria; the Eucharistic Congresses of Cologne in 1909 and of Vienna in 1912 had given them the opportunity of knowing one another more closely and of mutually appreciating one another. We had also the assurance that the Catholics of the nations at war with ours would not judge us hastily; and, without being much disturbed by the contents of (p.41) the telegram of Dom Ildefons, the Cardinal of Malines contented himself with begging him to unite with us in preaching humanity; "for", he added, "we are informed that the German troops are
shooting innocent Belgian priests".
From the very first days of August, crimes had been committed at Battice, Vise, Berneau, Herve, and elsewhere, but we tried to hope that they would remain isolated cases, and knowing the very distinguished connections of Dom Ildefons, we put great reliance on the following declaration, which he was good enough to send us on August 11: - "I am informed, on the highest authority, that a formal order has been given by the military command to the
German soldiers to spare the innocent. As regards the very deplorable fact that even priests have lost their lives, I would call your Lordship's attention to the circumstance that the costumes of priests and monks have lately become objects of suspicion and offense, since French spies have made use of the ecclesiastical costume, and even of that of nuns, in order to disguise their hostile intentions".
Nevertheless, the acts of hostility against the innocent population continued.
On August 18, 1914, the Bishop of Liege wrote to Commandant Bayer, Governor of the town of Liege: "Several villages have been destroyed one after another; important people, (p.42) among them some priests, have been
shot; others have been arrested, and all have protested their innocence. I know the priests of my diocese; I cannot believe that a single one of them has been guilty of acts of hostility towards German soldiers. I have visited several ambulances and I have seen that the German wounded are cared for there with the same attention as the Belgian. They admit it themselves"
(1).
No reply was received to this letter.
At the beginning of September the German Emperor lent the weight of his authority to the scandalous accusations of which our innocent people were the object. He sent to Mr. Wilson, the President of the United States, a telegram, which, as far as we know, has not been withdrawn to this hour: "The Belgian Government has publicly encouraged the civilian population to take part in this war, for which it has been long carefully preparing. The
cruelties committed in the course of this guerilla warfare, by women and even by priests on doctors and nurses, have been such that my Generals have been obliged at last to have recourse to the severest measures to punish the guilty, and to hinder the bloodthirsty (p.43) population from continuing to commit these abominable crimes. Several villages, and even the town of Louvain, have had to be destroyed (except the very beautiful Town Hall) for our defense and the protection of my troops. My heart bleeds when I see that such measures are rendered inevitable, and when I think of the numberless innocent people who have lost their homes and property in consequence of the crimes in question".
This telegram was posted up in Belgium by order of the German Government on September 11. The very next day, September 12, the Bishop of Namur asked for an interview with the military Governor of Namur, and protested against the accusation which the Emperor sought to make against the Belgian clergy. He maintained the innocence of all the members of the clergy who had been shot or ill-treated, and declared that he was himself ready to publish any guilty deeds which were in reality established.
The offer of the Bishop of Namur was not accepted, and his protest had no result.
Calumny was thus given a free course. The German press fomented it. The organ of the Catholic Center, the Cologne Gazette, rivaled the Lutheran press in its chauvinism, and on the day when thousands of our fellow
citizens (ecclesiastics and laity from Vise, Aerschot, Wesemel, Herent, Louvain, and twenty other localities as (p.44) innocent of deeds of war or of cruelties as you and we), were taken prisoners, led through the stations
of Aix-la Chapelle [Aachen] and Cologne , and for hours were exhibited as a spectacle for the morbid curiosity of the Rhenish metropolis, they had the pain of finding that theur Catholic brethren poured as many insults on them
as the Lutherans of Celle, Soltau, and Magdeburg.
Not a voice in Germany was raised in defense of the victims.
The legend, which turned innocent into guilty and crime into an act of justice, thus gained credence, and, on May 10, 1915, the "White Book", the
official organ of the German Empire, did not scruple to repeat the same charges, and to circulate in neutral countries these odious and cowardly
lies: "It is indisputable that German wounded have been robbed, murdered, and even frightfully mutilated by the Belgian population, and that even
women and young girls have taken part in these abominations. The eyes of wounded Germans have been gouged out, their ears, noses, fingers, and sexual
organs cut off, or their bowels opened. In other cases German soldiers have been poisoned, hanged from trees, sprinkled with boiling liquids, and
sometimes burnt, so that they have died in frightful agony. These brutish proceedings of the population not only violate the rules expressly laid down
by the Geneva Convention as to the (p.45) care and attention due to the enemy wounded, but are contrary to the fundamental principles of the laws of
war and of humanity" (2).
Put yourselves, for a moment, in our place, dear Brethren in the faith and priesthood. We know that these shameless accusations of the Imperial Government are calumnies from end to end. We know it and we swear it.
Now, your Government, to justify them, calls evidence which has not been submitted to any cross-examination.
Is it not your duty, not only in charity, but in strict justice, to enlighten yourselves and your flocks, and to furnish us with the opportunity of establishing our innocence legally?
You already owed us this satisfaction in the name of Catholic charity, which is above national struggles; you owe it to us to-day in strict justice, because a Committee, which has at least your tacit approval, and is composed of the most highly esteemed politicians, scientists, and theologians in Germany, has supported the official accusations, and has entrusted to the pen of a Catholic priest, Professor A. J. Rosenberg, of Paderborn, the task of summing them up in a book, entitled "The Lying Accusations of the French Catholics against Germany". It has thus thrown upon Catholic Germany the responsibility (p.46) for the active and public propagation of the calumny against the Belgian people.
When the French book, in reply to which the German Catholics publish their own, came out, their Eminences, Cardinal von Hartmann, Archbishop of Cologne, and Cardinal von Bettinger, Archbishop of Munich, felt impelled to
send a telegram to their Emperor in these terms: "Revolted by the libels against the German Fatherland and its glorious army, contained in the work "The German War and Catholicism", we feel in our hearts the necessity of
expressing our sorrowful indignation to Your Majesty in the name of all the German Bishops. We shall not fail to make our complaint to the Supreme Head of the Church."
Now, most reverend Eminences and venerated Colleagues of the German Episcopacy, in our turn, we, Archbishop and Bishops of Belgium, revolted by the calumnies against our Belgian land and its glorious army, contained in
the Imperial "White Book", and reproduced in the reply of the German Catholics to the work of French Catholics, we also feel impelled to express to our King, to our Government, to our army, and to our country our sorrowful indignation.
And, in order that our protest should not stand in conflict with yours without any useful result, we ask you to agree to help us to set up a tribunal to hear both sides. You will appoint, by virtue of your office, (p.47) as many members as you wish and such as you please to choose. We will appoint the same number - for instance, three on each side. We will join in asking the Bishops of a neutral State, Holland, Spain, Switzerland, or the United States, to choose us an arbitrator, who will preside over the sittings of the tribunal.
You have carried your complaints to the Supreme Head of the Church.
It is not just that he should hear your voice only.
You will be honest enough to help us make ours heard.
Both you and we have the same duty - to lay before His Holiness attested documents on which he may be able to found his decision.
You are not ignorant of the efforts which we have repeatedly made, to obtain from the Power, which is in occupation of Belgium, the establishment of a tribunal of inquiry.
The Cardinal of Malines, on two occasions, in writing, January 24, 1915, and February 10, 1915, and the Bishop of Namur, in a letter to the military Governor of his Province, April 12, 1915, urged the establishment of a tribunal to be composed of an equal number of German and Belgian arbitrators and presided over by a representative of a neutral State.
Our solicitations met with an obstinate refusal. Yet the German authorities were careful to set (p.48) up inquiries; but they wanted them to be one-sided, that is, without any legal value.
After having refused the inquiry which the Cardinal of Malines asked for, the German authorities proceeded to various localities, where priests had been shot and peacable citizens massacred or made prisoners, and there took
the depositions of witnesses, some of whom were chosen indiscriminately and others carefully selected. Sometimes it was in the presence of a representative of the local authority, who was ignorant of the German language, and so was obliged to accept and to sign on trust the official reports. They believed in this way they could form conclusions which might afterwards be presented to the public as the results of examination and cross-examination.
The German inquiry at Louvain in November, 1914, was conducted under these conditions. It is thus devoid of authority.
So it is natural that we should turn to you.
You will grant us the Court of Arbitration, which the occupying Power has refused us. You will obtain for us from your Government a public declaration that the witnesses will be asked by you and us to tell all they know without
fear of reprisals. Before you, under the shelter of your moral authority, they will feel more secure, and will be encouraged to relate what they have seen and heard; the world will have faith in the Episcopate (p.49) of
our two united countries; our joint control will guarantee the authenticity of the witnesses and the fidelity of the official reports. An inquiry, so conducted, will inspire confidence.
We ask for this inquiry, Your Eminences and venerated Colleagues, above all, to avenge the honor of the Belgian people. Slanders on the part of your people and its highest representatives have violated it. You know as well as
we, the adage of theology, moral, human, Christian and Catholic - no pardon without restitution: Non remittitur peccatum, nisi restituatur ablatum.
Your people, through the mouthpiece of their political powers and highest moral authorities, have accused our fellow citizens of having committed atrocities and horrors upon wounded Germans, of which the "White Book" and
the Catholic manifesto, above mentioned, pointed out the details; we oppose a formal denial to all these accusations, and we ask to be allowed to prove the facts upon which we found this denial.
In return, in order to justify the atrocities committed in Belgium by the German army, the political Power by the very heading of the "White Book", Die völkerrechtswidrige Führung des belgischen Volkskriegs (the violation
of international law by the methods of war employed by the Belgian people) and the hundred Catholic signatories of the work, The German War and (p.50) Catholicism; a German reply to French attacks, affirm that the German army in Belgium legitimately defended itself against a treacherous organization of francs-tireurs.
We declare that nowhere in Belgium was there an organization of francs-tireurs, and we claim the right to prove the truth of our assertion in the name of our calumniated national honor.
You will call whom you wish before the tribunal, at which all parties will be present. We will invite to appear there all the priests of the parishes where civilians, priests, monks, or laymen were put to death or threatened with death to the cry of Man hat geschossen (someone has fired). We will ask all these priests, if you wish, to sign their depositions on oath, and then, at the risk of maintaining that all the Belgian clergy is perjured, you will
be obliged to accept the conclusions of this solemn and decisive inquiry, and the civilized world will be also unable to deny them.
But, Your Eminences and venerated Colleagues, we should remind you that you have the same interest as ourselves in setting up a court of honor.
For we, through direct experience, know and declare that the German army gave itself up in Belgium, in a hundred different places, to plundering, incendiarism, imprisonments, massacres and sacrileges, contrary to all
justice and to every sentiment of humanity. (p.51)
We declare this, notably in the cases of the communes, the names of which appeared in our Pastoral Letters and in the two notes addressed by the Bishops of Namur and of Liege, on October 31 and November 1, 1915,
respectively, to His Holiness, Pope Benedict XV, to His Excellency, the Nuncio at Brussels, and to the ministers or representatives of neutral countries in residence at Brussels.
Fifty innocent priests and thousands of innocent Catholics were put to death; hundreds of others, whose lives have been saved by circumstances independent of the will of their persecutors, were in danger of death; thousands of innocent persons, with no previous trial, were imprisoned; many of them underwent months of detention, and, when they were released, the most minute questioning, to which they were submitted, revealed no guilt in any of them.
These crimes cry to heaven for vengeance.
If, in formulating these denunciations, we are calumniating the German army, or if the military authority had just reasons for commanding or permitting those acts which we call criminal, it is to the honor and the national interest of Germany to
confute us. So long as German justice is denied, we claim the right and the duty of denouncing what, in all sincerity, we consider as a grave attack on justice and on honor.
The Chancellor of the German Empire, at the (p.52) sitting on August 4, declared that the invasion of Luxembourg and of Belgium was "contrary to the principles of international law". He recognized that, "in disregarding the
rightful protestations of the Governments of Luxembourg and of Belgium, he committed a wrong which he promised to make good". The Pope, alluding intentionally to Belgium, as well as condescending to write in that sense to
the Minister, Monsieur van der Heuvel, by his Eminence, Cardinal Gasparri, Secretary of State, pronounced in his Consistorial address of January 22, 1915, this irrevocable decision: "It appertains to the Roman Pontiff, whom
God has set up as a sovereign interpreter and avenger of 'eternal law', to proclaim, before all things, that no one can for any reason whatever violate justice".
Since then, however, politicians and casuists have attempted to evade or to weaken those decisive words. In their reply to the French Catholics, the German Catholics indulge in the same paltry subtleties, and would like to
prove them by a fact. They have at their disposal two testimonies: one, anonymous, from someone who said he saw, on July 26, some French officers on the Boulevard Anspach, at Brussels, in conversation with some Belgian
officers; the other was from a certain Gustave Lochard, of Rimogne, who deposes that "two regiments of French dragoons, the 28 and the 30, and a battery crossed the Belgian frontier on the evening of July 31, 1914, and
remained entirely on Belgian soil for the whole following week".
Now, the Belgian Government declare "that before the declaration of war, no French troop, however small, had entered Belgium". And they add, "There is no honest evidence which can confute this assertion".
The Government of our King therefore declares the statement of the German Catholics to be an error.
Here we have a question of paramount importance, both political and moral, on which it is our duty to enlighten the public conscience.
But if, nevertheless, you decline the examination of this general question, we would ask you, at any rate, to attempt to check the evidence upon which the German Catholics have relied as decisive against us. The deposition of this Gustave Lochard rests on facts easy to check. The German Catholics will be anxious to clear themselves of the reproach of error and will make it a duty to their consciences to retract, if they have allowed themselves to be deceived to our prejudice.
We are well aware that you are reluctant to believe that the regiments whose discipline, honesty, and religious faith you say you know, could have allowed themselves to commit the inhuman deeds with which we reproach them. (p.54) You want to persuade yourselves that it is not so, because it cannot be so.
And, constrained by the evidence, we reply to you that it can be, because it is.
In face of facts no presumption holds good.
For you, as for us, there is only one issue: the proof of the facts by a commission whose impartiality is, and appears to all, unimpeachable.
We have no difficulty in understanding your feelings.
Pray believe that we also respect the spirit of discipline, of industry, and of faith, of which we had so often received proofs and witnessed the manifestations amongst your fellow countrymen. Very many are the Belgians
who confess to-day the bitterness of their deception. But they have lived through the sinister events of August and September. In spite of themselves the truth has overcome their most deeply rooted impressions.
The fact is no longer to be denied - Belgium has suffered martyrdom.
When foreigners from neutral countries - Americans, Dutch, Swiss, Spaniards - question us as to the manner in which the German invasion was conducted, and when we tell them of certain scenes to the horror of which, in spite of ourselves, we are compelled to testify, we strive to lessen the impression which the narrative would (p.55) make, feeling that the naked truth passes the bounds of credibility.
Nevertheless, when, in presence of the whole evidence, you have been able to analyze the causes, both remote and immediate, of what one of your generals (in face of the ruins of the little village of Schaffen-lez-Diest, and of the martyrdom of the pastor of the parish) called "a tragic error"; when you have heard of the influences which your soldiers were under at the moment they entered Belgium, in the intoxication of their first successes, the a priori unlikelihood of the truth will appear to you, as to us, less of a stumbling-block.
Above all, Your Eminences and venerated Colleagues, do not allow yourselves to be kept back by the empty pretext that an inquiry to-day would be premature.
Strictly speaking, we might say so, on our side, because, at the present hour the inquiry would take place under conditions unfavorable to us. Our population has been in truth so deeply terrified, the prospect of reprisals is still so threatening, that the witnesses, whom we shall call before a tribunal, consisting partly of Germans, will hardly dare to tell the complete truth.
But there are decisive reasons against any delay.
The first, which will most directly touch your hearts, is that we are the weak and you are the (p.56) strong. You would not wish to abuse your power over us.
Public opinion ordinarily is with him who first makes himself master of it.
Now, while you have complete freedom to inundate neutral countries with your publications, we are imprisoned and reduced to silence. We are hardly allowed to raise our voices inside our churches; the sermons in them are
censored, that is to say, travestied by hired spies; conscientious protests are styled revolt against public authority; our writings are stopped on the frontier, like an article of contraband. You alone enjoy freedom of speech and of pen, and if you are willing, through a spirit of charity and justice, to procure a little of the same freedom for the accused Belgians and to give them the opportunity of defending themselves, it is for you to come to their aid at the first possible moment. The old legal maxim, "Audiatur et altera pars", is inscribed, it is said, above many German law courts. In any case, with you as with us, it embodies the law in the proceedings of the episcopal courts, and in your case, too, no doubt as in ours, it is current in the popular tongue, under this image: "He who hears only one bell, hears only one sound".
Perhaps you will say: "It is past, forget it. Instead of throwing oil on the fire, rather turn your minds to forgiveness and unite your efforts (p.57) with those of the occupying Power, which asks only to stanch the wounds of the unfortunate Belgian
people".
Your Eminences and dear Colleagues, do not add irony to injustice.
Have we not suffered enough? Have we not been, are we not yet, tortured cruelly enough?
It is past, say you; resign yourselves, forget.
Past ! But all the wounds are bleeding ! There is not one honest heart which does not swell with indignation. When we hear our Government say in the face of the world: "He is twice guilty who, after having violated the
rights of another, still attempts, with the most audacious cynicism, to justify himself by imputing to his victim faults which he has never committed", our good folk stifle their curses only by force. Only yesterday a countryman of the neughbourhood of Malines learned that his son had fallen on the battlefield. A priest was consoling him. The good man replied: "Oh ! him, I give him to the country. But my eldest, they took him from me, the -, and foully buried him in a ditch".
How do you think that we could obtain a sincere word of resignation and of pardon from these poor creatures who have known all these tortures, as long as those who have made them suffer refuse to admit it, or to utter a word of regret, or a promise of reparation? (p.58)
Germany cannot now restore us to the blood which she has shed, the innocent lives which her arms have destroyed; but it is in her power to restore to the Belgian people its honor, which she has violated or permitted
to be violated.
We ask this restitution from you - you who stand first among the representatives of Christian morality in the Church of Germany.
There is something more profoundly sad than political divisions and material disasters. It is the hatred which injustice, real or supposed, stores up in so many hearts created to love one another. Is it not upon us, the pastors of our people, that the duty lies of helping to get rid of these bad feelings, and of reestablishing on its foundations of justice, to-day shaken, the union in love of all the children of the Great Catholic family?
The occupying Power speaks and writes of its intention to stanch our wounds.
But in the tribunal of the world intention is judged by action.
Now all that we poor Belgians, who submit for a time to the domination of the Empire, know, is that the Power which has staked its honor to govern us according to International Law codified in the Hague Convention, is ignoring its engagements. We are not speaking of particular abuses committed against individuals or communes, the character of which can only be estimated by (p.59) an investigation made after hearing both sides at the end of this war. We are considering at present only acts of the Government established by its official documents, posted up on the walls of our towns, and consequently involving directly its responsibility beyond any possible
question.
Now the breaches of the Hague Convention, since the date of the occupation of our provinces, are numerous and flagrant. We set them out here under headings and we shall provide, in an Annex
(3), the proof of our allegations. The following are the chief breaches:
Collective punishments imposed on account of individual acts, contrary to Article 50 of the Hague Convention;
Compulsory labor for the enemy, contrary to Article 52;
New taxes, in violation of Articles 48, 49, and 52;
Abuse of requisitions in kind, in violation of Article 52;
Disregard of the laws in force in the country, contrary to Article 43.
These violations of International Law, which aggravate our unhappy lot and increase the ferments of revolt and hatred in hearts usually peacable and kindly disposed, would not be continued if those who commit them did not feel (p.60) that they were supported, if not by the positive approbation, at least by the complacent silence of all those who form public opinion in their own country.
Again, then, we confidently appeal to your charity; we are the weak, you are the strong; come and judge whether it is still permissible for you to refuse your aid.
There are, moreover, in regard to the establishment of a commission of inquiry by members of the Catholic Episcopate, arguments of a general kind.
We have already dwelt upon this. This spectacle which our divisions afford to the world is disconcerting; it is an occasion of scandal to it, and awakens in it blasphemous thoughts.
Our people do not understand how you can be unaware of the twofold flagrant iniquity that has been inflicted on Belgium - the violation of our neutrality and the inhuman conduct of your soldiers - or how, knowing it, you can refrain from raising your voice to condemn it, and to dissociate yourselves from it.
On the other hand, what ought to scandalize your population, Protestant and Catholic, is the role ascribed by your Press to the Belgian clergy, and to a nation over which, for the last thirty years, it is well known that a Catholic Government has ruled. "Take care", said the Bishop of Hildesheim to his clergy, no later than the 21st September, 1914, (p.61) "these charges which the Press is circulating against priests, monks, and nuns of Catholic nations are making a rift between the Catholics and Protestants on German soil, and the religious future of the Empire is imperiled".
(4)
The campaign of calumnies against our clergy and our people has not slackened. Erzberger, a deputy of the Center, seems to have taken upon himself to increase it. In Belgium itself, in the Cathedral of Antwerp, on the sixteenth Sunday after Whitsuntide, one of your priests, Heinrich Mohr, dared to declare from the pulpit of truth to the Catholic soldiers of your army : "Official documents have informed us how the Belgians have hanged German soldiers on trees, sprinkled them with boiling liquid, and burnt them alive".
(5)
(p.62) There is only one means of stopping these calumnies, and that is to bring the whole truth to the light of day, and to condemn the true culprits publicly by religious authority.
There is another source of scandal for honest men, believers or non-believers, in the habit of giving prominence to the advantages and the disadvantages which Catholic interests would derive from the success either of the Triple Alliance or of the Quadruple Entente. Professor Schroers, of the Universoty of Bonn
(6) was the first, so far as we know, to devote his leisure to these alluring calcilations.
The religious results of the war are the secret of God, and none of us is in the Divine confidence.
But there is a higher question than that - the question of morality, of right, of honor.
"Seek ye first", said our Lord in the Holy Gospel, "the Kingdom of God and His righteousness, and all these things shall be added unto you."
Do your duty, come what may !
Also we bishops at this present moment have a moral duty, and therefore a religious one, which takes precedence of all others, that of searching out and proclaiming the truth.
Did not Christ, whose disciples and ministers we have the glorious honor to be, say : "For this (p.63) cause came I into the world that I should bear witness unto the truth
(7). Ego ad hoc veni in mundum, ut testimonium perbibeam veritati."
On the solemn day of our episcopal consecration we vowed to God and the Catholic Church never to forsake the truth, to yield neither to ambition nor to fear when it should be necessary to show our love for it. Veritatem diligat, neque eam unquam deserat aut laudibus aut timore superatus.
(8)
We have, therefore, in virtue of our vocation, a common role and a ground of sympathy. Confusion reigns in men's minds; what some call light, others designate as darkness; what is good to one is bad to another. We cherish the hope that the tribunal of impartial inquiry to which we have the honor of inviting your delegates will help to dissipate more than one uncertainty : Non ponat lucem tenebras, nec tenebras lucem; non dicat malum bonum, nec bonum malum. With all the warmtyh of his prayers, our Holy Father the Pope calls for peace; in the last letter he deigned to address to you at Fulda, after your last meeting, he urged you - he urges us all - to long for it with him. But he desires it only if it is based on the respect for the rights and dignity of nations.
(9) Dum votis omnibus pacem expetimus, (p.64) atque eam quidem pacem quae et justiciae sit opus et populorum
congruat dignitati.
We shall respond then to the desire of our common Father by working together to cause Truth to shine forth and triumph, Truth on which must rest justice, the honor of nations, and at length peace.
We are, Your Eminences and Venerated Colleagues, your respectful servants and brothers in devotion.
D.J. Card. Mercier, Archbishop of Malines
Antoine, Bishop of Ghent (10)
Gustave J., Bishop of Bruges (10)
Thomas Louis, Bishop of Namur
Martin Hubert, Bishop of Liege
Amedee Crooij, Bishop Designate of Tournai
(1) See page 65 for the complete text of the letter of the Bishop of Liege. The protest was repeated on August 21 to General von Kolowe, who had become military governor of Liege; then on August 29 to His Excellency, Baron von der Goltz, Governor-General of the occupied provinces of Belgium, and residing, at this time, in the episcopal palace of Liege.
(back)
(2) "Die völkerrechtswidrige Führung des belgischen Volkskriegs:
Denkschrift." (back)
(3) See page
81. (back)
(4) "For in such rumors it is not only a question of the honor of colleagues, but also the endangering of the holy interests of the Catholics in Germany. These rumors, indeed, are calculated to undermine slowly the peaceful relations between the members of the different faiths, to bring about mistrust, particularly towards the clergy, and to cause deep vexation and confusion amongst Catholics in non-Catholic countries. For this reason it is particularly important for the priest in non-Catholic countries to be on his guard against the insinuations which may be current in his parish with regard to the clergy". Dr. Adolf Bertram, Bishop of Hildesheim : Vigilance as to Insinuations as regards the
Clergy. (back)
(5) "We have read horrible things in the official reports : how the Belgians hanged German soldiers, and scalded them with hot tar and burnt them alive." A sermon on the 16th Sunday after Whitsuntide, by Heinrich Mohr, Chaplain to the Forces. The sermon has been published in the periodical, The Voice of Home [Die Stimme der Heimat] , No.34, Freiburg im Br. 1915.
Herder (back)
(6) "Der Krieg und der Katholizismus", br Dr. Heinrich Schroers, Professor of Catholic Theology in the University of
Bonn (back)
(7) John xviii.
37 (back)
(8) Pontificale Romanum : de consecratione electi
inepiscopum. (back)
(9) Acta Apostolicae Sedis, Vol.VII, October 6,
1915 (back)
(10) The Belgian Bishops unanimously decided to address a joint letter to the German Bishops. They have one and all knowledge of the scheme of the present letter and have given their adherence to it; but, owing to the difficulty of communicating with the Bishops of Ghent and Bruges, it has been impossible to submit to them this letter as it was finally drawn up, and obtain their signatures to
it. (back)
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| | Source: Rev. Joseph Stillemans (biographer, editor and translator), Cardinal Mercier, Pastorals, Letters, Allocutions 1914-1917, New York: P.J. Kenedy & Sons 1917, pp.39-64 |
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GM & AG
(digitale Umsetzung) für psm-data;
cfr. also: Belgium
in World War I, from WHKMLA |
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