The Daily Worker Newspaper, June 12, 1926, Page 9

The Eucharistic Congress On June 20-24 Chicago will be the Scena of & great medieval revival, On those four days the International Eu- charisti¢ Gongress will divide its ceremonies between Chicago and the seat of the Roman Gatholie Diocese at Mundelin, UL, a few miles distant, It will be the 28th biennial congress and the first to be held in the United States, Every two years a city is chosen in a different part of the world. The congresses are attended by the leaders of the Roman heirarchy, thous- ands of priests, monks and nuns. They are presided over by a papal nuncio, appointed by the. pope. Cath- olics. who. can affordit come from the far corners «ofthe: earthy - ‘What:ds the: purpose-ot-these con- The Religious The church claims Meaning of .. they aro purely spririt- The Eucharist ual reunion of millions of Catholic believers who come as pilgrims from the four quarters of the globe to do honor to Christ and to confess their faith be- tore men. The congresses are called’ “Eucharistic” becanse they are a glorification of the sacrament. The word comes from a combinatien of two Greek terms which mean “to re- joice.” Its religious meaning was given by the Gospel of St. Luke (XXTI, 19) in which the Greek terms “Eu- charistisas” is used in the sentence, “and taking bread ..: He gave thanks.” The word thus became a way of in- dicating the sacrament of the blood and body of Christ. According to the New Testament, which has been superimposed on the old Hebrew books, when Christ sat at the Last Supper the night before his death and said, referring to the bread, “Take ye and eat, this is my body,” and, referring to the wine, said, “Drink ye all of this, this-is my blood,” he, without probably any intention of doing so, laid the basis of what has become the central tenet of the cath- olic faith. The Real Body Catholics implicitly And Bloodof believethat when they The Christ. eat consecrated bread and when they drink consecrated wine, they are eating and drinking the actual, REAL body and blood of Christ. They believe that at the last supper and in the words given above, Christ, thru his divine power, transformed his blood and body into wine and bread by adding the words, “Do this for a memory of me,” he conferred the same power he himself exercised upon the disciples sitting around him and thru them upon all ordained priests for all time. This is called “Transubstantiation,” that is, the substance of blessed wine and bread become the substance of the blood and body of Christ. Thus the Eucharistic Congress is what might be called a World Mass— it is presided over by the highest pri- mates of the various countries—in worship of the transubstantiated body and blood of Christ. The wine and bread, Gigantic Preparations or wafers, to be used ForCongress on this occasion have been blessed by the pope and are being transported to Chicago under the careful watch of the Swiss guards of the Vatican. Mil- lions of dollars are being spent in the preparations. Great thrones have been erected upon which will sit the papal nunci and visttag cardinals. One mil- lion pilgrims are expected. Great pro- cessions of nuns and monks in the garbs of their different orders will be led by archbishops and primates in purple and red robes. Masses of thousands of voices will be sung, in- eluding those of 62,000 children. Serv- ices in honor of the Eucharist will be participated in by hundreds of thous- ands, These are the bare facts of the International Eucharistic Con- gress, By THURBER LEWIS. “Why do people build cathedrals for ancient in hovels?”——Robert G. Ingersoll. Why The Why was the Unit- United States ed States chosen for This Year? this year’s congress? There is no doubt that the church of Rome gives consid- erable thought to the matter of the location of the congress’ biennial ses- sions, The church of Rome is in a large measure a political institution. Its political influence in some coun- tries, especially the Latin countries and Austria, is enormous. It infiu- ence in Mexico was at one time quite as great. The Roman church, in Mex- ico, has played the role of a land- lord and oppressor of the peons. Things have changed there. The church is having trouble with the new Mexico, Its priests are being expel- led. Its educational system hag been replaced by a lay system supervised by the government. Count D’Yanville, the secretary of the Eucharistic Congress, is author- ity for the statement that the holding of the Congress in the United States this year has very much to do with the troublous times the church is hav- ing in Mexico. This means that the Catholic church, by a display of strength in the United States, hopes to influence the Mexican government to deal more easily with its represen- tatives and institutions in the South- ern Republic, That is one credit- able reason. Another is that there are, accord- ing to the church's esti- mates, 20,000,000 Catho- lics in the United States. There are 1,000,000 in Chicago alone. A great pageant of this sort will certainly have 20,000,000 Catholics in America the effect of arousing their church patroitism and perhaps of also influ- encing those outside the faith to be favorably impressed with the power df the church. Certainly so ancient and wise an institution as the Roman Catholic Church does not overlook these things. Certainly there are other considerations for them than merely “a, confession of faith before men.” The Feudal Power Of The Church Is Still Felt By such dictums and upon such faith, the Roman church was the prevading influence of feudalism. The answer to questions of knowledge as opposed to questions of belief was the stake! By the sheer momentum of the great power accrued to itself during those superstitious days and by the fact that capitalism, succeeding feudalism, did not contain the basis for the extinc- tion of ignorance and supersition— aye, in this, its decrepit period, it spreads both for its own maintenance —the Roman church, and all others, can still carry on. The greater part of the millions of Catholics thruout the world are work- ers of the cities or toilers on the land. The vast majority of workers who are Catholics are to be found in countries with a predominantly peas- ant population. In America it is dif- ferent. The majority of Catholic workers are engaged in industry. This is, of course, because they came originally from those countries in which catholicism dominates the minds of the peasant population from which most of the slaves of heavy in- dustry in the United States have been drawn, Altho very few of them will come to the Eucharistic Congress be- By Fred Ellis ghosts to parade in while they themselves live cause they haven't the money, they will watch the news of it with great ° interest. Even now the European pa- pers are full of it. It certainly is get- ting its share of the news here. But what has the Congress, or for Church Do For that matter the The Workers? church, to offer to the workers? Does the church make their hours of slaving for a master shorter? Does it put food in the mouths of their families when times are hard—strike or unemployment? Does it help to lessen in one degree the debasing exploitation that makes capitalists superfluously wealthy and the workers that much poorer? No, That is not its work. Its work is the work of the “spirit.” It teaches hu- mility. It teaches that if your brother is shot down during a strike it is God’s will. It teaches you to be obedt ent—to» whom? To your master, to your ‘boss. The papal nuncio will sit upon his high golden throne in the name of a distant, mysterious authority. Cowled monks, the white of the Dominicans, the brown of the Capuchins, the black of the Benedictines will parade slowly, carrying before them croziers of gold. The Swiss Guards, in sixteenth cen- tury habiliment, will hold their an- cient spears at attention. Te Deums will be sung by thousands of pious voices, Red robed cardinals will march under yellow and white canop- ies following the ostensorioum, that contains the holy wafers. A million knees will sink to the ground in prayer, And in every part of the globe— workers will continue to slave, What Can The Re ne re aT ee Mp Te tr ner ere simeen eee mre Cen a ry