You, Venerable Brethren, understand how much this question is on Our mind and We desire that Our children should also know it, not only those who belong to the Catholic world, but also those who are separated from Us. If these latter will humbly beg light from heaven, there is no doubt but that they will recognize the one true Church of Jesus Christ and will, at last, enter it and be united with Us in perfect love. Awaiting this event and as a sign of divine function and a pledge of Our paternal good will, We impart most affectionately to you, Venerable Brethren, and to your clergy and people, the apostolic benediction.
Given at Rome, at Saint Peter's, on the 6th day of January, on the Feast of the Epiphany of Jesus Christ Our Lord in the year 1928 and the sixth year of Our Pontificate. [402]
NOTE.
Pius Xi. and the Russian Christians.
An urgent appeal was made by Pius XI., dated February 2, 1930, calling for prayer and relief for the oppressed Christians under the Soviet government. The document lacks, as it would seem, the marks commonly, if not always, regarded as essential for a papal utterance to be infallible. Nevertheless, the attitude taken by the Roman pontiff in the critical religious crisis in Russia and the claims he makes for the Roman Church render the document of more than usual importance.
After referring to Benedict XV.'s interest in the people of Russia and the commission on the Russian conditions which he had himself appointed, Pius appealed to the Russian government "to respect conscience, the freedom of worship and the goods of the Church." Again setting forth acts of "terrible persecution" going on to the extent of a formal demand on the part of the Soviet government that the people proceed to "apostasy and the hatred of God," he announced a "mass of expiation, propitiation and reparation in the basilica of St. Peter over the tomb of the Prince of the Apostles for Our most beloved Russian people--Nostro dilettissimo popolo russo." He called upon the Russians to return "to the one fold of Our one Saviour and Liberator, the Lord Jesus Christ," commended them anew to "the sweet thaumaturge of Lisieux, St. Thérèse of the Child Jesus," and implored further on their behalf the help of "the most holy and immaculate Virgin Mary, Mother of God, her most chaste spouse and patron of the Church Universal, St. Joseph, and the special protectors of the Russians, St. John the Baptist, St. Nicholas, St. Basil, St. Chrysostom and Saints Cyril and Methodius."
On the day appointed, March 19, 1930, which was the Feast of St. Joseph, the pontiff officiated at mass in the midst of an overflowing throng. A handbill, distributed to the worshippers and spectators as they passed from the portico of St. Peter's to the body of the church, contained on the one side the text of the papal appeal and the prayer to St. Thérèse which the pope had issued, with the promise of 300 days of indulgence for all repeating it for a month. Calling upon the saint to help "our brother Russians, the victims of a long and cruel persecution," the prayer further besought her to bring about "the return, of the noble people to the one fold which Christ's most beloved heart intrusted to the care of St. Peter alone and his successors, that they might at last have the joy, in communion with the Catholic Church, of praising the Father, Son and Holy Ghost."
On the reverse side of the handbill under the caption, "The Catholic Church and Russian 'Orthodoxy'--La Chiesa cattolica e la 'orthodossia' russa," it was affirmed that, while the National Russian Church "pretends to call itself orthodox, it is heterodox, the only orthodox Church being the Catholic Apostolic Roman Church."
[400] The Original in Ada sed. s., XX., 1-9. Other trans. in Cath. Hist. Rev., July. 1928; Bell: Documents, I., 32-44. The capitalizations are as in the original.
[401] Adspectabilem et conspicuam. Leo XIII., June 29, 1896, put the idea of the visibility of Christ's kingdom and its identity with the Roman Church thus: 'As he willed that his kingdom should be manifest--conspicuam--Christ was obliged to appoint a vice-regent on earth in the person of Peter. He likewise determined that the authority given him for the salvation of mankind should in perpetuity pass to Peter's successors.'
[402] In his scarcely less important encyclical on the 'Christian Education of Youth' issued in Italian, Dec. 31, 1929, Pius XI. claimed as the Church's supreme right the authority to lay down the rules of education and conduct education. He also forbade anew training in mixed schools and also the coeducation of the sexes.