WESTMINSTER
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WESTMINSTER
Frcncli clergy also opened churches for English Cath-
olics, and thus laid the foundations of permanent
London missions. Such are the missions of Totten-
ham, opened by the Abbe (afterwards Cardinal) de
Chevereux in 1794; Somers Town, opened by the
famous Abbe Carron in 1808; Cadogan Terrace,
Chelsea, opened by the Abbe Voyaux de Fraiious in
1812; and Hampstead, opened by the Abb6 Morel in
1815.
Catholic Emancipation, which placed Catholics civilly and politically on a level with their fellow- citizens, marks the next epoch. "It is especially since 1829", as Cardinal Wiseman pointed out in 1863, "that the exterior expansion of Catholicism has been most visibly manifested." The next twenty years witnessed remarkable progress all round, which made the establishment of a hierarchy a necessity. The number of churches in London was doubled; the number of priests trebled; while the number of con- vents increased from one to nine. Ten years after Emancipation, the Catholics of London numbered close on 150,000, about one-tenth of the total popula- tion of London; and the churches were quite inade- quate in size ana number to the needs of the congre- gations. There were 400 conversions in London in 1836, and ten years later the harvest of the Oxford Movement was already being gathered. Because of the recent growth, the Bull "Muneris Apostolici Ratio" was pubhshed in 1840 to increase the vica- riates from four to eight, as a first step towards a regular hierarchy.
IL The Rule of the Archblshops. — A. On 29 Sept., 1850, the Bull "Universalis Ecclesite" was issued, restoring a hierarchy with territorial titles. England and Wales were formed into one ecclesiastical province. Westminster was raised to the dignity of metropoUtan, the twelve other sees being made suffragan to it. The old London Vicariate gave place to the dioceses of Westminster and Southwark, the for- mer retaining Middlesex, Hertfordshire, and E.ssex. Nicholas Wiseman, the last Vicar Apostolic of the London District, was appointed first archbishop and raised at the same time to the sacred purple. The new cardinal's letter "From out of the Flaminian Gate of Rome", announcing the reorganization of the English Church, aroused a storm of opposition in the country against what was termed "Papal aggres- sion". On his return from Rome he made it his first business to allay the storm. How well he succeeded is attested by Cardinal Newman. "Highly as I put his gifts, I was not prepared for such a display of vigour, power, judgment, sustained energy ..." The Ecclesiastical Titles Act, indeed, passed into law, but it was a dead letter from the beginning.
On Wiseman fell the task of beginning the recon- struction of the Church in England. The constitu- tion given to the vicars Apostolic was out of date, and a new code of legislation had to be laid down in the three provincial Synods held at Oscott in 1852, 1855, and 1859. The principal decrees of those Synods defined the status of cathedral chapters and the posi- tion of the rectors of missions, and regulated the government of the colleges and seminaries. In London much had to be done in the way of remodel- ling and reorganizing the missions. Wiseman gave a great impetus to the spread of popular devotions, introduced the Forty Hours' Adoration, and obtained more decorum and regularity in church ser\ices. Before his time daily Mass was regularly celebrated only in twelve clmrches in London. Benediction and Vespers were very rare, and seem to have been inter- mingled with Engli.sli iirayers and hymns at the will of the celebrant. In 1S49 only one church in London po.ssessed a .statue of Our Lady. Wiseman also took the initiative in obtaining the appointment of Catho- lic army chaplains on an e(|uality in all respects with the Frotcstant, and in making some provision for the
spiritual needs of Catholics in the navy. Both the
mihtary and naval chaplains' departments are now
administered from Archbishop's House, Westminster
(S. C. de Prop. Fide, 15 May, 1906).
The question of the education of the poor was in a very sad condition. Wiseman applied his energies to every new move. The Government started reform- atory schools for juvenile offenders in 1854, and Wiseman at once secured that one should be reserved near London as the first Cathohc reformatory. In 1857 he opened an industrial school for homeless children; and at the time of his death he was busy with negotiations for providing the Poor Law children with Cathohc instruction. Several new schools were also opened for the poor children in the missions. One of the great means to which Cardinal Wiseman looked for the carr\-ing out of his schemes was the formation of religious communities, especially of missionary communities to help in the work of evan- gelizing the poor, ^^'hen he first came to London "there was not a single community of men". The Jesuits indeed had a "splendid church" at F.arm Street, opened in 1849; but could not pro\'ide a com- munity of the nature that Wiseman required. In a few years, however, the Redemptorists, the Passion- ists, the Slarists, and the Oratorians had come. By the end of his life he had seen the estabhshment of fifteen communities of men, and the number of com- munities of women increase from nine to thirty-two. These figures, taken in conjunction with the increase in number of churches from 46 to 120, and of priests from 113 to 215, testify amply to the wonderful development of the diocese under the first archbishop.
But by 1853 \\'iseman had already arrived at the conclusion that the regular commimities could not give to the diocese the manifold activities he expected from them. He therefore determined to form a com- munity of secular priests "ready to undertake any spiritual work which the Bishop cut out for them". The work was entrusted to Henry Edward (afterwards Cardinal) Manning, and resulted in the formation of the Oblates of St. Charles in 1857. L'nfortunately, this brought the cardinal some of the saddest days of his life. The new foundation aroused a strong opposition, at the head of which Archbishop EiTing- ton, coadjutor with right of succession to the see, was found. The controversy resulted in Archbishop Errington's resignation of his rights of succession in 1862. He had been associated with Wiseman in all his undertakings, supplying the business capacity that Wiseman lacked; and in his retirement, it is recorded of him that "he nursed no resentment in his heart . . . His tongue left no sting or stain behind". Cardinal Wiseman died in 1805, after several years of failing health. Always regarded on the Continent as one of the greatest personalities of the age, his popularity grew steadily in England among all classes of the population. How thoroughly he had conquered was made known by an almost imique demonstration of public .sympathy at the time of his death.
B. Mgr. Manning had been appointed provost of the Westminster Chapter under Cardinal Wiseman in 1857, and now succeeded him as metropolitan. The contrast between the loles of the first and second archbishop has been drawn by the latter's biographer. "If Wiseman's was the pilot's venturesome arm to steer the bark of Peter through heavy seas to a safe anchorage, it was Manning's i)art to make smooth the way by tact and skill and intimate knowledge of the land, for the advance of the Church into the fulness of English life." Manning's qualifications in this respect were his Oxford training and his intimacy with English life and society. The first thing to which the new archbishop turned his attention was the education of the poor. "Our weak side is the education of our children", was Wiseman's lament in 1863, and he estimated that there were 17,000 poor Catholic
