Part 41

The Catholic church of Switzerland, after long continued troubles, obtained again a regular hierarchical organization in 1828. Since that time the Jesuits settled there in crowds, and assumed to themselves in most of the Catholic cantons the whole direction of church and schools. The unfortunate issue of the cantonal war of 1847 led indeed to their banishment by law, but, favoured by the bishops, they knew how still to re-enter by back doors and secretly to regain their earlier influence. The city of Calvin was the centre of their plots, not only for Switzerland, but also for all Cisalpine Europe, until at last the overstrained bow broke, and the Swiss governments became the most decided and uncompromising opponents of the ultramontane claims. In 1873 the papal nuncio, in consequence of a papal encyclical insulting the government, was banished.--In Protestant Switzerland, besides the destructive influence of the Illumination, antagonistic to the church, and radical liberalism, there appeared a soil receptive of pietism, separatism, and fanaticism, whose first cultivation has been ascribed to Madame Krüdener (§ 176, 2). In the Protestant church of German Switzerland the religious and theological developments stood regularly in lively connexion with similar movements in Germany, while those in the French cantons received their impulse and support from France and England. From France, to which they were allied by a common language, they learned the unbelief of the encyclopædists (§ 165, 14), while travelling Englishmen and those residing in the country for a longer period introduced the fervour and superstition of Methodism and other sects.

§ 199.1. =The Catholic Church in Switzerland till 1870.=--The ecclesiastical superintendence of Catholic Switzerland was previously subject to the neighbouring foreign bishoprics. But for immediate preservation of its interests the curia had appointed a nunciature at Lucerne in 1588. When now, in 1814, the liberal Wessenberg (§ 187, 3), already long suspected of heresy, was called as coadjutor to Constance, the nuncio manœuvred with the Catholic confederates till these petitioned the pope for the establishment of an independent and national bishopric. But when each of the cantons interested claimed to be made the episcopal residence negotiations were at last suspended, and in 1828 six small bishoprics were erected under immediate control of Rome. At the end of 1833 the diocesan representatives of Basel and St. Gall assembled in Baden to consult about the restoration of a national Swiss Metropolitan Union and a common state church constitution for securing church and state against the encroachments of the Romish hierarchy. But Gregory XIV. condemned the articles of conference here agreed upon, which would have given to Switzerland only what other states had long possessed, as false, audacious, and erroneous, destructive of the church, heretical, and schismatic, and among the Catholic people a revolt was stirred up by ultramontane fanaticism, under the influence of which the whole action was soon frustrated. On the occasion of a revision of the constitution of the canton of Aargau, a revolt, led by the cloisters, broke out in 1841. But the rebels were defeated, and the grand council resolved upon the closing of all cloisters, eight in number. Complaint made against this at the diet was regarded as satisfied by the Aargau Agreement of 1843 restoring three nunneries. An opposition was organized against the revision of the constitution of Canton =Lucerne= in 1841. The liberal government was overthrown, and the new constitution, in which the state insisted on its _placet_ in ecclesiastical matters and the granting of cantonal civil rights to those only who professed attachment to the Roman Catholic church, was submitted to the pope for approval. At last, in 1844, the academy of Lucerne was given over to the Jesuits, for which Joseph Leu, the popular agitator, as member of the grand council, had wrought unweariedly since 1839. In Canton =Vaud= the parties of old or clerical and young Switzerland contended with one another for the mastery. The latter suffered an utter defeat in 1844, and the constitution which was then carried allowed the right of public worship only to the Catholic church. In consequence of this victory of the clerical party Catholic Switzerland with Lucerne at its head became a main centre of ultramontanism and Jesuitism. At the diet of 1844, indeed, Aargau, supported by numerous petitions from the people, moved for the banishment of all Jesuits from all Switzerland, but the majority did not consent. The Jesuit opponents expelled from Lucerne now organized twice over a free volunteer corps to overthrow the ultramontane government and force the expulsion of the Jesuits, but on both occasions, in 1844 and 1845, it suffered a sore defeat. In face of the threateningly growing increase of the excitement, which made them fear a decisive intervention of the diet, the Catholic cantons formed in 1845 a =separate league= (_Sonderbund_) for the preservation of their faith and their sovereign rights. This proceeding, irreconcilable with the Act of Federation, led to a civil war. The members of the _Sonderbund_ were defeated, the ultramontane governments had to resign, and the Jesuits departed in 1847. The new Federal constitution which Switzerland adopted in 1848, secured unconditional liberty of conscience and equality of all confessions, and the expulsion of the Jesuits in terms of the law. But since that time ultramontanism has gained the supremacy in Catholic Switzerland, and in spite of the existing law against the Jesuits all the threads of the ultramontane clerical movements in Switzerland were in the Jesuits’ hands. These were never more successful than in Canton =Geneva=, where the radical democratic agitator Fazy leagued himself closely with ultramontanism to compass the destruction of the old Calvinistic aristocracy, and by bringing in large numbers the lower class Catholics from the neighbouring France and Savoy he obtained a considerable Catholic majority in the canton, and in the capital itself made Catholics and Protestants nearly equal.

§ 199.2. =The Geneva Conflict, 1870-1883.=--The Catholic church of Canton Geneva, on the founding of the six Swiss bishoprics by a papal bull, had been incorporated “for all time to come,” after the style of the concordat, with the bishopric of Freiburg-Lausanne. But the government made no objection when the newly elected priest of Geneva, Mermillod, a Jesuit of the purest water, assumed the title and rank of an episcopal vicar-general for the whole canton. But when in 1864 the pope nominated him bishop of Hebron _in partibus_ and auxiliary bishop of Geneva, it made a protest. Nevertheless, when, in the following year, Bishop Marilley of Freiburg by papal orders transferred to him absolute power for the canton with personal responsibility, and in 1870 formally renounced all episcopal rights over it, so that the pope now appointed the auxiliary bishop independent bishop of Geneva, it was evident a step had been taken that could not be recalled. The government renewed its protest and made it more vehement, in consequence of which, in January, 1873, by a papal brief which was first officially communicated to the government after it had already been proclaimed from all Catholic pulpits, Mermillod was appointed apostolic vicar-general with unlimited authority for Canton Geneva, and the district was thus practically made a Catholic mission field. A demand made of him by the state to resign this office and title and divest himself of every episcopal function, was answered by the declaration that he would obey God rather than man. The _Bund_ then expelled him from Federal territory until he would yield to that demand. From Ferney, where he settled, he unceasingly stirred up the fire of opposition among the Genevan clergy and people, but the government decidedly rejected all protests, and by a popular vote obtained sanction for a Catholic church law which restricted the rights of the diocesan bishop who might reside in Switzerland, but not in Canton Geneva, and without consent of the government could not appoint there any episcopal vicar, and transferred the election of priests and priests’ vicars to the congregations. The next elections returned Old Catholics, since the Roman Catholic population did not acknowledge the law condemned by the pope and took no part in the voting. By decision of the grand council of 1875 the abolition of all religious corporations was next enacted, and all religious ceremonies and processions in public streets and squares forbidden. Leo XIII. made an attempt to still the conflict, for in 1879 he gave Bishop Marilley the asked for discharge, and confirmed his elected successor, Cosandry, as bishop of Freiburg, Lausanne, and Geneva, without however removing Mermillod from his office of vicar apostolic of Geneva. But this actually took place after the death of Cosandry in 1882 by the appointment of Mermillod as his successor in 1883. As he now ceased to style himself a vicar apostolic, the Federal council removed the decree of banishment as the occasion of it had ceased, but left each canton free as to whether or not it should accept him as bishop. Freiburg, Neuenburg, and Vaud accepted him, and Mermillod had a brilliant entry into Freiburg, which he made his episcopal residence. But Geneva refused to recognise him, because it had already officially attached itself to the Old Catholic Bishop Herzog of Berne, and Mermillod went so far in his ostentatious love of peace as to declare that he would not in future enter Genevan territory.

§ 199.3. =Conflict in the Diocese of Basel-Soleure, 1870-1880.=--Bishop Lachat of Soleure, whose diocese comprised the Cantons Bern, Soleure, Aargau, Basel, Thurgau, Lucerne, and Zug, had been previously in conflict with the diocesan conference, _i.e._ the delegates of the seven cantons entrusted with the oversight of the ecclesiastical administration, on account of introducing the prohibited handbook on morals of the Jesuit Gury (§ 191, 9), which ended in the closing of the seminary aided by the government, and the erection of a new seminary at his own cost. Although the diocesan conference next forbad the proclamation of the new Vatican dogma, the bishop threatened excommunicated Egli in Lucerne in 1871, and Geschwind in Starrkirch in 1872, who refused. The conference ordered the withdrawal of this unlawful act, and on the bishop’s refusal, deposed him in January, 1873. The dissenting cantons, Lucerne and Zug, indeed declared that after as well as before they would only recognise Lachat as lawful bishop, the chapter refused to make the required election of administrator of the diocese, the clergy in Soleure and in =Bernese Jura= without exception took the side of the bishop, as also by means of a popular vote the great majority of Catholics in Thurgau. But amid all this the conference did not yield in the least. Lachat was compelled by the police to quit his episcopal residence, and withdrew to a village in Canton Lucerne. The council of the Bernese government resolved to recall the refractory clergy of the Jura, took their names off the civil register and forbad them to exercise any clerical functions. The outbreaks incited by rebel clergy in the Jura were put down by the military, sixty-nine clergymen were exiled, and, so far as the means allowed, replaced by liberal successors introduced by the Old Catholic priest Herzog (§ 190, 3) in Olten. In November, 1875, permission to return home was granted to the exiles in consequence of the revised Federal constitution of 1874, according to which the banishment of Swiss burghers was no longer allowed. The Bernese government felt all the more disposed to carry out this enactment of the National Council, as it believed that it had obtained the legal means for checking further rebellion and obstinacy among those who should return. On January, 1874, by popular vote a law was sanctioned reorganizing the whole ecclesiastical affairs of the =Canton Bern=. By it all clergy, Catholic as well as Protestant, are ranked as civil officers, the choice of whom rests with the congregations, the tenure of office lasting for six years. All purely ecclesiastical affairs for the canton rest in the last instance with a synod of the particular denomination, for the several congregations with a church committee, both composed of freely elected lay and clerical members. But if a dispute in a

## particular congregation should arise about a synodal decree, the

congregational assembly decides on its validity or non-validity for the particular congregation. All decrees of higher church courts and pastorals must have state approval, which must never be refused on dogmatic grounds. If a congregation splits over any question, the majority claims the church property and pastor’s emoluments, etc. And this law was next extended in October 31st, 1875, in the matter of penal law by the so-called Police Worship Law. It imposes heavy fines up to 1000 francs or a year’s imprisonment for any clerical agitation against the law, institutions or enactments of the civil courts, as well as for every outbreak of hostilities against members of other religious bodies, refuses to allow any interference of foreign spiritual superiors without leave granted by government in each particular case, forbids all processions and religious ceremonies outside of the fixed church locality, etc. In the same year the first Catholic Cantonal Synod declared its attachment to the Christian or Old Catholic church of Switzerland. But it was otherwise after the newly elected Grand Council of the canton of its own accord, on September 12th, 1878, granted the returned Jura clergy complete amnesty for all the past, and on the assumption of future submission to existing laws of state, recognised them again eligible for election to spiritual offices which had previously been denied them. Not only did the Roman Catholic people regularly take part in elections of priests, church councils, and synods, undoubtedly with the approval of the new pope Leo XIII., who had in February addressed a conciliatory letter to the members of the Federal Council, but also the extremest of the Jura now submitted without scruple to the new election required by the law, and won therein for the most part the majority of votes. In the Catholic Cantonal Synod convened in Bern, in January, 1880, were found seventy-five Roman Catholics and only twenty-five Old Catholic deputies. The latter were naturally defeated in all controversies. The synod declared that the connexion with the Christian Catholic national bishopric was annulled, that auricular confession was obligatory, that marriages of priests were forbidden, etc. Since now the law assigns the state pay of the priest as well as all the church property in the case of a split to the majority for the time being, the inevitable consequence was that Old Catholics of the Jura district were deprived of all share in these privileges, and had to make provision for their own support. Also in Canton =Soleure=, the law that all pastors must be re-elected after the expiry of six years, came in force in 1872, and then the thirty-two Roman Catholic clergymen concerned were with only two exceptions re-elected, while, on the other hand, the Old Catholic priest Geschwind of Starrkirch was rejected.--But all efforts to restore the bishopric of Basel-Soleure came to grief over the person of Bishop Lachat, whom the curia would not give up and the Federal Council would not again allow, until at last a way out of the difficulty was found. The canton Tessin, which previously in church matters belonged to the Italian dioceses of Milan and Como, was, in 1859, by decree of the Federal Council, detached from these. But Tessin insisted on the founding of a bishopric of its own, while the Federal Council wished to join it to the bishopric of Chur. Thus the matter remained undecided, till in September, 1884, the papal curia came to an understanding with the Federal Council that Lachat should be appointed vicar-apostolic for the newly founded bishopric of Tessin, and that to the vacated bishopric of Basel-Soleure the “learned as well as mild” Provost Fiala of Soleure should be called. In this way all the cantons referred to, with the exception of Bern, were won.[552]

§ 199.4. =The Protestant Church in German Switzerland.=--Among all the German cantons, =Basel= (§ 172, 5), which unweariedly prosecuted the work of home and foreign missions, fell most completely under the influence of rationalism and then of the liberal Protestant theology. While pietism obtained powerful support and encouragement in its missionary institutions and movements, and there, though developing itself on Reformed soil, assumed, in consequence of its manifold connection with Germany, a colour almost more Lutheran than Reformed, the university by eminent theological teachers of scientific ability represented the Mediation school in theology of a predominantly Reformed type. In the Canton =Zürich=, on the other hand, the advanced theology, theoretical and practical, obtained an increasing and finally an almost exclusive mastery in the university and church. But yet, when in 1839 the Grand Council called Dr. David Strauss to a theological professorship, the Zürich people rose to a man against the proposal, the appointment was not enforced, the Grand Council was overthrown, and Strauss pensioned. The victory and ascendency of this reaction, however, was not of long continuance. Theological and ecclesiastical radicalism again won the upper hand and maintained it unchecked. In the other German cantons the most diverse theological schools were represented alongside of one another, yet with steadily increasing advantage to liberal and radical tendencies. The theological faculty at =Bern= favoured mainly a liberal mediation theology, and an attempt of the orthodox party in 1847, to set aside the appointment of Professor E. Zeller by means of a popular tumult, miscarried. From 1860 ecclesiastical liberalism prevailed in German Protestant Switzerland, frequently going the length of the extremest radicalism and showing its influence even in the cantonal and synodal legislation. The starting of the “_Zeitstimmen für d. ref. Schweiz_,” in 1859, by Henry Lang, who had fled in 1848 from Württemberg to Switzerland, and died in 1876 as pastor in Zürich, marked an epoch in the history of the radical liberal movement in Swiss theology. In Fred. Langhans, since 1876 professor at Bern, he had a zealous comrade in the fight. During 1864-1866, Langhans published a series of violent controversial tracts against the pietistic orthodox party in Switzerland, which zealously prosecuted foreign missions, and in 1866 he founded the _Swiss Reform Union_, while Alb. Bitzius, son of the writer known as Jer. Gotthelf (§ 174, 8) started as its organ the “_Reformblätter aus d. bernischen Kirche_,” which was subsequently amalgamated with the _Zeitstimmem_.--After more or less violent conflicts with pietistic orthodoxy, still always pretty strongly represented, especially in the aristocracy, the emancipation of the schools from the church and the introduction of obligatory civil marriage were accomplished in most cantons, even before the revised Federal constitution of 1874 and the marriage law of 1875 gave to these principles legal sanction throughout the whole of Switzerland. In almost all Protestant cantons the re-election or new election to all spiritual offices every six years was ordained by law, in many the freeing of the clergy from any creed subscription with the setting aside of confessional writings as well as of the orthodox liturgy, hymnbooks and catechisms was also carried, and the withdrawing of the Apostles’ Creed from public worship and from the baptismal formula was enjoined. The Basel synod in 1883, by thirty-six to twenty-seven votes, carried the motion to make baptism no longer a condition of confirmation; and although the Zürich synod in 1882 still held baptism obligatory for membership in the national church, the Cantonal Council in 1883, on consulting the law of the church, overturned this decision by 140 against 19 votes.