Abstract

Father Hyacinthe's Lectures

This article critically appraises the book, "The Family and the Church. Advent Conferences of Notre Dame, Paris," by Father Rafael Hyacinthe and edited by Leonar W. Bacon. This book, reportedly, is an edition of two series of conferences, the one relating to the family and the other to the church. The orator believes that the properly organized family is a cure for all the evils of political and religious society. A political cure from whose training in order, obedience, and self-respect the trusty citizen must at last emerge. A spiritual restoration, since in the Christian household the father is in a manner the secular arm of the church, moulding by precept, and, when necessary, by punishment, the young barbarian bequeathed to him by original sin, into a civilized being and a Christian. Father Hyacinthe, however, does not base the supremacy of the husband. over the wife upon this sort of rank, since he is still her ruler and domestic priest.