Our Catholic He1·itage in Texas
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in particular have been subjected by ill-intentioned persons who have invoked old prejudices and appealed to misconceptions founded on igno- rance for the sake of personal rivalries, political ambitions, and religious bigotry. There is nothing new in persecution, although rabid manifesta- tions of religious prejudice in our day, in an age of enlightenment and good will do seem strange. Here have the Knights of Columbus been called again and again to defend their faith against infamy and to fight against ignorance and malice as the knights of old, but not with sword and lance, nor by resorting to violence. Rather, as will be shown, they have fought with the arms of enlightenment; they have used law, legal means, and education, not force, in the dissemination of information in their efforts to vanquish ignorance and dispell prejudice. There are times throughout history when peculiar conditions and cir- cumstances have brought organized attacks on the Church and the Cath- olics. From the beginning of our country's history, it has been a serious problem, one on which George Washington expressed himself emphat- ically against all persecution and dissensions because of religious differ- ences. Neither one nor the other has a place in a Democracy. But again and again bigots have hidden behind the broad emblem of Americanism and in its name invoked the sacred flame of patriotism to turn brother against brother because of religious differences. One of the earliest movements of this sort was the formation of the American Protective Association, better remembered as the A.P.A., which for years kept alive religious agitation against Catholics and aroused great bitterness for almost a half century for purely political reasons until the Spanish American War in 1898 fused the nation again in a common cause. Political strife in the presidential campaign of 1912 revived the reli- gious issue, and public "confessions" for political purposes by alleged "ex-priests" and "ex-nuns" became common. Then came the Ku Klux Klan, which has sporadically broken out again and again, from time to time, since the days following World War I. In Texas, animosity against Catholics dates back to the days of its movement for independence from Mexico in 1836. For a long time after independence from Mexico and annexation to the United States there were few English-speaking Catholics in Texas. They were regarded generally as a people "strongly devoted to idolatry, addicted to a strange ritual, and completely mastered by a foreign power." all the result of ignorance even on the part of intelligent and well educated persons as
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