The Catholic World, Vol. 02, October, 1865 to March, 1866: A Monthly Eclectic MagazineVarious
Religion
The Catholic World, Vol. 02, October, 1865 to March, 1866: A Monthly Eclectic Magazine
Various
Catholic Church -- Periodicals
held to his promise.
The last scene of this eventful life closed on the sixth of May, when
the missionary prince left this world, accompanied by the prayers of
his parishioners gathered around him; for every apartment of the
house, and every portion of the chapel attached to it, was literally
thronged by a wailing, weeping, and praying community. This supreme
hour revealed the depth and the sincerity of the love which dwelt in
every heart for this man of God. On the day of his burial, whole
populations swarmed from every point--from distances ranging fifty and
sixty miles--to pay to the good father a last tribute of that
affectionate respect which had attended him through life.
The most respectable men of the parish contended for the honor of
bearing his body to the cemetery. In the body of the church, it was a
perfect contest among the congregation to look for the last time on
the feature of him who was thenceforward for ever lost to earth. Those
who were lucky enough, through the pressure of the crowd, to reach the
coffin, kissed in tearful love the icy hands of the missionary; while
the attendants were compelled to resort to force in order to close the
coffin for the final rites of the Church.
It were no easy task, without reference to the work of his
biographer--an ocular witness of Gallitzin's labors--to convey a just
conception of their bearing and extent "When," he says, "we come to
consider the {158} theatre on which Gallitzin inaugurated his immense
labors in so obscure and modest a manner, we realize the amount of
substantial good that can be achieved by an apostolic missionary in
America when, like Gallitzin, he conceives the practical sense of
things and leads them on to their crowning development with the zeal
and perseverance which marked his course. The small county of Cambria,
in Pennsylvania, created in 1807, which is indebted to Gallitzin for a
majority of its settlers, is everywhere, and with every reason,
characterized as the Catholic county. Indeed, when the traveller on
business, or the tourist for pleasure, strikes this point from other
districts of Pennsylvania more controlled by Protestant influences, it
seems to him that he has passed from a comparative desert into a
smiling oasis. This may be easily understood. For all their
journeyings for whole days, over counties twice and thrice more
opulent than this little Catholic county, there is no indication to
tell them what religion is there professed. Not till they have pressed
the soil of Cambria county do they feel that they are in a _truly_
Christian land, as they catch sight of ten Catholic churches and three
monasteries--all of which cropped out of Loretto under Gallitzin's
creative and fostering hands."
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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