The Catholic World, Vol. 10, October, 1869 to March, 1870Various
Religion
The Catholic World, Vol. 10, October, 1869 to March, 1870
Various
Catholic Church -- Periodicals
of the sisters are still working-women and servant-girls. We would
here incidentally remark that the French servant-girls rank far above
those of the other continental countries in a moral and religious
point of view. This is mainly due to the strictness with which good
behavior and chastity are enforced in all French households, where no
promiscuous intercourse between the sexes is countenanced. However
indifferent master and mistress may themselves be to religion, they
nevertheless invariably insist that their servants should be regular
communicants and church-goers. The status of the female domestics
is therefore higher than that of the average working-woman, whose
independence of control but too often proves her ruin. This also
explains why servant-girls should be so much more eagerly sought in
marriage than working-girls. In France, the domestic, and especially
the female one, is treated almost as a member of the family. The
difference between master and servant is not so marked, and the
result is that the latter has more self-respect and pride. Indeed,
the manner in which servants are treated by their employers in France
is a highly creditable feature in the national character.
But to return to the religious and other societies. A very useful
association is a woman's society founded by a dozen ladies, "Invalid
Working-Woman's Aid Society," which numbers in 27 parishes 600
members, and cordially co-operates with the sisters of St. Vincent
de Paul in visiting and tending the sick in their own habitations. In
1865, its members had paid 158,368 sick calls to 52,748 sufferers.
Another female society attends the sick poor in the public hospitals,
and seeks to assist feeble convalescent girls and boys in procuring
employment. "The Church Aid Society" furnishes churches destitute
of means with vestments worked by the hands of its members. Still
another society of women keeps on hand stocks of clothing for the
needy, its members sewing for this purpose several hours each day.
One society has set itself the laudable task of returning to their
relatives and friends the destitute and forsaken orphans who have
come with their families to the city from the provinces. Several
orphan schools have been opened for the same purpose by laymen and
the rural clergy in different parts of France. Many of the orders
labor to a similar end, especially that of the Trappists, who own
now twenty-two extensive agricultural settlements, mostly in France,
some of them with a hundred brothers. Some of the most barren and
unhealthy districts were taken in hand by the Trappists, and the
results which they there achieved are really marvellous. At the abbey
of Staoueli, in Algeria, they fed during the last famine 600 Arabs a
day for several months, without materially lessening the provisions
sent for sale to the markets. Though the brothers work from ten to
twelve hours daily, besides devoting several hours at night to their
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