A SCHOLAR, AN APOSTLE Belgium's Great Bishop

From Our Own Correspondent
ANTWERP.
/ write with emotion of the death of Mgr. Rasneur, Bishop of Tournai, whom I had the honour to know and esteem Mgr. Rasneur was the 100th bishop to occupy the ancient See of Tournai, In the Belgian Province of Haine,ult, the hundredth in that splendid line of bishops all successors of St. Eieutherius, whose 141-h centenary was celebrated in 1931.
His Lordship died after a few days' illness at the relatively early age of 65. His last sermon was preached on Sunday, October 29, feast of Christ the King. " Man in face of the Trial " was his theme, in which he met certain objections raised by the measures taken at the imminence of war.
Son of a Farmer
His solicitude for his clergy was touching. He visited his clergy called up to do military service in their cantonments all over Belgium.
Mgr. Rasneur was the son of humble Belgian farming folk. Endowed with intellectual gifts. he became a scholar of note. He was pious, ardent, vigilant, and his ministry was stamped by a deep apostolic spirit. He was consecrated bishop by Cardinal Mercier in 1924. His ministry proved him to be an eminent prelate and a true guardian of his Master's doctrine.
Belgium has lost a great bishop.
French Papers Demand State Aid For Clergy
From Our Own Correspondent
PARIS.
Since the outbreak of war the influence of the Church in France— already very great—has shown a remarkable increase. Newspapers which before the war took no interest in the Church and were at best indifferent to It, have opened their columns for the examination of many questions concernlog the influence of the Church on the home life of the country.
Radio stations—State controlled— devote in their news broadcasts far more attention to Catholic events, and broadeast interviews with dignitaries of the Church are very frequently given. There Ls no longer any official function at which the clergy are not represe,ntedindeed many of these functions are now preceded by prayers.
The daily and weekly papers—Catholic and non-Catholic—receive a continually increasing stream of letters from their readers which show the greateat interest in world events seen from a Catholic point of view.
Help for the Clergy
Another startling example of the new amity between Church and State is shown in the help which has generously been given to the Parisian clergy, who have been put in extremely embarrassing financial straits by the evacuation from Paris of a great number of their parishioners. The clergy, of course, are not in any way supported by the State.
Almost all the newspapers have published appeals advocating compensation for this diminution of incomes. Some non-Catholic papers suggested that the State should come to the rescue by means of a contribution to the priests left at their posts. These appeals, pub Lished in a very conspicuous position, provoked at once a considerable increase in gifts for the Church. Moreover, recourse to Church authority has increased. • The attendance at Parisian churches, in spite of the departure of from a quarter to a third of the population. has increased by about 30 per cent.
Priests newly promoted from Austrian. Polish and Czech churches to minister ta their respective emigrants in Paris, highly praise their congregations, who come from all parts of Paris to attend the services of their churches and to listen to the sermon in their mother tongue. In the provinces church attendance has also increased, particularly in the big towns: Marseilles, Bordeaux, Tours, Rennes and Orleans.