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» ot allowed to go into Norway . The Catholic religion , cruelly persecuted in Sweden in the sixteenth and sevenieenth century , became extinct there ; only the ambassadors and ministers from the Catholic courts had the liberty of having with them the priests
of their religion for themselves and the persons of their retinue . These chaplains preserved a feeble spark of Catholicism in this part of the North . It was extremely dangerous for any other priests to go into those districts . Towards the middle of the eighteenth
century , the Swedes began to mitigate their rigid intolerance : in order to improve the manufacture of cloths and silk , the government sent for a number of intelligent workmen from Germany , especially from the countries between the Meuse and the Rhine *
most of them Catholics , verbally promising them the liberty of exercising * heir religion . The only chapels for the exercise of Catholic worship at Stockholm , were those of France , of Germany , and of Spahi . The arrival of these strangers awakened the attention and the fears of
the Swedish clergy . They appealed on the subject to the States ; and they imagined they could discern amongst these workmen and artisans , priests in disguise , and Jesuits . The assembly of the States-general of 1778 , was the first since the Reformation
that authorized the exercise of the Catholic religion ; not for the Swedes , but for foreigners . In consequence , King Gustavus III . who , during his travels in France and Italy , had seen
the Pope at Rome , and had promised him to protect the Catholic religion in his dominions , in 1781 issued the decree of Toleration , which has established the privileges of the Catholic religion in Sweden .
This decree re-ordains the ancient punishments with which those Swedes had been threatened who should renounce the Lutheran religion ; these punishments are banishment and the
confiscation of goods . It allows the Catholics to build themselves churches , to carry on their worship publicly , to have bells , buryinggrounds , and schools for the
instruction of their children ; and authorizes their ministers to baptize , to marry , to bury , to draw up acts , and to sign
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certificates . Mixed marriages are there so ordered , that the Catholic husband has the right of bringing up his children according to his own religion ; but the wife has not this right . In consequence of this decree , a Catholic church was erected at
Stockholm in 1784 , with the consent of King Gustavus III . and of Pope Pius VL who , the year before , had sent a French priest , the Abbfe Oster , from the diocese of Metz , with the title of
apostolic vicar . The congregation of the Propagandists at Rome under * took solely to defray the expenses of a worship of which they saw the re-establishment in Sweden * wilh joy . The new parish was organized ; two priests supplied it : and the Catholics
zealously frequented a chapel which united them all under the same pastor . Some years after , the chapels of the embassies from France , Germany and Spain , were shut up , and the Catholic courts no longer sent and main * tained chaplains for them . The number of Catholics resident in Sweden
is about a thousand . The parish of Stockholm contains about eight hundred . They consist of Germans and their descendants , who went there pa work at the manufactures of cloth , silk and glass ; of French , whom the arts have led into Sweden , or who have entered in the retinue of
noblemen ; and of Italians attracted by speculations in commerce . Some of almost all nations are to be found amongst them . The ancient wars led many Catholic soldiers thither . This parish is generally very poor ; it has no church of its own , because it has no funds either to build one or to
buy a suitable building . Divine service is conducted in a large hall , which is hired at a great expense of the city , and which has been decorated for this purpose by the Propagandists . The alms which are collected here as well as in the city , from charitable persons , are dedicated to the relief of the
indigent , and to the maintenance of a particular establishment , destined td receive orphans and the children of the poor , to be fed , clothed and instructed in religion . It is much to be wished that an establishment so worthy of support stood on a solid foundation . The number of C atholics
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Remarks concerning the Present State oflteTigious Sects in Sweden . 543
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Citation
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Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), Sept. 2, 1819, page 543, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/vm2-ncseproduct1776/page/19/
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