Benedetto, whose voice had been growing louder and louder, rose to his feet.
"But what manner of faith is yours!" he exclaimed excitedly, "if you talk of deserting the Church because you are displeased with certain antiquated doctrines of her rulers, with certain decrees of the Roman congregations, with certain tendencies in the government of a Pontiff?
What manner of sons are you who talk of denying your mother because her dress is not to your taste?
Can a dress change the maternal bosom?
When resting there, you tearfully confess your infirmities to Christ, and Christ heals you, do you speculate concerning the authenticity of a passage in St.John, the true author of the Fourth Gospel, or the two Isaiahs?
When, gathered there, you unite yourselves to Christ in the sacrament, are you disturbed by the decrees of the Index, or of the Holy Office?
When, lying there, you pass into the shadows of death, is the peace it sheds about you any less sweet because a Pope is opposed to Christian Democracy?
"My friends, you say 'We have rested in the shade of this tree, but now its bark is splitting, is being dried up, the tree will die; let us seek another tree.' The tree will not die.

If you had ears you would hear the movement of the new bark which is forming, which will have its span of life, which will crack, will be dried up in its turn only to be replaced by another coat of bark.

The tree does not perish, the tree grows." Benedetto sat down, exhausted, and was silent.

There was a movement among the audience like the shuddering of waves surging towards him.
Raising his hands, he stopped them.
"Friends," he said, in a weary, sweet voice, "listen to me once more.
Scribes and Pharisees, elders and princes among priests, have striven in all times against innovations, as they strive to-day.

It is not for me to speak to you of them; God will judge them.