George Matulaitis Journal

individuals, we must follow the moral principles of Christ. No one has the the right to hate, insult, or mistreat anyone. We must love one another equally, and so on. The representatives of the Lithuanian Council did not arrive. As it turned out, there had been a misunderstanding. The coachman did not know what to do; he had waited for a while in front of the Council headquarters and then returned. None of the members of the Council had been at the Cathedral either, because the Chapter refused to reserve separate seats for them. They allowed them room only in the sanctuary with the representatives of the various associations and organizations. I do not know why all these nationalist quarrels, prejudices, and hatreds never appeared to be so petty and despicable as they did today. It seemed to me that with even a minimum of good will and a conciliatory attitude it was possible to make peace with all in Christ. In this case, it appeared to me that the fault lay with certain priests. I learned that the Cathedral Chapter and the Polish clergy refuse to recognize the Lithuanian Council and the Lithuanian State. Later, I found out that for two weeks before the installation most of the talk and arguments in Vilnius centered around which language I would speak in first. If I dared to speak first in Lithuanian, as the Council had insisted, the Poles would have raised havoc in church and started riots. When I spoke in Polish first, they were satisfied. The Polish citizens invited me to a lunch at two o’clock on December 9th. The Lithuanian Council also invited me to dinner the same day. When I asked what time the dinner was to be held, they replied that it was to be at six o’clock. I saw that I would be able to honor both invitations, so I accepted the Polish one as well. However, the Lithuanians then canceled their dinner. That evening the clergy gave a dinner for me at the seminary; there were many speeches. The next day, I immediately called on the President of the Lithuanian Council, Mr. Antanas Smetona and his aides as well as all the Lithuanian ministers and prominent statesmen. In the evening the Council issued a formal complaint that the bull and sermon had not been given in Belorussian and that the representatives of the Council had not been assigned appropriate places. I received this note, which the Council had given to the administrator, Monsignor Hanusowicz, only in the early morning of December 9th, when the 158