‘It is a well-known fact that the spiritual welfare cannot be separated from the material welfare. There is a constant interaction between both. By arousing in the destitute a longing to raise and better himself economically and socially we awaken in him a desire to make the best possible use of all moral and physical forces.’ That was said many years ago by a Protestant in Germany, and though we could quote similar statements from important Catholic sources, we prefer to quote this from the works of Frederick Raiffeisen because it has a direct connection with the subject of this article.

Raiffeisen started among the German peasants people’s banks, or credit unions. To-day, throughout the world, credit unions on the Raiffesen system number well over 250,000 and have some 28,000,000 members. The line we are tracing from Raiffeisen to the natives of South Africa runs through Dr. Heim, the founder of the Bavarian Catholic Farmers’ Union, and Fr. Tom Finlay, S.J., the great Irish co-operator, who died recently, to Fr. Bernard Huss, a Marianhi'll missionary in South Africa. Though this line starts with a Protestant it can be ultimately traced back to the formation by the Franciscans in fifteenth century Italy of the Montes Pie tat is, welfare associations to alleviate the economic distress of the people. Then the great burden of the people was heavy taxation, and to meet this they had to borrow and the heavy rates of interest that they had to pay kept them permanently tied to the money lender.