BAKERSTREET:
The inquisition was NOT individuals, it was the official stance of the church for centuries. The pope is supposedly the heir of Peter and God's annoited on earth, and the popes in question were party to the inquisition.

THE INQUISITION WAS INDEED INDIVIDUALS. AND YES, THERE HAVE BEEN SOME WICKED MEN IN THE CHURCH AND CHRIST PREDICTED THERE WOULD BE BAD FISH IN THE NET. THESE MEN WERE BAD, IN SPITE OF THE TEACHINGS OF THE CATHOLIC CHURCH, NOT BECASUE OF THEM. YOU CANNOT ARGUE FROM BAD FISH IN THE NET TO THE ROTTENESS OF THE NET.
CHRIST PROMISED HIS CHURCH WOULD NEVER GO WRONG, NOT INDIVIDUAL MEMBERS, WHETHER THEY BE THE POPE TO INDIVIDUAL LAY MEMBERS, LIKE ME.

WE KNOW FOLLOWING THE PROTESTANT REVOLUTION THAT PROTESTANTS WEREN'T AT ALL 'TOLERANT' OF RELIGIOUS BELIEFS. AND WE KNOW FROM HISTORY, SECTS OF EVERY DESCRITPTION AROSE WITH VARYING OPINIONS ABOUT DOCTRINES AND PRACTICES. THEY HANDLED THEIR DIFERENCES ACCORDING TO THE TIMES---VERY BRUTALLY. ONE DENOMINATION WARRED AGAINST THE OTHER. CIVIL WAR BROKE OUT ALL OVER
EUROPE. THE LUTHERAN REVOLT RAVAGED GERMANY.

PERSECUTION FOR RELIGIOUS OPINION IS GOING ON TODAY. IN IRELAND AND ENGLAND TODAY, CATHOLICS ARE STILL PERSECUTED BY MORAL ANTIPATHY. IT IS ACCOMPLISHED BY MORE CIVILIZED MEANS SUCH AS LEGLISLATION AND THE COURTS.

BAJKERSTREET: The inquisition wasn't a bunch of freelancers, it was church policy.

NOT ENTIRELY THE CHURCH. THE INQUISITION FIRST EXISTED IN SOUTHERN FRANCE IN ITALY AND THE ROMAN EMPIRE. THE SPANISH INQUISTION WAS A STATE INSTITUTION AND WAS EFFECTIVELY OUT OF THE CONTROL OF CHURCH AUTHORITIES. THE ROMAN INQUISITION BEGAN IN 1542, THAT WAS THE ONE UNDER WHICH GALILEO WAS TRIED. THAT WAS ENTIRELY AN ECCLESIASTICAL TRIBUNAL. THE OTHERS WERE A MIXED TRIBUNAL WITH ECCLESIASTICAL AND CIVIL OFFICIALS. AGAIN, EITHER WAY THERE IS NO JUSTIFICATION FOR THE ABUSES. I CONDEMN THEM AS HEARTILY AS YOU ALL DO.

THE CRUELTY OF CERTAIN INDIVIDUALS WHO HELD OFFICE IN THE INQUISITION WAS NOT THE FRUIT OF THE TEACHINGS OF THE CHURCH. ALTHOUGH I DON'T CONDONE IT, MUCH OF WHAT THEY DID WAS IN KEEPING WITH THOSE TIMES, AND CERTAINLY WOULDN'T BE SANCTIONED TODAY. THAT GOES WITHOUT SAYING.

THE FACT REMAINS THAT THEIR CONDUCT WAS NOT IN ACCORDANCE WITH THEIR CATHOLIC RELIGION, AND THEY THERFORE DESERVE CONDEMNATION, NOT THE CHURCH THEY UNWORTHILY REPRESENTED FOR SUCH CONDUCT.

that is like when a Catholic politician, like john Kerry or ted kennedy, or susan collins votes over and over for abortion on demand. their conduct is not in accordance with the teachings of the CC, and they deserve condemnation, however, the Church is not responsible for the wrong actions of her adherents and should not be condemned. their evil of voting for abortion is not the fruit of catholicism. never was and never will be. Jesus promised to be with her and I go with that.

Hey Lulabelle -

YOU CAN STOP SCREAMING AT BAKER NOW! IT'S NOT VERY FRIENDLY! AND IT'S ANNOYING TO READ IN ALL CAPS!

Look, hon, you're not going to convince any of us that the Catholic church is the way to go, because frankly, that attitude scares me shitless. As I've mentioned, I have a lot of very good Catholic friends, and there are many good Catholic bloggers here on this site, but you've been completely brainwashed. You're like the borg, baby, just like the borg.

You can't whitewash what the Catholic Church OFFICIALLY did. They kept records far too well.

The Medieval Inquisition you refer to in France was sanctioned personally by Gregory IX specifically so the Dominicans could exterminate the Cathars and steal their property. They went so far as to dig dead people up and hold trials so they could take lands from people who hadn't committed heresy.

Torture and burning people at the stake was AN OFFICIAL CATHOLIC PRACTICE, created on May 15, 1252, by Pope Innocent IV in a papal bull referred to as Ad exstirpanda. It was confirmed later by Pope Alexander IV on November 30, 1259, and by Pope Clement IV on November 3, 1265.

Don't even TRY to start in on the witch burning. The Malleus Maleficarum was WRITTEN by the Dominicans. The Summis desiderantes was the papal bull issued by Pope Innocent VIII that led to the bloodiest witch hunts in human history, long before there were colonies in New England.

Innocent VIII also set up Tomas de Torquemada in Spain, and commanded the genocidal slaughter of the Waldensians, and was basically an evil man all around. He had more than a dozen children and his cronies killed three boys trying to give him blood transfusions to revive him on his deathbed. This is what you call the Vicar of Christ?

This is what you call the Vicar of Christ?

That's exactly what she calls the Vicar of Christ. She's the borg, I tell ya what, trying to convert us all . . .

"Resistance is Futile"

unfortunately lulabelle has been reduced to "legalisms and carefully worded denials" as a basis of her faith...pretty sad.

if any church was "one true church" they wouldn't be full of scandal not only in aincient times, but in modern. and the scandals aren't superficial. the inquisition was about as brutal and inhumane as anyone in history has been. they were essentially catholic terrorists on a jihad for christ. as were the crusades as a whole...today, the church covers up every possible thing it can about how more than a few of their sexually repressed clergy have taken it out on young boys for generations and continues to this day to try to squelch the sins against man that it has committed and continues to commit by harboring molesting priests and excommunicating complaining catholics. the catholic church cannot even get by it's own dogmatic preaching and practices to admit that priests are human and sex is natural to humans.

the catholic church blows enormous amounts of money treating priests like rock stars, building exotic idols to saints and mary, who are really just false gods according to the bible and being about the richest entity on the planet while still fleecing their poor for donations every week.

christ tore down the temple as it symbolized all that was corrupt and wrong with religion. after christ ascended into heaven, man took it upon himself to rebuild the temple and culture of corruption that christ warned against. so much for man not making the same mistakes twice...

the catholic church is no truer a church than any other on the planet. they have no given authority from God, unless you selectively interpret a vauge passage in the bible. but besides that, the actions of the church over centuries and even today should be more than enough evidence for any thinking person to realize that the catholic church is a fraud. it is a corrupt organization created and maintained by men and that uses God to advance their own power and influence more than any goverment ever has. it supports ideas well after science or others have thoroughly disproven them for the sole purpose of power retention. the catholic church "plays politics" more than most politicians, and it's sad. what is sadder is the amount of death and destruction the church has been responsible for, at least in part over centuries.

i hope ya wake up and smell the divine coffee one of these days lula..it's much better than the kool-aid that the church has been serving you:)

Lulabelle stated that the Catholic Church wasn't officially responsible for the various incarnations of the inquisition. After my post above showing where almost all of them were direct responses to a papal bull, I'd like to know her response. Obviously the facts don't support the idea that this behavior wasn't official church policy.

This isn't like saying the all people of the Middle East are responsible for terrorism. This is like someone saying that Hamas isn't responsible for terrorism. Now, maybe in a couple of hundred years when no one in Hamas supports terrorism you could say that it is a 'new' Hamas, but there can be no confusion about it until then.

They were, of course, different times, but you can't forget that Jesus Christ, the focus of the Catholic religion came long before. Jesus didn't suggest the burning and torture of people who differed with Him. Not even the people who crucified Him. Yet he lived in barbaric times as well.

I can't help but think that lulabelle has betrayed that she herself supports at least some of the barbarity of the Inquisition, through her portrayal of Galileo's plight as the church supposedly keeping Christ's commandment. Sure, he was only confined to house arrest for life, but that is one nasty slippery slope when a religious body can hand down punishment for your beliefs. It smacks of modern day Iran.

Sure, he was only confined to house arrest for life,

but in the middle ages, that was how you could effectively silence someone. he couldn't "blog from the inside" or "broadcast from home" to get his messages out. the church essentially imprisoned him but sent him to the modern day equivalent of a minimum security prison instead of throwing him in the regular, maximum security prison.

if someone is "house arrested" today, they can still communicate outside the house. In his day, that was impossible as most communications were done in person and even when they weren't, by imprisoning in his own home, they ensured he had no access to any of those new fangled printing presses that that yahoo gutenberg was inventing. the only recourse he had left was to write his stuff down and hope that someone might discover it later. fortunately, we did.

bottom line, he was imprisoned in a middle age version of "political correctness" because of his reputation and standing in his community. but the end result was silencing him just the same.

Truth hurts, I guess.

What do you think of the Protestant leaders, concientious clergymen and magistrates, who directed persecution for denominational "heresies"? Longfellow portrays this hideous truth in New England Tragedies.

History shows that Luther, Calvin, Knox, Beza, Cranmer, and Ridley unquestionably advocated the right of civil authorities to punish the "crime" of heresy.
Rouseau says, The Reformation was intolerant from its cradle, and its authors were universal persecuters? Hallam, a Protestant historian, "persecution is the deadly original sin of the Reformed churches, which cools every honest man's zeal for their cause, in proportion as his reading becomes more extensive." Constitutional History, Vol. 1 Chapter 2.

Why did English Protestants hold Star Chamber hearings prior to 1641?

Unfortunately, Prtoestantism has its share of intolerance. Luther was not tolerant. He authored four anti-Semitic pamphlets in a vigorous onslaught on the Jews and the Jewish religion---indignation at their fidelty, their blasphemies against Christianity and there oppression of non-Jews in Germany.
They are:
1538 Epistle against the Sabbatarians
1542 On the Jews and Their Ilk.
1542 On Shem Hamphoras and athe Generation of Christ (On Cabbalism).
1543 On the Last Words of David

In his Eisleben sermon of February 14, 1546, he attacked the Jews, "You Rulers ought not to tolerate (the Jews), but to expel them." John Frederick, the Elector of Saxony, did indeed expel them and they found asylum in the Catholic King Frederick's land.

Luther also upbraided the Jews of Mansfield not only for hating the Christians but also for cheating them and practicing usury.

Luther declared war against German peasants on May 6, 1525 with his pamphlet, "Against the Murderous and Rapacious Horde of Peasants." He wrote, "Therefore, whoever is able, should dash them to pieces, Strangle them, and stab them, secretly or openly, just as one is compelled to kill a mad dog."
The above references are found in Hartman Grisar's Book, Martin Luther" His life and work".

Why did John Calvin, one of the Fathers of the Reformation, burn Michael Servetus at the stake in Geneva on Oct. 7, 1553? All Servetus did was differ with Calvin on the Trinity and infant baptism.

Why did Oliver Cromwell, the Protestant Puritan, slaughter the Catholic populations in the towns of Drogheda and Dundalk in Ireland?

Prime Minister Tony Blair has a Catholic wife, Cherie,and all of his kids are Catholic. Yet, it is against UK law for a Catholic to become King or Queen of England. Why are Protestant Anglicans intolerant? A Muslim, Jew, Buddhist, JW, Mormon or Christian Scientist can ascend the throne, but not a Catholic? Why?

ANyone who thinks intolerance of Catholics by Protestants has ended should travel to present day Northern Ireland, enter a bar in Drumcree and announce to all concerned that you are a Catholic. You would be lucky to escape with your life.

What about the record of horrors perpetuated by ANglican vs. Catholics in Ireland 1692-1800?

What about the persecution of Catholics in England for 3 hundred years 1584-1829?

Let us not forget that when this country was founded, slavery was in vogue, and it wasn't until about the same time that Lincoln 'freed the slaves', that Catholics were allowed to vote.

In the 1830's, it was so dangerous for a Catholic priest to celebrate Holy Mass in the state of Maine that a cleric caught doing so risked being tarred and feathered.

A good book on Protestant intolerance of Catholicism in AMerica since Colonial times is Robert Lockwood's Anti-Catholicism in AMerican Culture.

Have you read John Greenleaf Whittier's poem, How the WOmen went from Dover? It tells of 2 women who were apprehended by COngregationalists in DOver, NH, stripped to the waist, tied to the back of an ox cart which was headed for BOston. The women were Quakers, but when the cart reached Salisbury, Mass. It was halted by Robert Pike, who released the women. Laus Deo! Later the COngregationalists took to burning witches in 1692 in Salem, Mass. The point here is that the behavior of Congregationalists in the 17th Century does not subtract from present day Congregational belief.

Does the Mountain Meadows Massacre of 1857 detract from waht Mormonism believes? To keep harping on why God All Powerful allowed this to happen or that to happen, e.g. present day Darfur, is futile. His ways are not our ways. Sure, He could have intervened to prevent mistakes in scriptural translation or stop wars, crime, famine, insanity, misuse of sex, etc. but He endowed us with free will and the pair in the Garden of Eden exercised it and we have been in trouble ever since, human nature being marked by the Fall. Not abiding by Scripture gets us all (including Protestant clergymen and Catholic popes), in trouble.

Thinking you can injure Catholicism or demonstrate illegetimacy,you level accusations about the Inquisitians that have been universally acknowledged as unjust. But these facts will not do what you want to Catholicism or to the Church. No account of individual Catholic wrong-doing, then or today, can undo the divine foundation of the Catholic Church. The wheat and the chaff co-exist in the Kingdom until the end.

You think the sin operating through the Inquisition proves the one, true, holy catholic apostolic Church false. It doesn't. The Church's credentials and her authority come from Jesus, Himself. And the gates of Hell and all those of you who call her every name under the sun won't change that. All you are doing is calling Jesus a liar saying He didn't keep His promise to be with her until the end of time.

In the end, Dawn was 100% correct---the Holy Bible is inerrant.....at least the Douay Rheims is.

Does the Mountain Meadows Massacre of 1857 detract from waht Mormonism believes?

Nice try. You know not of what you speak. Despite what Anti-Mormon literature would have you believe, the church itself had nothing to do with that . . . it was only one small group of men. If you're going to condemn a church for what a small group did, without the knowledge or approval of the congregational leaders, then you'll have to condemn EVERY. RELIGION. IN. THE. WHOLE. WIDE. WORLD. Every one, without fail, has had a member or two - or a few - that has done abhorrent things.

Far cry from the atrocities committed by the Catholic church. To put these sort of things in the same boat is at best laughable and at worst deplorable.

But keep-a comin'. This could get very entertaining.

Lulabelle said, "Jesus forbid the changing of Scripture and the Holy Inquisition upheld that." Galileo wanted to change Sacred Scripture to align with his hypothesis. The Church wasn't going to let him get away with doing (or even wanting or talking about doing that.)

Bakerstreet replied: through her portrayal of Galileo's plight as the church supposedly keeping Christ's commandment.

When I said that, I was thinking of St. Matthew 5:18. "For amen, I say unto you, till heaven and earth pass, one jot, or one tittle, shall not pass of the law, till all be fullfilled." Catholic interpretation of this passage is Jesus stresses the perennial value of the Old Testament. It is the Word of God; because it has divine authority it has total respect. (in other words, Sacred Scripture can't be changed for the whims of men.)

THIS ALSO GOES TO WHAT I SAID WAY BACK AT THE BEGINNING: Now back to the making of the Bible, the original one being an eminently Catholic book. The original texts were written by reeds on parchment and later on papyrus by men who were inspired by God. The OT books were written in Hebrew and compiled (collected in one volume) around 430 BC under Esdras and Nehemiah, and rested on the authority of the famous Jew, Josephus, who lived immediately after our Lord that "no one had dared to add or subtract anything from the Jewish Scriptures or make any changes. These are the very Scriptures that Jesus referred to when we read the New Testament.

The Old Law enjoined precepts of a moral, legal and liturgical type. The law promulagated through Moses and explained by the prophets was God's gift to His people, a kind of anticipation of the definitive Law which Christ or the Messiah would lay down. Thus, the Council of Trent defined, dogmatically, Jesus not only, "was given to men as a redeemer in whom they are to trust, but also as a lawgiver whom they are to obey." (De iustificatione, can. 21).

P.S. to whomever complained about my all caps, it's because after I type awhile in this small box, my eyesight goes and I was more comfortable working in caps. I had no idea they would be troublesome to read.

P.S.S. I got an interesting mailing today about a new E-Book "Galilieo Was Wrong" by Robert Sungenis, Ph.D. and Robert Bennett, Ph.D. Vol. 1 "The Scientific Evidence". It says THis book demonstrates through history, philosophy and mainly through science that the earth is in the center of the universe and that the Bible accoun of creation is absolutely correct. "Modernist" scientists are now attempting to convince us that the universe is a 4 dimensional hypercube or donut shape. This outstanding presentation will change the reader's view on what is reality and what is not.! Over 1,000 pages of text, 1500 references, more than 195 figures and pictures plus animation.

I'm curious.

Please re-read my question very carefully this time before you fly off the handle. that question is not condemnation. it's a logical question to make a point that I see you actually got when you say:


SAN CHONINO says: "Every one, without fail, has had a member or two - or a few - that has done abhorrent things."


BY GEORGE, YOU'VE GOT IT. THIS EXACTLY IS THE MAIN POINT OF MY 1ST NOV. 9 POST. You all condemn Catholicism, then apply equally and condemn all. All have bad apples.

Sometime when I have more time, I'll gladly ask you a few questions about Mormonism. Perhaps I'm as mixed up about that as you are about Catholicism.

I am very friendly with a wonderful Mormon family and we are very like-minded on social issues. We joined forces against our town council when they wanted to ban the Boy Scouts from the local school, etc. I am very impressed how she cans and jars much of her food that she grows in her vegetable garden...for pleasure, fun and yummy gifts.

Re: Protestants: Why do you keep pretending I am promoting the protestant church? Do you think I have any more respect for it than I have for yours? I'll happily accept every accusation you want to level, and I'll thank you afterward for giving me points to level at hypocrites on that side.

"You think the sin operating through the Inquisition proves the one, true, holy catholic apostolic Church false. It doesn't. The Church's credentials and her authority come from Jesus, Himself."

Ah, because Jesus said so. That would be Jesus vouching for a church that hadn't been put together yet. Strain really hard and you might see that ANY church could claim He was talking about them.

"(in other words, Sacred Scripture can't be changed for the whims of men.) "

Now show me the part where Jesus said you can burn people at the stake for it.

"Thus, the Council of Trent defined, dogmatically, Jesus not only, "was given to men as a redeemer in whom they are to trust, but also as a lawgiver whom they are to obey." (De iustificatione, can. 21)."

...and so like Pontius Pilate, the church washes its hands of the sin and hires out to the local authorities to burn people, offering a share of the person's estate in return. If it were just, what would have been the shame in doing the deed themselves?

Again, you lemme know when you find where Jesus said to burn and torture people.

"It says THis book demonstrates through history, philosophy and mainly through science that the earth is in the center of the universe and that the Bible accoun of creation is absolutely correct."

And I'm betting as sinful and awful as this world is, this guy won't be confined for life for differing with the popular belief that the earth isn't the center of the universe.

"BY GEORGE, YOU'VE GOT IT. THIS EXACTLY IS THE MAIN POINT OF MY 1ST NOV. 9 POST. You all condemn Catholicism, then apply equally and condemn all. All have bad apples."

No. The Inquisition has been shown to have been official church policy. That makes the inquisition officially "catholic". You, yourself continue to call it "holy". If every other church in the world had an inquisition, it doesn't give you the right to whitewash the fact that it was more than just a few bad apples.

The fact is your church simply hijacked the worship of Christ for power and profit for more than a thousand years. Not a few bad apples, but as a whole. You don't get stamped "God's Church" and then keep it regardless of your behavior. You just worship religion, and can't bear the thought of there being other paths to God.

KFC writes: "I could never be a Catholic again for many reasons and one would be the history of the CC. ...Bibles were burned..... At one point the bible was written in 500 languages (before the true inception of the CC) and after reduced to only one.....the Latin Vulgate."

It is true the CC at those times burned Bibles. ...but it wasn't in an effort to keep people in the dark about what the BIble says. The action was taken to prevent the spread of error among the faitful from scores, nay, thousands of heretical versions that omitted passages, added spurious ones, altered the words of Scripture, or included incorrect footnotes to confuse the reader and lead him away from BIblical truth.

KFC, you are quite right , there were 1,000's of Bible about.....a deluge of every sort and description....Could these Bibles have been filled with error?


In those days, especially in Europe, the CC WAS in the position legally to prevent defective versions of Bibles to wreak spiritual and theological havoc among the faithful.

On this, you live in a glass house, KFC. Go back to your history books you have dusted off and read about the Protestant burning of the BIble. Read how Calvin didn't care for the version of Scripture of his Protestant rival, Servetus. He had them all confiscated and burned. Not content with that, Calvin burnt Seretus.

King Henry VIII abandoned the Catholic faith, and set himself up as the head of his new Protestant enterprise, The CHurch of England. He ordered all Catholic Bibles, and everything else Catholic burned including in Ireland. During this phase of madness, anyone with a Catholic bible was hunted down and killed. Queen Elizabeth I in 1582, followed his murderous policy and ordered the Catholic Rheims edition burned.

And there is more, but why?


I choose to dwell not on the past, only on the present. A wise person once said--- only use the past as the trees use our Heavenly Father's sunlight to absorb it, to make from it after days the warming fire rays.

What good does it do to dwell on failures, of your own, and those of others?

"One thing I do, forgetting those things which are behind, and reaching forth unto those things which are before, I press toward the mark." Phil. 3:13.

"On this, you live in a glass house, KFC."

Who said KFC lives in Calvin's house? You can't fathom anything but this catholic versus protestant thing. I'd bet KFC wouldn't think either the Catholic Church OR Calvin are any more authoritative. Try hard and you might be able to grasp the idea of people having their own relationship with God without all this idolatry and false religion.

lulabelle seems to think it comes down to whether catholocism or protestantism is the "real" thing. You need to look into it and see that there are sects of protestantism that think only their CHURCH is right. Poking Calvin to me is no different than poking the Catholic Church. They're both far too distant from who I am and what I believe to cause guilt by association.