#rome 125-150 ce | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

morganh1066-blog · 7 years ago

Text

Christian Atrocities Timeline

~150 St. Clement of Alexandria wrote: “Every woman should be filled with shame by the thought that she is a woman.” (The “Natural Inferiority” of Women compiled by Tama Starr (New York: Poseidon Press, 1991), p. 45)

~180 CE Orthodox Christians around assembled the Bible not to bring all the gospels together, but rather to encourage uniformity. Bishop Irenaeus, from the Plethora of Christian gospels, compiled the first list of biblical writings that resemble today’s New Testament (Michael Baigent, Richard Leigh & Henry Lincoln, Holy Blood, Holy Grail (New York: Dell, 1982), p. 364, 318).

~300 The Church first began to kill heretics (Walter Nigg, The Heretics: Heresy Through the Ages (New York: Dorset Press, 1962), p. 220).

~300 Christian monks in the fourth century hacked the great scholar Hypatia to death with oyster shells, St. Cyril explained that it was because she was an iniquitous female who had presumed, against God’s commandments, to teach men(Riane Eisler, The Chalice and the Blade (San Francisco: Harper and Row, 1987), p. 132-133).

~300 St. Pachomius advised his monks in the religion of love and life, “Above all, let us always keep our last day before our eyes and let us always fear everlasting torment.” (Jean Delumeau, Sin and Fear, translated by Eric Nicholson (New York : St. Martins Press, 1990), p. 54)

Early 300s Jerome, a Church Father and early monastic, rejoiced that the classical authors were being forgotten. And his younger monastic contemporaries were known to boast of their ignorance of everything except Christian literature (Smith, The Death of Classical Paganism (New York: Charles Schribner’s Sons, 1976), p. 223).

319 Constantine passed a law excusing the clergy from paying taxes or serving in the army (Charles Merrill Smith, The Pearly Gates Syndicate (New York: DoubleDay, 1971), p. 27-28)

355 Bishops were exempted from ever being tried in secular courts (J.N. Hillgarth, The Conversion of Western Europe (Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice Hall, 1969), p. 49).

380 Emperor Theodosius passed a decree that read:

We shall believe in the single Deity of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit, under the concept of equal majesty and the Holy Trinity

1. We command that those persons who follow this rule shall embrace the name of Catholic Christians. The rest however, whom We adjudge demented and insane, shall sustain the infamy of heretical dogmas, their meeting places shall not receive the name of churches, and they shall be smitten first by divine vengeance and secondly by the retribution of Our own initiative, which we shall assume in accordance with the divine judgment . (J.N. Hillgarth, The Conversion of Western Europe (Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice Hall, 1969), p. 46)

386 A written protest to the roman government about Christians pillaging Pagan temples:

If they [the Christians] hear of a place with something worth raping away, they immediately claim that someone is making sacrifices there and committing abominations, and pay the place a visit -- you can see them scurrying there, these guardians of good order (for that is what they call themselves), these brigands, if brigands is not too mild a word; for brigands at least try to conceal what they have done: if you call them brigands, they are outraged, but these people, on the contrary, show pride in their exploits...they believe they deserve rewards! (Smith, The Death of Classical Paganism (New York: Charles Schribner’s Sons, 1976), p. 166-167; DC, p. 28)

388 A Theodosian prohibition forbade any public discussions of religious topics (Smith, The Death of Classical Paganism (New York: Charles Schribner’s Sons, 1976), p. 218).

392 The ancient, multidemensional Pagan worship was prohibited in 392 and considered a criminal activity (Smith, The Death of Classical Paganism (New York: Charles Schribner’s Sons, 1976), p. 218)

391 Christians burned down one of the world’s greatest libraries in Alexandria, said to have housed 700,000 rolls (The New Columbia Encyclopedia edited by William H. Harris and Judith S. Levey (New York & London: Columbia University Press, 1975), p. 61; Riane Eisler, The Chalice and the Blade (San Francisco: Harper and Row, 1987); DC, p. 46). All the books of the Gnostic Basilides, Porphyry’s 36 volumes, papyrus rolls of 27 schools of the Mysteries, and 270,000 ancient documents gathered by Ptolemy Philadelphus were burned (Tuchman, A Distant Mirror (New York: Ballantine Books, 1978), p. 444)

398 The Fourth Council of Carthage forbade bishops to even read the books of gentiles (Smith, The Death of Classical Paganism (New York: Charles Schribner’s Sons, 1976), p. 223).

~400 Intermarriage between Jew and Christian carried the same penalty as adultery: the woman would be executed (J.N. Hillgarth, The Conversion of Western Europe (Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice Hall, 1969) p. 44-48)

410 Emperor Honorius decreed: “Let all who act contrary to the sacred laws know that their creeping in their heretical superstition to worship at the most remote oracle is punishment by exile and blood, should they again be tempted to assemble at such places for criminal activities...” (Smith, The Death of Classical Paganism (New York: Charles Schribner’s Sons, 1976), p. 218)

416 Augustine wrote to the bishop of Rome warning him that Pelagian ideas undermined the basis of episcopal authority and that appeasing the Pelagians would threaten the Catholic Church’s new-found power (Elain Pagels, Adam, Eve and the Serpent (New York: Random House, 1988), p. 125; DC, p. 35). Augustine’s friend, the African bishop Alypius, brought 80 Numidian stallions to the imperial court as bribes to persuade the Church to side with Augustine against Pelagius. See 418 CE (Elain Pagels, Adam, Eve and the Serpent (New York: Random House, 1988), p. 129-130, 134). (Pelagianism is the belief that original sin did not taint human nature and that mortal will is still capable of choosing good or evil without special Divine aid)

418 The bribe from Alypius for Augustine worked and the pope excommunicated Pelagius (Elain Pagels, Adam, Eve and the Serpent (New York: Random House, 1988), p. 129-130, 134).

~425 St. Augustine wrote, “we must conclude, that a husband is meant to rule over his wife as the spirit rules over the flesh.” (Elain Pagels, Adam, Eve and the Serpent (New York: Random House, 1988), p. 113-114)

435 A law threatened any heretic in the Roman Empire with death. Judaism remained the only other legally recognized religion (J.N. Hillgarth, The Conversion of Western Europe (Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice Hall, 1969), p. 44-48).

up to 450 Theodore of Cyrrhus states that there were at least 200 different gospels circulating in his own diocese (Barbara Walker, The Woman’s Encyclopedia of Myths and Secrets (San Francisco: Harper & Row, 1983), p. 467). By prohibiting and burning any other writings, the Catholic Church eventually gave the impression that this Bible and its four canonized Gospels represented the only original Christian view. Even the Catholic Encyclopedia now admits that the “idea of a complete and clear-cut canon of the New Testament existing from the beginning... has no foundation in history.” (Barbara Walker, The Woman’s Encyclopedia of Myths and Secrets (San Francisco: Harper & Row, 1983), p. 469)

~500 Christian philosopher, Boethius, wrote in the Consolation of Philosophy, “Women is a temple built upon a sewer.” (The “Natural Inferiority” of Women compiled by Tama Starr (New York: Poseidon Press, 1991), p. 45).

presupposionalism: ~500 Bishop Martin of Braga asked, “But what is the lighting of wax lights at rocks or trees or wells or crossroads if it is not worship of the devil?” (Smith, The Death of Classical Paganism (New York: Charles Schribner’s Sons, 1976), pp. 240-241)

From about A.D. 500 onward, it was thought no hardship to lie on the floor at night, or on a hard bench above low drafts, damp earth and rats. To be indoors was a luxury enough. Nor was it distasteful to sleep huddled closely together in company, for warmth was valued above privacy (Walter Nigg, The Heretics: Heresy Through the Ages (New York: Dorset Press, 1962), p. 169)

The vast network of roads that had enabled transportation and communication also fell into neglect and would remain so until almost the nineteenth century (Charles Homer Haskins, The Renaissance of the 12th Century (Cleveland & New York: Meridian Books, 1927), p. 96).

590-604 While best known for strengthening the Pope’s independence from the Byzantine Emperor, Gregory the Great condemned education for all but the clergy as folly and wickedness. He forbade laymen to read even the Bible. He had the library of the Palatine Apollo burned “lest its secular literature distract the faithful from the contemplation of heaven.” (WEMS, p. 208)

742 A church decree read: “...every pagan defilement should be rejected and spurned, whether it be sacrifices of the dead, or soothsaying and divining, or amulets and omens, or incantations, or the offering of sacrifices -- (all of) which ignorant people perform pagan rites alongside those of the church, under cover of the names of the sacred martyrs and confessors” (Smith, The Death of Classical Paganism (New York: Charles Schribner’s Sons, 1976), p. 246)

789 The General Capitularies of Charlemagne in 789 decreed:

With regard to trees, and rocks and springs, wherever ignorant people put lights or make other observances, we give notice to everyone that this is a most evil practice, execrable to God, and wherever they are found, they are to be taken away and destroyed (Smith, The Death of Classical Paganism (New York: Charles Schribner’s Sons, 1976), p. 246).

The church’s continual admonishments against pagan practices indicate how insubstantial most conversions to Christianity were. It constantly warned against customs relating to trees, nature and the belief in magic, occasionally going so far as to raze a church after discovering that people were actually worshiping older gods or goddesses there (Smith, The Death of Classical Paganism (New York: Charles Schribner’s Sons, 1976), p. 229).

891-903 Ten different Popes held power (Tuchman, A Distant Mirror (New York: Ballantine Books, 1978), p. 464). At least forty different Popes are known to have bought their way into the papacy (Malachi Martin, Decline and Fall of the Roman Church (New York: G. P. Putnam’s Sons, 1981), p. 141).

~900 Odo of Cluny declared, “To embrace a woman is to embrace a sack of manure...” (Joan Smith, Misogynies: Reflections on Myths and Malice (New York: Fawcett Columbine, 1989), p. 61).

906 The Canon Episcopi, a Church law which first appeared in 906, decreed that belief in witchcraft was heretical. (Julio Caro Baroja, The World of Witches (Chircago: University of Chicago Press, 1961), pp. 60-61; Brian P. Levack, The Witch-Hunt in Early Modern Europe (London: Longman, 1987), p. 45)

1000-1200 A Christian oath excluded Jews from working the land and sent them into commerce and crafts in the eleventh and twelfth centuries and the consequent influx of people to the cities, artisan guilds were established, each with its own patron saint. Jews were again driven from the crafts into what fields remained: banking, money-changing and money-lending (Jeffrey Burton Russell, A History of Medieval Christianity (New York: Thomas Y Cromwell, 1968), p. 155; ). Persecuting Jews therefore, also became a convenient means of getting rid of one’s creditors Religious arguments were taken up by indebted kings to justify their confiscation of Jewish property and their expulsion of Jews from their domains (Jeffrey Burton Russell, A History of Medieval Christianity (New York: Thomas Y Cromwell, 1968), p. 157).

1095 Pope Urban II called for the knights of Europe to unite and march to Jerusalem to save the holy land from the Islamic infidel. The crusades provided an opportunity to vastly increase the influence of the Catholic Church. There were many imperial powers outside the Church: King of France, King of England, and the German Emperor The crusades were a means of uniting much of Europe in the name of Christianity (Henri Daniel-Rops, Cathedral and Crusade (New York: E.P. Dutton & Company, Inc., 1957), p. 433, 435).

~1095 Pope Gregory VII said, “Cursed be the man who holds back his sword from shedding blood.” (Malachi Martin, Decline and Fall of the Roman Church (New York: G. P. Putnam’s Sons, 1981), p. 134; Henri Daniel-Rops, Cathedral and Crusade (New York: E.P. Dutton & Company, Inc., 1957), p. 276)

~1095 Nicetas Choniates, a Byzantine chronicler, wrote, “Even the Saracens (the Muslims) are merciful and kind compared to these men who bear the cross of Christ on their shoulders.” (Malachi Martin, Decline and Fall of the Roman Church (New York: G. P. Putnam’s Sons, 1981), p. 134)

1096 The People’s Crusades. Belgrade, the chief imperial city after Constantinople, was sacked (Henri Daniel-Rops, Cathedral and Crusade (New York: E.P. Dutton & Company, Inc., 1957), p. 439-441). A Greek Chronicler wrote of the Pope:

...he wished to compel us to recognize the Pope’s primacy among all prelates and to commemorate his name in public prayers, under pain of death against those who refuse. (G. G. Coulton, Inquisition and Liberty (Glouster, MA: Peter Smith, 1969), p. 165)

1099 The chronicler, Raymond of Aguilers, described the scene when a band of crusaders massacred both Muslims and Jews in Jerusalem in 1099:

Wonderful things were to be seen. Numbers of the Saracens were beheaded...Others were shot with arrows, or forced to jump from the towers; others were tortured for several days, then burned with flames. In the streets were seen piles of heads and hands and feet. One rode about everywhere amid the corpses of men and horses. In the temple of Solomon, the horses waded in the blood up to their knees, nay up to the bridle. It was just and marvelous judgment of God, that this place should be filled with the blood of unbelievers. (James A. Haught, Holy Horrors (Buffalo: Prometheus, 1990), p. 25-26)

~1100 Catharism began to thrive in southern France. The Cathars were a society that included different races lived harmoniously -- Jews, Muslims, Greeks, Phoenicians. There is evidence of a strong connection between Catharism, Moslem Sufi, and Jewish Kabbalist tradition (Timothy O’Neil, “Century of Marvels, Century of Light”, p. 14-18; Judith Mann, “The Legend of the Cathars” GNOSIS, NO. 4, p. 28). In this society women could serve as priests (Ian Bergg, The Cult of the Black Virgin (London: Arkana, 1985), p. 136; Henry Charles Lea, The Inquisition and the Middle Ages, Abridgment by Margaret Nicholson (New York: MacMillan, 1961), p. 43). The Catharan society not only was free of Jewish persecution, but Jews held management and advisory position with lords and even prelates. There was less class distinction, a milder form of serfdom, freer towns, and a judicial system based upon Roman law (G. G. Coulton, Inquisition and Liberty (Glouster, MA: Peter Smith, 1969), p. 59). Culture and commerce flourished, making it one of the most prosperous regions in Europe (Timothy O’Neil, “Century of Marvels, Century of Light”, p. 14-18; Judith Mann, “The Legend of the Cathars” GNOSIS, NO. 4, p. 28). Yet again, the church began to make up lies about a culture they hated and said they defiled the cross, renounced Jesus, and engaged in cannibalism and sexual orgies (Russell, Witchcraft in the Middle Ages (Cornell University Press, 1972), p. 125).

The church did the same thing with the Templars: The Church incited people to kill the Templars who had been Knights that protected the Crusaders. They had been believed to brought with them Gnostic, Kabalistic, and Islamic beliefs, the Church and kings planned to persecute them. Stories began to spread about them denying various aspects of Christianity and defiling the cross. After the Templars were murdered, their property was confiscated (WEMC, p. 510).

~1100 Christian Honorius of Autun wrote:

How is the soul profited by the strife of Hector, the arguments of Plato, the poems of Virgil, or the elegies of Ovid, who others like them, are now gnashing their teeth in the prison of the infernal Babylon, under the cruel tyranny of Pluto? (Charles Homer Haskins, The Renaissance of the 12th Century (Cleveland & New York: Meridian Books, 1927), p. 96)

~1100 The Church forbade clergy to marry in order to prevent property from passing out of the Church to the families of clergy. 15 (Henry C. Lea, History of Sacerdotal Celibacy in the Christian Church, 4th edition revised (London: Watts & Co., 1932), pp. 264, 279)

~1100 In his letter to King Henry II of England, the twelfth century Pope Adrian IV sanctioned the English invasion of Ireland. He wrote: _It is not doubted, and you know it, that Ireland and all those islands which have received the faith, belong to the Church of Rome; if you wish to enter that Island, to drive vice out of it, to cause law to be obeyed and St. Peter’s Pense to be paid by every house, it will please us to assign it to you._ (Henry Charles Lea, The Inquisition and the Middle Ages, Abridgment by Margaret Nicholson (New York: MacMillan, 1961), p. 252)

~1100 The Abbot, Ruppert of Deutz, tried to defend the somberness of a Christian holiday:

It is not a fast to make us sad or darken our hearts, but it rather brightens the solemnity of the Holy Spirit’s arrival; for the sweetness of the Spirit of God makes the faithful loathe the pleasures of earthly food (Weiser, Handbook of Christian Feasts and Customs, p. 35).

Such morbidity! This is quite deviant behavior.

~1100 To the orthodox, neither nature nor physical pleasure were imbued with God’s presence; both were of the devil. The church had long condemned sensual pleasure as ungodly. In the twelfth century Bishop of Chartres, Sir John of Salisbury, declared:

Who except one bereft of sense would approve sensual pleasure itself, which is illicit, wallows in filthiness, is something that men censure, and that God without doubt condemns? (The “Natural Inferiority” of Women compiled by Tama Starr (New York: Poseidon Press, 1991), p. 46)

1139 The Church began calling councils to condemn the Cathars and all who supported them (Henry Charles Lea, The Inquisition and the Middle Ages, Abridgment by Margaret Nicholson (New York: MacMillan, 1961), p. 54).

1149 St. Bernard had realized the implicit threat of civil law to the Church and complained that the courts rang with Justinian’s laws rather than those of God (Henry Charles Lea, The Inquisition and the Middle Ages, Abridgment by Margaret Nicholson (New York: MacMillan, 1961), p. 24).

[note that justinian law went out of favor long before this, but that the new roman law even went so far as to say that non-christians were not considered citizens. something bush senior said]

1179 Alexander III proclaimed a crusade against the Cathars and promising two years’ indulgence, or freedom from punishment for sins, to all who would take up arms, and eternal salvation for any who should die. This managed to provide the church with a militia to fight their quarrels it failed to insight people to fight against the popular Cathars 74. (Henry Charles Lea, The Inquisition and the Middle Ages, Abridgment by Margaret Nicholson (New York: MacMillan, 1961), pp. 57-59)

~1200 Catholics opposed the Magna Carta (John Dollison, Pope-Pourri (New York: Simon & Schuster, 1994)C, pp. 135-140; “World Watch” The Rocky Mountain News, April 14, 1992; “Vatican denies helping Nazis flee after war”, The Associated Press, February 15, 1992)

~1200 St. Thomas Aquinas suggested that God had made a mistake in creating woman: “nothing [deficient] or defective should have been produced in the first establishment of things; so woman ought not to have been produced then.” (Saint Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologica (New York & London: Blackfriars, McGraw-Hill, Eyre & Spottiswoode), question 92, 35).

1204 Pope Innocent III sent a group of crusaders to Constantinople. The soldiers of Christ fell upon Constantinople with a vengeance, raping, pillaging and burning the city (Jeffrey Burton Russell, A History of Medieval Christianity (New York: Thomas Y Cromwell, 1968), p. 159-160). According to the chronicler Geoffrey Villehardouin, never since the creation of the world had so much booty been taken from a city (Karen Armstrong, Holy War: The Crusades and Their Impact on Today’s World (New York: Doubleday, 1988), p. 387). The Pope’s response to the Greek Emperor: “...we believe that the Greeks have been punished through (the Crusades) by the just judgment of God: these Greeks who have striven to rend the Seamless Robe of Jesus Christ... Those who would not join Noah in his ark perished justly in the deluge; and these have justly suffered famine and hunger who would not receive as their shepherd the blessed Peter, Prince of the Apostles...” (G. G. Coulton, Inquisition and Liberty (Glouster, MA: Peter Smith, 1969), pp. 164-165)

1208-1238 When Innocent III added to the rewards for killing the Cathars their lands and property to anyone who would take up arms, the Albigensian Crusade to slaughter the Cathers finally began. 12,000 people were killed at the Cathedral of St. Nazair. Bishop Folque of Toulouse put to death 10,000 (Cl, p. 27). When the crusaders fell upon the town of Beziers and the commanding legate, Arnaud, was asked how to distinguish Cathlic from Cathar, he replied, “Kill them all, for God knows his own!” (Henry Charles Lea, The Inquisition and the Middle Ages, Abridgment by Margaret Nicholson (New York: MacMillan, 1961), p. 75) Not a child was spared. One historian wrote that “even the dead were not safe from dishonor, and the worst humiliations were heaped upon women.” (Friedrich Heer, The Medieval World, translated by Janet Sondheimer, (New York: NAL, 1961), p. 214) The total slain at Beziers as reported by papal legates was 20,000, by other chroniclers the numbers killed were between 60,000 and 100,000 (Henry Charles Lea, The Inquisition and the Middle Ages, Abridgment by Margaret Nicholson (New York: MacMillan, 1961), p. 75). The Albigensian crusade killed an estimated one million people, not only Cathars but much of the population of southern France (Henry Charles Lea, The Inquisition and the Middle Ages, Abridgment by Margaret Nicholson (New York: MacMillan, 1961), p. 75).

1210&1215 Papal prohibitions restricted the teaching of Aristotle’s works in Paris (Charles Homer Haskins, The Renaissance of the 12th Century (Cleveland & New York: Meridian Books, 1927), p. 364).

1215 Pope Innocent III decreed that Jews were to wear a circular badge of yellow felt, said to represent money. Sometimes patches were green or red and white. The patch was worn by both sexes starting between the ages of 7 and 14. This same badge later was imposed on Moslems and convicted heretics, and prostitutes (Tuchman, A Distant Mirror (New York: Ballantine Books, 1978), p. 112)

1219 The Pope had forbidden priests to study Roman law and had altogether prohibited its teaching at the University of Paris (Charles Homer Haskins, The Renaissance of the 12th Century (Cleveland & New York: Meridian Books, 1927), pp. 217-218).

1231 Papal statutes insisted that heretics suffer death by fire (Walter Nigg, The Heretics: Heresy Through the Ages (New York: Dorset Press, 1962), p. 220). Burning people to death technically avoided spilling a drop of blood. The words of the Gospel of John were understood to sanction burning: “If a man abode not in me, he is cast forth as a branch, and is withered; and men gather them, and cast them into the fire, and they are burned.” (John 15:16)

1231 Pope Gregory IX established the Inquisition as a separate tribunal, independent of bishops and prelates. Its administrators, the inquisitors, were to be answerable only to the Pope (Henri Daniel-Rops, Cathedral and Crusade (New York: E.P. Dutton & Company, Inc., 1957), 155). Its inquisitional law replaced the common law tradition of “innocent until proven guilty” with “guilty until proven innocent.” (Rossell Hope Robbins, The Encyclopedia of Witchcraft and Demonology (New York: Bonanza Books, 1981), p. 13) Despite an ostensible trial, inquisitional procedure left no possibility for the suspected to prove his or her innocence; the process resulted in the condemnation of anyone even suspected of heresy (Henry Charles Lea, The Inquisition and the Middle Ages, Abridgment by Margaret Nicholson (New York: MacMillan, 1961), p. 216). The accused was denied the right of counsel. (Henry Charles Lea, The Inquisition and the Middle Ages, Abridgment by Margaret Nicholson (New York: MacMillan, 1961), p. 211)

1240 Christians went so far as to to try a book for heresy and blasphemy: in 1240 in Paris the Talmud was tried and convicted. The sentence was burning 24 cartloads of Talmudic works (Tuchman, A Distant Mirror (New York: Ballantine Books, 1978), p. 112).

1244 The Council of Narbonne ordered that in the sentencing of heretics, no husband should be spared because of his wife, nor wife because of her husband, nor parent because of helpless children, and no sentence should be mitigated because of sickness or old age and each and every sentence included flagellation (Henry Charles Lea, The Inquisition and the Middle Ages, Abridgment by Margaret Nicholson (New York: MacMillan, 1961), p. 232-233). (Henry Charles Lea, The Inquisition and the Middle Ages, Abridgment by Margaret Nicholson (New York: MacMillan, 1961), p. 232-233).

1245 Inquisitors were chosen on their zeal to persecute heretics (Henry Charles Lea, The Inquisition and the Middle Ages, Abridgment by Margaret Nicholson (New York: MacMillan, 1961), p. 177). The Pope and his assistants, messengers and spies were allowed to carry arms. In 1245 the Pope granted the Inquisitor to absolve his assistants of any acts of violence (Henry Charles Lea, The Inquisition and the Middle Ages, Abridgment by Margaret Nicholson (New York: MacMillan, 1961), p. 174).

1272 By this time discussion of any purely theological matter was forbidden (Charles Homer Haskins, The Renaissance of the 12th Century (Cleveland & New York: Meridian Books, 1927), p. 364).

1275 When Florence had disputes over tribute payments to the Pope he excommunicated the whole town (Malachi Martin, Decline and Fall of the Roman Church (New York: G. P. Putnam’s Sons, 1981), p. 146).

1252 By far the cruelest aspect of the inquisitional system was the means by which confessions were wrought: the torture chamber. Torture remained a legal option for the Church from 1252 when it was sanctioned by Pope Innocent IV until 1917 when the New Codex Juris Canonici was put into effect.(G. G. Coulton, Inquisition and Liberty (Glouster, MA: Peter Smith, 1969), pp. 154-155) Innocent IV authorized indefinite delays to secure confessions, giving inquisitors as much time as they wanted to torture the accused (G. G. Coulton, Inquisition and Liberty (Glouster, MA: Peter Smith, 1969), pp. 154-155). Although the letter of law forbade repeating torture, inquisitors easily avoided this rule by simply “continuing” torture, calling any interval a suspension (Jean Plaidy, The Spanish Inquisition (New York: Citadel Press, 1967), p. 139).

1262 Now inquisitors and their assistants were granted the authority to quietly absolve each other from the crime of bloodshed (G. G. Coulton, Inquisition and Liberty (Glouster, MA: Peter Smith, 1969), pp. 154-155). They simply explained that the tortured had died because the devil broke their necks.

1291 The Archdeacon of Seville launched a “Holy War against the Jews.” in that year alone, some 50,000 jews were murdered in Castile. (Barbara Walker, The Woman’s Encyclopedia of Myths and Secrets (San Francisco: Harper & Row, 1983), p. 472) and (Missett, Soul Theft: How Religions Seized Control of Humanity's Spiritual Nature, p. 26)

in the 14th century, The Bubonic plague claimed an estimated 27 million lives. The church claimed that the Jews were responsible for it (Charles Panati, Panati’s Extraordinary Endings of Practically Everything (New York: Harper & Row, 1989), p. 225-228). there was a plethora of violence against the jews believing that they were responsible, and in particular with the valentine's day strasbourg massacre in 1349 when 900 jews were killed. (Stéphane Barry and Norbert Gualde, «La plus grande épidémie de l'histoire» ("The greatest epidemic in history"), in L'Histoire magazine, n° 310, June 2006, p. 47 (French))

Eusebius of Caesarea set about during the time of Constantine to rewrite the history of the world into a history of Christianity: ‘ “Other writers of history,” Eusebius wrote recorded the fighting of wars waged “for the sake of children and country and other possessions. But our narrative of the government of God will record in ineffaceable letters the most peaceful wars waged in behalf of the peace of the soul...” ’ (Daniel J. Boorstin, The Discoverers (New York: Random House, 1983), p. 573)

I have never known of a peaceful war.

The church had a devastating impact upon artistic expression. According to orthodox Christianity, art should enhance and promote Christian values; it should not serve simple as an individual’s creative exploration and expression. New works of art which did not concur with the Church’s ideology would not be created again until the Renaissance. Marble statues of ancient Rome were torn down, most notably by Gregory the Great, and made into lime or went to adorn cathedrals all over Europe and as far away as Westminster Abbey in London. The ravaging of marble works accounts for the thin ornate slabs with ancient inscription still found in many churches today (Daniel J. Boorstin, The Discoverers (New York: Random House, 1983), p. 581).

~1300 Many heretics insisted upon a direct relationship with God. Despite the danger, they translated the Bible into common or vernacular languages which lay people could understand. Simple possession of such a bible was punishable by death (a law of the church, of course) (WEMS, p. 212)

~1300 When the bubonic plague struck, the Church explained that Jews were to blame and prompted attacks upon them (Jeffrey Burton Russell, A History of Medieval Christianity (New York: Thomas Y Cromwell, 1968), p. 75). A whole folklore developed claiming that Jews kidnapped and ate Christian children in Jewish rituals of cannibalism, and that Jews stole and profaned the blessed Christian sacraments. These were the same tales that Romans once told of the hated Christians, the same tales that Christians would tell of witches, and the same tales Protestants would tell of Catholics. Pogroms, the raiding and destroying of Jewish synagogues and ghettos, became a common demonstration of Christian righteousness (Jeffrey Burton Russell, A History of Medieval Christianity (New York: Thomas Y Cromwell, 1968), p. 156).

1302 Pope Boniface issued the bull Unam Sanctum: showing the current desire for popes to be viewed as superior to all other mortals: “Therefore, if the earthly power errs, it shall be judged by the spiritual power... but if the supreme spiritual power errs it can be judged only by God, and not by man... Therefore we declare, state, define and pronounce that it is altogether necessary to salvation for every human creature to be subject to the Roman pontiff” (Jeffrey Burton Russell, A History of Medieval Christianity (New York: Thomas Y Cromwell, 1968), pp. 168-169).

1315 The Church excommunicated the Fraticelli. The church regarded the Franciscan founder, Francis of Assisi, as a saint, the Church persecuted Francis’s followers who upheld his ideas of poverty (These were the Fraticelli). 22 (Tuchman, A Distant Mirror (New York: Ballantine Books, 1978), p. 36)

1318 Twenty-seven members of a particularly stubborn group of Spiritual Franciscans of Province were tried by the Inquisition and four of them burned at the stake at Marseille (Tuchman, A Distant Mirror (New York: Ballantine Books, 1978), pp. 36-37).

1320 Pope John XII formalized the persecution of witchcraft when he authorized the Inquisition to prosecute sorcery (Jeffrey Burton Russell, A History of Medieval Christianity (New York: Thomas Y Cromwell, 1968), p. 173). Thereafter papal bulls and declarations grew increasingly vehement in their condemnation of witchcraft and of all those who “made a pact with hell.” (Jeffrey Burton Russell, A History of Medieval Christianity (New York: Thomas Y Cromwell, 1968), p. 173).

1326 The income of a wealthy bishop could range from 300 times to as much as 1000 times that of a vicar (Henri Daniel-Rops, Cathedral and Crusade (New York: E.P. Dutton & Company, Inc., 1957), 246). The incongruity of an extravagantly wealthy organization representing the ideals of Jesus Christ prompted the papal bull or edict Cum inter nonnullos which proclaimed it heresy to say that Jesus and his Apostles owned no property (Barbara Walker, The Woman’s Encyclopedia of Myths and Secrets (San Francisco: Harper & Row, 1983), p. 438).

1354 Earliest extant documentation stating the existence of the Shroud of Turin

1375 When a group of smaller Italian city-states organized a revolt against papal control in 1375, the Pope’s legate in Italy, Robert of Geneva, hired a mercenary band to re-conquer the area. After failing to take the city of Bologna, this band set upon the smaller town of Cessna (Tuchman, A Distant Mirror (New York: Ballantine Books, 1978), p. 321-322).

Swearing clemency by a solemn oath on his cardinal’s hat, Cardinal Robert persuade the men of Cessna to lay down their arms, and won their confidence by asking for 50 hostages and immediately releasing them as evidence of good will. Then summoning his mercenaries... he ordered a general massacre ‘to exercise justice.’...For three days and nights beginning February 3 1377, while the city gates were closed, the solders slaughtered. ‘All the squares were full of dead.’ Trying to escape, hundreds drowned in the moats, thrust back by relentless swords. Women were seized for rape, ransom was placed on children, plunder succeeded the killing, works of art were ruined, handicrafts laid waste, ‘and what could not be carried away, they burned, made unfit for use or spilled upon the ground.’ The toll of the dead was between 2,500-5,000. (Tuchman, A Distant Mirror (New York: Ballantine Books, 1978), p. 322)

See 1378.

1377 See 1375.

1378 Robert of Geneva, the person who hired a mercenary band to slaughter whole towns because the towns revolted against papal control was appointed Pope and became Clement VII (The New Columbia Encyclopedia edited by William H. Harris and Judith S. Levey (New York & London: Columbia University Press, 1975), p. 2442).

1378-1417 The Great Schism: Two separate lines of Popes, one living in Rome and one in Avignon, reigned from 1378 to 1417. They disagreed, not over matters concerning Christian ideology or religious practices, but over politics and who should reign (Henri Daniel-Rops, Cathedral and Crusade (New York: E.P. Dutton & Company, Inc., 1957), p. 433-435).

~1400 Orthodox Christians expressed disdain for the flourishing creativity and declared supporters of the arts to be heathens and pagans. Dominican prophet Girolamo Savonarola believed that science, culture and education should return entirely to the hands of monks. He wrote: “The only good thing that we owe to Plato and Aristotle is that they brought forward many arguments which we can use against the heretics. Yet they and other philosophers are now in hell... It would be good for religion if many books that seem useful were destroyed. When there were not so many books and not so many arguments and disputes, religion grew more quickly than it has since (Jacob Burckhardt, The Civilization of the Renaissance in Italy, edited by Irene Gordon (New York: Mentor Books, 1960), p. 336).

1484 Pope Innocent VIII issued the bull Summis desiderantes authorizing two inquisitors, Kramer and Sprenger, to systematize the persecution of witches (Brian P. Levack, The Witch-Hunt in Early Modern Europe (London: Longman, 1987), p. 49).

1484 The Inquisition spread the frightening belief in werewolves (Barry Holstun Lopez, Of Wolves and Men (New York: Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1978), pp. 238-239; DC p. 142). And in 1484 Pope Innocent VIII officially ordered pet cats to be burned together with witches, a practice which continued throughout the centuries of witch-hunting (Lewis Regenstein, Replenish the Earth (New York: Crossroad, 1991), p. 73).

1487-1520 14 editions of the manual for the persecution of witches, Malleus Maleficarum were published (Joan Smith, Misogynies: Reflections on Myths and Malice (New York: Fawcett Columbine, 1989), p. 68).

1492 The Inquisition in Spain had become so virulent in its persecution of Jews that it demanded either their conversion to Christianity or their expulsion. (During this time, Islamic countries actually offered far safer sanctuaries to escaping Jews than Christian lands. (Barbara Walker, The Woman’s Encyclopedia of Myths and Secrets (San Francisco: Harper & Row, 1983), p. 472)

1492 Columbus raped and killed. Referenced in James Lowen's Lies my Teacher Told me and Howard Zinn's a People's History of the United States

1493 A papal bull justified declaring war on any natives in South America who refused to adhere to Christianity (Jean Delumeau, Catholicism Between Luther and Voltaire (London: Burns and Oats, 1977), p. 85). As the jurist Enisco claimed in 1509: “The king has every right to send his men to the Indies to demand their received it from the pope. If the Indians refuse, he may quite legally fight them, kill them and enslave them, just as Joshua enslaved the inhabitants of the country of Canaan” (Jean Delumeau, Catholicism Between Luther and Voltaire (London: Burns and Oats, 1977), p. 85).

1497 Books, particularly those of Latin and Italian poets, illuminated manuscripts, women’s ornaments, musical instruments, and paintings were burned in a huge bonfire, destroying much of the work of Renaissance Florence (Jeffrey Burton Russell, A History of Medieval Christianity (New York: Thomas Y Cromwell, 1968), p. 97-98).

~1500 Guillaume Briçonnet warned “Holidays are not for the pleasure of the body, but for the salvation of the soul; not for laughter and frolic, but for weeping.” (Jean Delumeau, Sin and Fear, translated by Eric Nicholson (New York : St. Martins Press, 1990), p. 457)

~1500 Copernicus reintroduced the theory that the earth revolves around the sun, a belief that was first found by Pythagoras in 600 BCE, 2100 years previously (Tuchman, A Distant Mirror (New York: Ballantine Books, 1978), p. 448).

1500 Ancient letters that had been discovered and incorporated into canon law as evidence of the Pope’s supremacy over imperial powers had been exposed as total forgeries. One such letter, the “Donation of Constantine,” purported to be a letter from Emperor Constantine to Pope Sylvester in which Constantine attributes his power to the Pope. It reads, “We give to Sylvester, the Universal Pope...the city of Rome and all the provinces, districts and cities of Italy and the Western regions...” (Jeffrey Burton Russell, A History of Medieval Christianity (New York: Thomas Y Cromwell, 1968), p. 75)

About ~200 years after the Crusades probably millions were killed. During each of these Crusades the Christians burned any books they found (Charles Homer Haskins, The Renaissance of the 12th Century (Cleveland & New York: Meridian Books, 1927), p. 282). The common belief that the crusaders returned from their exploits with literature and learning is mistaken. To quote Charles H. Haskins, “The Crusaders were men of action, not men of learning, and little can be traced in the way of translation in Palestine or Syria.” (Charles Homer Haskins, The Renaissance of the 12th Century (Cleveland & New York: Meridian Books, 1927), p. 282)

1517 Martin Luther, an anti-Semite and an incredible male chauvinist (see 1533), posted his 95 these on the door of his town’s church (DC, p. 93). Martin Luther wrote, “If [women] become tired or even die, that does not matter. Let them die in childbirth -- that is why they are there.”103 (Karen Armstrong, The Gospel According to Woman: Christianity’s Creation of the Sex War in the West (New York: Doubleday, 1986), p. 69 )

Luther also wrote about the Jews:

"to set fire to their synagogues or schools and to bury and cover with dirt whatever will not burn... I advise that their houses be razed and destroyed... I advise that all their prayer books... in which such idolatry, lies, cursing, and blasphemy are taught, be taken from them... that their rabbis be forbidden to teach henceforth on pain of loss of life and limb... that safe-conduct on the highways be abolished completely for the Jews... that all their treasure of silver and gold be taken from them... But if the authorities are reluctant to use force and restrain the Jews' devilish wantonness, the latter should, as we said, be expelled from their country and be told to return to ... Jerusalem where they may lie, curse, blaspheme, defame, murder, steal, rob, practice usury, mock, and indulge in all those infamous abominations which they practice among us, and leave ... our Lord the Messiah, our faith, and our church undefiled and uncontaminated with their devilish tyranny and malice." (Luther, On the Jews and their Lies, 1543, cited in Stannard, American Holocaust, Oxford 1992, p. 248]

During the Reformation a man commented during the Reformation, “It was never merry England since we were impressed to come to the church.” (Keith Thomas, Religion and the Decline of Magic (New York: Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1974), p. 151)

1521 The senate of Venice refused to approve executions of heretics. However Pope Leo X wrote to the secular officials: “...to intervene no more in this kind of trial, but promptly, without changing or inspecting the sentences made by the ecclesiastical judges, to execute the sentences which they are enjoined to carry out. And if they neglect or refuse, you (the Papal legate) are to compel them with the Church’s censure and other appropriate measures. From this order there is no appeal “ (WEBS, p. 443)

In practice, any secular authorities who refused to cooperate were excommunicated and subject to the same treatment as suspected heretics (Henry Charles Lea, The Inquisition and the Middle Ages, Abridgment by Margaret Nicholson (New York: MacMillan, 1961), p. 252).

1525 Luther supported the merciless suppression of the Peasants’ War, a rebellion that his own spirit of independence from the Roman Church had helped to ignite (The New Columbia Encyclopedia edited by William H. Harris and Judith S. Levey (New York & London: Columbia University Press, 1975), p. 1631).

1533 Luther wrote, “Girls begin to talk and to stand on their feet sooner than boys because weeds always grow up more quickly than good crops.” (The “Natural Inferiority” of Women compiled by Tama Starr (New York: Poseidon Press, 1991), p. 36)

1535 "Upon arriving there, since what they found to eat was so meager, some of these Christians, seeing themselves in extreme hunger, killed an Indian they had captured, and roasted the entrails and ate them; and they put a good part of the Indian to stew in a large pot in order to bring along something to eat in the ship's boat in which those who did this were traveling." --Gonzalo Fernandez de Oviedo, Historia general y natural de las Indias, islas y tierra firme del Mar Oceano, 1535

1542 "The reason the Christians have murdered on such a vast scale and killed anyone and everyone in their way is purely and simply greed... Their insatiable greed and overweening ambition know no bounds; the land is fertile and rich, the inhabitants simple, forbearing and submissive. The Spaniards have shown not the slightest consideration for these people, treating them (and I speak from first-hand experience, having been there from the outset) not as brute animals - indeed, I would to God they had done and had shown them the consideration they afford their animals - so much as piles of dung in the middle of the road." --Bartolome de Las Casas, A Short Account of the Destruction of the Indies, 1542

1545 The Catholic Church responded with its own Reformation, called the Counter Reformation, centered around the decisions and canons of the Council of Trent which met between 1545 and 1563. The animosity between Protestants and Catholics sparked a series of civil wars in France and England as well as the bloody Thirty Years War involving Germany, Sweden, France, Denmark, England, the Netherlands, and the Holy Roman Empire represented by the Hapsburgs. That both sides considered themselves Christian did not temper the bloodshed (Lloyd M. Graham, Deceptions and Myths of the Bible (New York: Citadel Press, 1975), p. 461).

1565 The confession-box was first introduced (John Bossy, Christianity in the West 1400-1700 (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1985), p. 134; Keith Thomas, Religion and the Decline of Magic (New York: Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1974), p. 155).

1572 August 24 The massacre of St. Bartholomew’s Day, 10,000 Protestants were slaughtered in France. Pope Gregory XIII (The so-called “reformer” of the Calendar) wrote to France’s Charles IX, “We rejoice with you that with the help of God you have relieved the world of these wretched heretics” (Lloyd M. Graham, Deceptions and Myths of the Bible (New York: Citadel Press, 1975), p. 461)

1574-1669 Another 16 editions of the manual for the persecution of witches, Malleus Maleficarum were published (ellerbe, dark side of christianity, p. 121). Some members of the clergy proudly reported the number of witches they condemned, such as the bishop of Würtzburg who claimed 1900 lives in five years, or the Lutheran prelate Benedict Carpzov who claimed to have sentenced 20,000 devil worshipers (Barbara Walker, The Woman’s Encyclopedia of Myths and Secrets (San Francisco: Harper & Row, 1983, p. 444)

~1575-1625 The Inquisition spread as far as Goe, India where it took no less than 3,800 lives (Roth, The Spanish Inquisition (W. W. Norton & Company, 1964), p. 221).

1578 Inquisitor Francisco Pena stated, “We must remember that the main purpose of the trail and execution is not to save the soul of the accused but to achieve the public good and put fear into others.” (Henry Kamen, Inquisition and Society in Spain (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1985), p. 161)

1586 Barbara Walker writes that _“the chronicler of Treves reported that in the year 1586, the entire female population of two villages was wiped out by the inquisitors, except for only two women left alive.”_ (Barbara Walker, The Woman’s Encyclopedia of Myths and Secrets (San Francisco: Harper & Row, 1983), p. 444)

~1600 Galileo attempted to promote the heliocentric theory which had been first found in 300 BCE, some 1900 years previously, and Galileo, one of the foremost scientists in history, was subsequently tried by the Inquisition on Rome. Only in 1965 did the Roman Catholic Church revoke its condemnation of Galileo (Tuchman, A Distant Mirror (New York: Ballantine Books, 1978), p. 449).

[nofun] ~1600 In seventeenth century New England where Puritans controlled much of society, warnings or actual punishment befell any youths caught sledding or swimming and any adults caught simply enjoying themselves when they might be better employed (Joseph Gaer and Ben Siegel, The Puritan Heritage: America’s Roots in the Bible (New York: Mentor Books, 1964), p. 87).

1614 Iyeyazu, the Shogun of Japan, accused the missionaries of “wanting to change the government of the country and make themselves masters of the soil.” (Jean Delumeau, Catholicism Between Luther and Voltaire (London: Burns and Oats, 1977), p. 79)

1624 In Protestant England Parliament passed an act prohibiting swearing and cursing (Keith Thomas, Religion and the Decline of Magic (New York: Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1974), p. 503).

1634 The Puritain General Court forbade garments: “...with any lace on it, silver, gold or thread... also all cutworks, embroidered or needlework caps, bands and rails... all gold and silver girdles, hatbands, belts, ruffs, beaver hats” (Joseph Gaer and Ben Siegel, The Puritan Heritage: America’s Roots in the Bible (New York: Mentor Books, 1964), p. 88)

1639 A law prohibited the custom of drinking toasts or health-drinking as an “abominable” pagan practice (Joseph Gaer and Ben Siegel, The Puritan Heritage: America’s Roots in the Bible (New York: Mentor Books, 1964), pp. 86-87; DC, p. 152). One should not adjourn to the tavern after meetings, and nature-oriented occasions such as harvest huskings should not degenerate into merrymaking (Joseph Gaer and Ben Siegel, The Puritan Heritage: America’s Roots in the Bible (New York: Mentor Books, 1964), p. 86).

1647 The English Parliament ordered that Christmas, along with other pagan holidays, should cease to be observed (Weiser, Handbook of Christian Feasts and Customs, p. 64).

1650 Clothing which revealed the female body was illegal. A 1650 New England law prohibited “short sleeves, whereby the nakedness of the arm may be discovered.” (Joseph Gaer and Ben Siegel, The Puritan Heritage: America’s Roots in the Bible (New York: Mentor Books, 1964), p. 87).

1652 A Parliamentary act repeated that “no observance shall be had on the five-and-twentieth of December, commonly called Christmas day; nor any solemnity used or exercised in churches in respect thereof.” (Weiser, Handbook of Christian Feasts and Customs, p. 65)

1653 A Massachusetts law of 1653 prohibited Sunday walks and visits to the harbor as being a waste of time. Playing children or strolling young men and women were warned that they were engaging in “things tending much to the dishonor of God, the reproach of religion and the profanation of the holy Sabbath.” (Joseph Gaer and Ben Siegel, The Puritan Heritage: America’s Roots in the Bible (New York: Mentor Books, 1964), p. 31).

1670 John Lewis and Sarah Chapman were brought before the New London court in 1670 for “sitting together on the Lord’s Day, under an apple tree in Goodman Chapman’s orchard.” (Joseph Gaer and Ben Siegel, The Puritan Heritage: America’s Roots in the Bible (New York: Mentor Books, 1964), p. 31; DC, p. 104).

The 1683 Addendum to the constitution of the diocese of Annecy read: _"...we order the people, under excommunication, to suppress and abolish entirely the torches and fires customarily lit on the first Sunday of Lent... and the masquerades... which are merely shameful relics of Paganism "_ (Jean Delumeau, Catholicism Between Luther and Voltaire (London: Burns and Oats, 1977), p. 177).

1684 Dancing was a sign of spiritual decay to New England’s Puritan ministers who in 1684 published a pamphlet entitled An Arrow against Profane and Promiscuous Dancing, drawn out of the Quiver of the Scriptures (Joseph Gaer and Ben Siegel, The Puritan Heritage: America’s Roots in the Bible (New York: Mentor Books, 1964), p. 92). See 1700s hymn entry.

~1700 An eighteenth century hymn warns that satan: “...slithers through the flesh//Of dancing men and dames//To hold them in the mesh//Of his hot and am’rous flames” (Jean Delumeau, Sin and Fear, translated by Eric Nicholson (New York : St. Martins Press, 1990), p. 437).

[/nofun]

~1700 Protestants and Catholics competed with each other over how little they could care for their bodies, using little soap and water throughout a lifetime. A Jesuit in the 1700s, explaining in the 1700s that “religious modesty” is enough to prevent anyone from bathing, told a story of one who violated the prohibition: “A youth who dared to bathe at one of our country houses did drown there, perhaps by God’s merciful judgment, for He may have wished this fearful example to serve as law.” (Jean Delumeau, Sin and Fear, translated by Eric Nicholson (New York : St. Martins Press, 1990), p. 437).

1701 A city ordinance in New England prohibited making coffins, digging graves or holding funerals on the Sabbath as acts that profaned the holy day (Joseph Gaer and Ben Siegel, The Puritan Heritage: America’s Roots in the Bible (New York: Mentor Books, 1964), p. 92).

in 1722 a group of villagers from Oster gronning in salling, denmark burned a woman to death for allegedly killing two children and a number of livestock by witch-craft. the courts tried and executed two of the ringleaders of this lynching for murder, outlawed one of their accomplices and forced another five to do public penance (9) (henningsen, "witch persecution," pp. 110-19, 135)

[nofun] 1746 “Boring” and “pious” were thought to be synonymous (Jean Delumeau, Catholicism Between Luther and Voltaire (London: Burns and Oats, 1977), p. 228). Diderot described the extremes of Christian “unhappiness”: “What cries! what shrieks! what groans! Who has imprisoned all these woeful corpses? What crimes have all these wretches committed? Some are beating their breasts with stones, others tearing bodies with hooks of are beating their breasts with iron; remorse, pain and death lurk in their eyes...” (Jean Delumeau, Catholicism Between Luther and Voltaire (London: Burns and Oats, 1977), p. 206) [/nofun] More evidence of behavior disorders. Disorders considered to be “moral.”

in 1751 at tring, hertfordshire, a group of villagers suspected ruth and john osborne, a poor elderly couple living in a work house, of being witches because they had become dependent upon the community for their living. when they were subjected to the "swimming test, ruth osborn drowned. The ringleader of the mob that attacked her, thomas colley, was tried and executed for the murder. Colley's neighbors did not think this was a just sentence for killing _"an old wicked woman that had done so much mischief by her witchcraft."_ (W.B. Carnochan, "Witch hunting and belief i 1751: The case of Thomas Colley and Ruth Osborne," _cournal of Social History_ 4 (1971) pp 389-403. Gaskill, Crime and Mantalities, p. 86)

1797 A treaty written during Washington’s administration and ratified by US Senate stated, “The government of the United States is not in any sense, founded on the Christian religion.” (Treaties and Other International Acts of the United States of America, edited by Hunter Miller, Volume 2 (Washington: United States Government Printing Office, 1931), pp. 349-385)

~1800 Pope Gregory XVI wrote: “It is in no way lawful to demand, to defend, or to grant unconditional freedom of thought, or speech, of writing, or of religion, as if they were so many rights that nature has given to man” (John Dollison, Pope-Pourri (New York: Simon & Schuster, 1994), p. 9).

1805 A Seneca chief asked of a Moravian missionary, “If there is but one religion, why do you white people differ so much about it?” (Forrest Wood, The Arrogance of Faith (New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1990), p. 13)

1807 The Dartmouth Gazette responded when Vermont passed a bill allowing religious liberty stating that it was a striking example “of the pernicious and direful, the infernal consequences to which the leveling spirit of democracy must inevitably tend.” (Peter McWilliams, Aint Nobody’s Business If You Do: The Absurdity of Consensual Crimes in a Free Society (Los Angeles: Prelude Press, 1993), pp. 103-104)

up to 1834 The Inquisition continued even in some places up to 1834 (WEBS, p. 447).

[nofun] 1870 As late as 1870 in Boston, students who failed to attend public schools on Christmas were punished by public dismissal (Weiser, Handbook of Christian Feasts and Customs, pp. 65-66). [/nofun]

in southern provinces of the netherlands, which later became belgium witch-lynchings occurred sporadically from the end of the seventeenth century until 1882. The attacks were almost always directed against women from rural areas, and were often thrown into fires (m. gijswijt-hofstra, "witchcraft after the witch-trials," in witchcraft and magic in europe: the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, pp 115-16; m.-S. Dupont-bouchat, "le diable apprivoisee: Le sourcellerie revisite; mague et sorcellerie au XIXe siecle," in R. Muchembled (ed.), magie et sorcellerie du moyen age a nos jours (paris, 1994), pp235-66)

good last one: Early 1900 Pope Leo XIII still argued that the ends justified the means: The death sentence is a necessary and efficacious means for the Church to attain its end when rebels act against it and disturbers of ecclesiastical unity, especially obstinate heretics and heresiarchs, cannot be restrained by any other penalty from continuing to derange the ecclesiastical order and impelling others to all sorts of crime... When the perversity of one or several is calculated to bring about the ruin of many of its children it is bound effectively to remove it, in such wise that if there be no other remedy for saving its people it can and must put these wicked men to death (Tuchman, A Distant Mirror (New York: Ballantine Books, 1978), p. 468).

~1900 Doctors performed hysterectomies to Native American women without their consent after they had just given birth (Mary Crow Dog, “Lakota Woman”) you think these doctors were not christian?

in 1911, in the vicinity of perugia, italy, farmers seized an old woman reputed to be a witch and burned her to death in a lime kiln (W.G. Soldan and H. Heppe, _Geschichte der Hexenprozesse_, ed. M. Bauer (minich, 1912), II, p. 350)

1917 Torture remained a legal option for the Church from 1252 when it was sanctioned by Pope Innocent IV until 1917 when the New Codex Juris Canonici was put into effect.(G. G. Coulton, Inquisition and Liberty (Glouster, MA: Peter Smith, 1969), pp. 154-155)

1928 A family of Hungarian peasants was acquitted of beating an old woman to death whom they claimed was a witch. The court based its decision on the ground that the family had acted out of “irresistible compulsion.” (Barbara Walker, The Woman’s Encyclopedia of Myths and Secrets (San Francisco: Harper & Row, 1983), p. 1087)

3/23/1933 "The Government, being resolved to undertake the political and moral purification of our public life, are creating and securing the conditions necessary for a really profound revival of religious life." -Adolf Hitler, in his speech to the Reichstag on 23 March 1933

~1940 Catholics refused to oppose the attempted extermination of Jews by Nazis during World War II, (Lawrence Lader, Politics, Power & the Church (New York: Macmillan Publishing Company, 1987), pp. 135-140; “World Watch” The Rocky Mountain News, April 14, 1992; “Vatican denies helping Nazis flee after war”, The Associated Press, February 15, 1992)

~1940 Hitler did the Lord's work according to many quotes of his

1965 The Catholic Church decided that Galileo wasn’t in hell, and reversed its condemnation of him for attempting to promote the heliocentric theory (Barbara Walker, The Woman’s Encyclopedia of Myths and Secrets (San Francisco: Harper & Row, 1983), p. 910).

1976 A poor spinster, Elizabeth Hahn, was suspected of witchcraft and of keeping familiars, or devil’s agents, in the form of dogs. The neighbors in her small German village ostracized her, threw rocks at her, and threatened to beat her to death before burning her house, badly burning her and killing her animals (Brian P. Levack, The Witch-Hunt in Early Modern Europe (London: Longman, 1987), p. 229).

1977 Pope John Paul VI still explained that women were barred from the priesthood “because our Lord was a man.”(Riane Eisler, The Chalice and the Blade (San Francisco: Harper and Row, 1987), p. 131-132)

1977 In France, an old man was killed for ostensible sorcery (Brian P. Levack, The Witch-Hunt in Early Modern Europe (London: Longman, 1987), p. 229).

in 1977 two brothers in a village near alencon, france, were tried for murdering a "village sorcerer" who kept a cabin full of "magical potions" and who was known to throw salt on people's gardens. (agence france-press, may 13, 1977. This case is discussed in Henningsen, _witches' advocate,_ p 18)

~1980s Shroud of Turin is exposed as a fraud.

1981 A mob in Mexico stoned a woman to death for her apparent witchcraft which they believed had incited the attack upon Pope John Paul II (Brian P. Levack, The Witch-Hunt in Early Modern Europe (London: Longman, 1987), p. 110).

8/27/1988 President George Bush stated, "No, I don't know that atheists should be considered as citizens, nor should they be considered patriots. This is one nation under God." Boulder Daily Camera, Monday February 27, 1989; "Free Inquiry", Fall 1988 issue, Volume 8, Number 4, page 16.

1989 "A survey of hotel bills from last year's National Religious Broadcasters Association convention found that 80 percent of them watched an X-rated movie in the privacy of their rooms. Just doing a little research on the enemy, we suppose." _Reason_, October 1989

1992 "The feminist agenda is not about equal rights for women ... It is about a socialist, anti-family political movement that encourages women to leave their husbands, kill their children, practice witchcraft, destroy capitalism, and become Lesbians." -- Pat Robertson

8/16/93 "I want you to just let a wave of intolerance wash over you. I want you to let a wave of hatred wash over you. Yes, hate is good...Our goal is a Christian nation. We have a Biblical duty, we are called by God, to conquer this country. We don't want equal time. We don't want pluralism." --Randall Terry, Founder of Operation Rescue The News-Sentinel, Fort Wayne, Indiana. 8-16-93

1994 "I've been fighting against the Jews and niggers and for our Lord Jesus Christ and the white race ever since I was a child. And most of the time we've been losing ...We had lost the fight for the preservation of the white race until God himself intervened in earthly affairs with AIDS to rescue and preserve the white race that he had created. So AIDS is a great racial miracle. I praise God all the time for AIDS." -- J. B. Stoner at the Aryan Nations Congress at Hayden Lake Idaho in 1994.

1997 Catholic Bishops sent a letter to the Churches asking parents to accept their homosexual children’s sexual orientation, because it is not a choice. They want to stop the violence against homosexuals. They still, however, deny homosexuals the right to marry or even to have sex. (12:42 AM, 10/01/97, By Andrea Shalal-Esa WASHINGTON [Reuter])

bibliography:

AES Elain Pagels, Adam, Eve and the Serpent (New York: Random House, 1988) AF Forrest Wood, The Arrogance of Faith (New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1990) C&B Riane Eisler, The Chalice and the Blade (San Francisco: Harper and Row, 1987) C&C Henri Daniel-Rops, Cathedral and Crusade (New York: E.P. Dutton & Company, Inc., 1957) CBV Ian Bergg, The Cult of the Black Virgin (London: Arkana, 1985) CITW Karen Armstrong, Holy War: The Crusades and Their Impact on Today’s World (New York: Doubleday, 1988) CLV Jean Delumeau, Catholicism Between Luther and Voltaire (London: Burns and Oats, 1977) CMCL Timothy O’Neil, “Century of Marvels, Century of Light” CRI Jacob Burckhardt, The Civilization of the Renaissance in Italy, edited by Irene Gordon (New York: Mentor Books, 1960) CW John Bossy, Christianity in the West 1400-1700 (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1985) CWE J.N. Hillgarth, The Conversion of Western Europe (Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice Hall, 1969) DB Lloyd M. Graham, Deceptions and Myths of the Bible (New York: Citadel Press, 1975) DC Helen Ellerbe, the Dark Side of Christianity (California: Morningstar Books, 1995) DCP Smith, The Death of Classical Paganism (New York: Charles Schribner’s Sons, 1976) DFRC Malachi Martin, Decline and Fall of the Roman Church (New York: G. P. Putnam’s Sons, 1981) DM Tuchman, A Distant Mirror (New York: Ballantine Books, 1978) EEPE Charles Panati, Panati’s Extraordinary Endings of Practically Everything (New York: Harper & Row, 1989) EWD Rossell Hope Robbins, The Encyclopedia of Witchcraft and Demonology (New York: Bonanza Books, 1981) GW Karen Armstrong, The Gospel According to Woman: Christianity’s Creation of the Sex War in the West (New York: Doubleday, 1986) HA Walter Nigg, The Heretics: Heresy Through the Ages (New York: Dorset Press, 1962) HBG Michael Baigent, Richard Leigh & Henry Lincoln, Holy Blood, Holy Grail (New York: Dell, 1982) HCFC Weiser, Handbook of Christian Feasts and Customs HH James A. Haught, Holy Horrors (Buffalo: Prometheus, 1990) HM Treaties and Other International Acts of the United States of America, edited by Hunter Miller, Volume 2 (Washington: United States Government Printing Office, 1931) HMC Jeffrey Burton Russell, A History of Medieval Christianity (New York: Thomas Y Cromwell, 1968) HSC Henry C. Lea, History of Sacerdotal Celibacy in the Christian Church, 4th edition revised (London: Watts & Co., 1932) IL G. G. Coulton, Inquisition and Liberty (Glouster, MA: Peter Smith, 1969) IMA Henry Charles Lea, The Inquisition and the Middle Ages, Abridgment by Margaret Nicholson (New York: MacMillan, 1961) ISS Henry Kamen, Inquisition and Society in Spain (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1985) LC Judith Mann, “The Legend of the Cathars” GNOSIS, NO. 4 X -- MC Geoffrey Ashe, The Virgin: Mary’s Cult and the Re-emergence of the Goddess (London: Arkana, 1976, 1988) MW Friedrich Heer, The Medieval World, translated by Janet Sondheimer, (New York: NAL, 1961) NB Peter McWilliams, Aint Nobody’s Business If You Do: The Absurdity of Consensual Crimes in a Free Society (Los Angeles: Prelude Press, 1993) NCE The New Columbia Encyclopedia edited by William H. Harris and Judith S. Levey (New York & London: Columbia University Press, 1975) NI The “Natural Inferiority” of Women compiled by Tama Starr (New York: Poseidon Press, 1991) PGS Charles Merrill Smith, The Pearly Gates Syndicate (New York: DoubleDay, 1971) PH Joseph Gaer and Ben Siegel, The Puritan Heritage: America’s Roots in the Bible (New York: Mentor Books, 1964) PP John Dollison, Pope-Pourri (New York: Simon & Schuster, 1994) PPC Lawrence Lader, Politics, Power & the Church (New York: Macmillan Publishing Company, 1987) RC Charles Homer Haskins, The Renaissance of the 12th Century (Cleveland & New York: Meridian Books, 1927) RDM Keith Thomas, Religion and the Decline of Magic (New York: Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1974) RE Lewis Regenstein, Replenish the Earth (New York: Crossroad, 1991) RMM Joan Smith, Misogynies: Reflections on Myths and Malice (New York: Fawcett Columbine, 1989) RMN “World Watch” The Rocky Mountain News, April 14, 1992 RSI Roth, The Spanish Inquisition (W. W. Norton & Company, 1964) SF Jean Delumeau, Sin and Fear, translated by Eric Nicholson (New York : St. Martins Press, 1990) SI Jean Plaidy, The Spanish Inquisition (New York: Citadel Press, 1967) ST Saint Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologica (New York & London: Blackfriars, McGraw-Hill, Eyre & Spottiswoode) TD Daniel J. Boorstin, The Discoverers (New York: Random House, 1983) VD “Vatican denies helping Nazis flee after war”, The Associated Press, February 15, 1992 WEBS Barbara Walker, The Woman’s Encyclopedia of Myths and Secrets (San Francisco: Harper & Row, 1983) WHE Brian P. Levack, The Witch-Hunt in Early Modern Europe (London: Longman, 1987) WM Barry Holstun Lopez, Of Wolves and Men (New York: Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1978) WMA Russell, Witchcraft in the Middle Ages (Cornell University Press, 1972) WW Julio Caro Baroja, The World of Witches (Chircago: University of Chicago Press, 1961) Mary Crow Dog, Lakota Woman

0 notes