sorompio

So, history is just a succession of events, no moral lessons, no ethic considerations. The crimes of Christians, seventeen centuries of massacres, castration, superstition, ignorance and stupidity shouldn't suggest us anything but foolish stories to discuss over dinner.

Roger Pearse

I have not followed this thread, but this seems to sum up the argument, if I understand it correctly. But it seems unfair to the inquisition (did the inquisitors really take an interest in witches? Surely they were about heretics?).

Naturally if there are no such things as people practising sorcery to inflict disease on their neighbours -- or behaving as if they can -- in order to extort money and create a climate of fear, then people cannot be guilty of the crime as charged.

But if such did exist, surely these activities are a capital crime, if ever there was one? In which case, what precisely is the case against the inquisition? That they did not live in an era in which no-one believed in witchcraft? (And do we live in such an era now?)

Let us condemn people for what they do which they know to be wrong, not for the crime of following the societal values of their time, rather than our own.

All the best,

Roger Pearse

jim_w

Put better than I ever could. Nice one, Roger.

Roger Pearse

You're welcome.

IMHO It's easy enough to shout, "Burn him! Burn him" at anyone we disagree with, and the inquisition is an easy target. It's also easy to be the sort of revisionist that cannot see a scumbag without itching to prove him a saint. I'd rather do neither, tho.

But I'm not sure why this thread is in BC&H, to be honest. Anyone?

All the best,

Roger Pearse

Chili

No such thing? Read this:
Bold is mine and read more here:
http://http://gnosistraditions.faithweb.com/mont.html

Did you know that our mental institutions are loaded with 'born again' Christians trying to deal with the aftermath their conversion experience?

Skeptical

I read your site. I have no doubt that you have paraphrased correctly, but I do find it interesting the "slants" that you put on your FAQ's, including not really answering some of the questions.

For example, one of the questions is "How often was torture used?". Your answer includes "The strapido, whereby the victim is hung by the arms and dropped, is also mentioned in the fifteenth century. Cases of abuse occurred, however, and this led to procedures being tightened up."

Three things I find of interest in this:

1) The description of the procedure is very bland, no mention of the effects this has on the human body when it is performed. No sense of the horror of the procedure. In fact, the procedure is only "mentioned", much like one might mention the weather as a banal topic of conversation.

2) You immediately follow it up with an apologetic that "abuses occured", so "procedures were tightened up". Again, no sense that any of this was wrong. It's a minor, almost clerical matter that we had some problems with so we "tightened" our procedures. It's also interesting to me to say "abuses occured", meaning that it's use was wrong or that it's use on certain people was inappropriate? No mention of what it means that "procedures were tightened". One gets the impression that this was a matter of the slightest importance, not worth spending any time discussing.

The attitude seems to be "Sure, the Inquisitors ripped peoples arms out, but it was only a few, and they enacted some safeguards to make sure they only ripped out the arms of those who _really_ needed it. It wasn't so bad."

3) This doesn't answer the question at all. The question was how often did torture occur. I would expect a number or at least some indication that "we don't know exactly, but a reasonable estimate would be..." Instead, this seems like more of an apologetic answer, intended to deflect blame or criticism of the procedures used than to actually determine with what frequency torture tactics were employed.

Is your intent to convey the facts of what occured or to spin the events so that one gets the impression that things weren't so bad? It definitely seems like the latter.

sorompio

We do reward people who actually broke through the societal values of their time with our admiration. We praise Socrates, Gandhi or Voltaire because they opened the eyes of their fellows. Why shouldn't we condemn the bloodthirsty and superstitious criminals that actually struggled to keep the eyes of their fellows shut and drown them in ignorance and fear through the most vile violence?

sorompio

As always. Typically Christian. The procedure goes both ways: 1)try to diminish the atrocities 2)point out that others committed atrocities too.

When diminishing is impossible, as in this case, they plead exaggeration. They don't tear up their clothing or throw ashes on their heads, they just claim that a conspiracy is trying to make them look like monsters. How did Christians apologized from the monstrosities of Inquisition... A few hypocritical words from a crook in the Vatican, that's all. And the world is expected to forgive automatically, just like that. Crazy, huh?

RussianM3_dude

The Soviet Union never acted on behalf of atheism. The acted on the behalf of ANOTHER ideology, communism. Communists just happen to be atheist in addition. I remember in a book reading about a humorous attempt to fuse Communism and Christianity, and hey, it worked. The commisar became the priest, but instead of "crossing" himself, a communist would "star" himself, doing the imaginary star on his body with three fingers, representing the Communist trinity, Ideology, Communist Party and People.

Actually one could argue that Jesus was the original commie, since he preached equality and was against material posessions. Let your friend wrap his head around that.

Chili

I'll take this one step further and say that the only true atheists is one who is God since God is that part of us that we do not know. Theists recognize this 'super-natural' existence and call it God while atheist call it not God but are inspired (read baffled) by it nonetheless (eg. panteism of sorts).

This would be where I hold that Catholic-ism ends where Christian-ity begins and I emphasize the -ity as a state of mind as opposed to an -ism that looks but can't see. This makes the -ity opposite to the -ism and that also leaves commune-ism behind for the solitary individual who is God and thus for whom not the commune but the entire world is his playground

Those who are torn between the -ism and the -ity are called saved-sinners who claim to have victory over death once they die. To this end the Church was happy to oblige and no apology is needed: http://museoprado.mcu.es/imuerteg.html