The Truth About Papal Infallibility
By Lee Penn
© Lee Penn, 2006-2009
“Take heed that no one leads you astray. For many will come in my name, saying , ‘I am
the Christ,’ and they will lead many astray.” (Matt. 24:4-5)
Introduction
With this report, I intend to call the world’s attention to a long-standing, commonly accepted
error in many Catholics’ thinking: the idolization of the Pope and the Papacy. My intent is to
warn readers to accept no man-made substitutes for the true God.
I show here that Popes can sin, sometimes gravely. I also show that serious errors in Catholic
teaching and practice – errors committed under Papal authority – can occur, and can persist for
centuries.
My intent is to warn against making idols of the Popes and of the Hierarchy. The objective of
this report is not to make an argument against the Catholic Faith itself, or to claim that all
Popes have been evil. On the contrary: this report is an effort to uphold the true Catholic
Faith and the salutary teachings of many Popes.
As for my beliefs:
I am a member of the Russian Catholic Church, an Orthodox Church in communion with Rome.
I therefore believe, as I vowed when being received into the Church:

“in one God Who is glorified and adored in the Trinity, the Father, the Son, and the Holy
Spirit: and I worship Him as my King and my God,”

in the teachings of “the Seven Holy Ecumenical Councils,”

in the teachings of Scripture “as understood and interpreted in the community of the Holy
Orthodox-Catholic Church of the East,”

in the seven life-giving and holy “Sacramental Mysteries of the Church,”

that in the Divine Liturgy “the faithful partake of the Body and Blood of our Lord Jesus
Christ, unto the remission of sins,”

that it is “proper to reverence and invoke the Saints who reign on high with Christ,”

that the intercessions of the saints “avail the beneficent God unto our salvation,”

that icons of Christ, the ever-Virgin Mary, and the saints “are worthy of being possessed and
honored, not unto idolatry, but that, through contemplation thereof, we may be incited unto
piety,”
Page 1 of 29

that prayers “for the salvation of those who have departed this life are favorably received,
through the mercy of God,”

that Christ is “the Foundation, Head and Great High Priest and Chief Shepherd of the Holy
Orthodox Catholic Church,”

that “Bishops, Pastors, and Teachers are appointed by Him to administer the Church,” and

that the Church is “the Bride of Christ.” [1]
The Faith stands, and will do so forever (despite Satan’s “best efforts” to destroy it, using the
evil deeds of men).
The Claim: Papal Infallibility
The teaching and the associated illusions:
1. Popes – supported by the Councils of the Roman Catholic Church – have claimed to teach
infallibly on matters of faith and morals. This claim was written into Roman Catholic dogma
in 1870, with the decree Pastor Aeternus by the First Vatican Council.
The text of the Vatican I decree on papal infallibility makes it clear that the scope of this
authority is limited; it applies to a Papal definition of doctrine on faith and morals, intended
to be binding on all:
“We teach and define as a divinely revealed dogma that when the Roman Pontiff speaks
EX CATHEDRA, that is, when, in the exercise of his office as shepherd and teacher of
all Christians, in virtue of his supreme apostolic authority, he defines a doctrine
concerning faith or morals to be held by the whole Church, he possesses, by the divine
assistance promised to him in blessed Peter, that infallibility which the divine Redeemer
willed his Church to enjoy in defining doctrine concerning faith or morals. Therefore,
such definitions of the Roman Pontiff are of themselves, and not by the consent of the
Church, irreformable.” [2]
This dogma was not defined by the Hierarchy until 1870 – which means either:
(a) that the Holy Spirit offered infallibility to the Church only after 1870 – about 1,840
years after Pentecost, when the Church began,
or
(b) that this decree was retroactive, covering all binding Papal teachings on “faith and
morals” since the Church was founded. This poses obvious problems, as I discuss below.
Page 2 of 29
In any case, there’s Scriptural evidence that Peter, who Roman Catholics consider to be the
first of the Popes, erred at least once after Pentecost in teaching “faith and morals,” and
required correction from St. Paul. As Paul said:
“But when Cephas came to Antioch I opposed him to his face, because he stood
condemned. For before certain men came from James, he ate with the Gentiles; but when
they came he drew back and separated himself, fearing the circumcision party. And with
him the rest of the Jews acted insincerely, so that even Barnabas was carried away by
their insincerity. But when I saw that they were not straightforward about the truth of the
gospel, I said to Cephas before them all, ‘If you, though a Jew, live like a Gentile and not
like a Jew, how can you compel the Gentiles to live like Jews?’” (Gal. 2:11-14)
Additionally, as a Catholic historian notes, “the popes of the first four centuries wielded
relatively limited authority beyond Rome and its immediate environs. … Not until the
pontificate of Leo the Great (440-461) was the claim of universal papal jurisdiction (that is,
over the whole Church, East as well as West) first articulated and an attempt made to
exercise it in any really decisive manner.” [3] Another historian of the Papacy adds, “No
controversy in the first thousand years of Christianity had been settled merely by Papal
fiat.”[4]
2. The Vatican has given the doctrine of infallibility a very wide interpretation, so as to cover
almost any Papal teachings with the mantle of infallibility. Pope John Paul II said in 1993:
“Alongside this infallibility of ex cathedra definitions, there is the charism of the Holy
Spirit’s assistance, granted to Peter and his successors so that they would not err in
matters of faith and morals, but rather shed great light on the Christian people. This
charism is not limited to exceptional cases, but embraces in varying degrees the whole
exercise of the Magisterium. … We will close by noting that the exercise of the
Magisterium is a concrete expression of the Roman Pontiff’s contribution to the
development of the Church's teaching.” [5]
Therefore, as article 2037 of the 1994 Catechism of the Catholic Church says:
“The law of God entrusted to the Church is taught to the faithful as the way of life and
truth. … They have the duty of observing the constitutions and decrees conveyed by the
legitimate authority of the Church. Even if they concern disciplinary matters, these
determinations call for docility in charity.” [6]
In other words, the Vatican says the faithful are to obey all teachings issued by the Catholic
Church, in matters of discipline as well as in faith and morals. A recent participant in a
Catholic discussion group understands what the Vatican wants, and urges us all to trust and
obey:
“When doubts cloud our minds and things seem grey, we should exhibit humble,
childlike trust in the Church and in the Pope. The Church is our sweet mother on earth
and the Pope is our spiritual father. Sometimes to children their parents seem arbitrary
Page 3 of 29
and contradictory, but it is only because they are lacking in the maturity to grasp things
that are beyond them.” [7]
The Vatican now extends its claim of infallibility even to the canonization of saints. A 1997
decree by Ratzinger’s Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith (CDF) says that “truths
connected to revelation by historical necessity and which are to be held definitively” by
Catholics include “the canonizations of saints (dogmatic facts).” [8]
The CDF says that Catholics must assent, “based on faith in the Holy Spirit’s assistance to
the Magisterium and on the Catholic doctrine of the infallibility of the Magisterium.” [9] A
pre-Vatican II theological manual explains that “if the Church could err in her opinion” that
“a member of the Church has been assumed into eternal bliss and may be the object of
general veneration,” “consequences would arise which would be incompatible with the
sanctity of the Church.” [10] So, the Vatican now says that whoever “denies these truths” –
including the accuracy of canonizations – “would be in a position of rejecting a truth of
Catholic doctrine and would therefore no longer be in full communion with the Catholic
Church.” [11]
If this ruling means what it says, those who deny that the founder of Opus Dei is a saint are
out of communion with Rome. Meanwhile, there’s the counter-example of Joan of Arc, who
was burned as a heretic in 1431, found innocent in a Church re-trial in 1456, and canonized
in 1920. [12]
3. In conjunction with this new doctrine on Papal authority, the trend since Pius IX has been to
promote the Pope as a living icon and a media star, and to make him the center of
Catholicism.
A historian of the Papacy says that in the mid-1800s, “in the age of cheap popular print
and the emergence of the mass media, the Pope himself became, quite literally, a popular
icon. Catholic households from Africa to the Americas were as likely to display a picture
of the Pope as a crucifix or a statue of the Virgin, and the face of Pio Nono [Pius IX] was
better known than that of any Pope in history.” [13] In 1876, Cardinal Henry Manning of
England said that the Pope, “stripped of his ‘temporal glory,’ was the living icon of the
Sacred Heart.” [14] A popular hymn of the time ran thus:
“Full in the panting Heart of Rome
Beneath the Apostle’s crowning dome.
From pilgrim lips that kiss the ground,
Breathes in all tongues one only sound:
‘God bless our Pope, the great the good!’” [15]
Such veneration apparently went to the Pope’s head. When Cardinal Guidi spoke at
Vatican I in favor of limiting the scope of Papal infallibility (saying that its use must be
assisted by “the counsel of the bishops manifesting the tradition of the churches”), Pius
IX reprimanded the Cardinal, saying “I am the tradition.” [16]
Page 4 of 29
There’s more …
The Greek-Catholic Patriarch Youssef had opposed the infallibility decree, and left
Rome before the dogma was voted upon. Later, Pius IX “forced the Patriarch to
kneel in front of him, then placed his foot on the Patriarch’s neck,” [17] and said,
“testa dura” [18] (in essence, calling him a stubborn mule). [19]
Pius IX, incidentally, was declared “Blessed” by John Paul II in 2000, putting him on the
road to canonization.
As Pius IX did, Leo XIII (1878-1903) continued. The historian Eamon Duffy said that
Leo “surrounded himself with the trappings of monarchy, insisted that Catholics received
in audiences kneel before him throughout the interview, never allowed his entourage to
sit in his presence, never in twenty-five years exchanged a single word with his
coachman.” [20]
John XXIII and Paul VI divested the Papacy of some of the courtly pomp and regal trappings
that it had inherited – but since the election of John Paul II, there has been a renewed
emphasis on the idolatrous mystique of the Papacy. The Pope is no longer lifted up and
carried about on a sedan chair by his footmen; he is lifted up before the whole world by his
publicists, with the cooperation of image-hungry media.

Recent news stories in Catholic and secular publications say that Benedict XVI is more
popular than John Paul II, as measured by attendance at Papal audiences and other
Vatican events.

George Weigel, a pro-war neoconservative and Catholic apologist, recently issued God’s
Choice : Pope Benedict XVI and the Future of the Catholic Church. The title implies that
the current Pope was the best choice, one made by God (acting through the Conclave).

Two writers for a Catholic Worker newspaper gave this headline to their story about the
death of John Paul II: “Our Dear Sweet Christ on Earth, John Paul II, Has Died.” [21] (St.
Catherine of Siena had used this phrase to describe the Pope in the 1300s.)
The Papal press secretary from 1984 until July 2006, under John Paul II and Benedict XVI,
was Dr. Joaquin Navarro-Valls. He stage-managed the recent Popes’ public image, and had
the background to do it: he is an Opus Dei numerary, a former actor and psychiatrist, and
author of a book titled Manipulation in Advertising. [22]
4. With the media-star status of current Popes goes encouragement of adulation of the Pope, and
uncritical support for his teachings and actions.
Catholic apologist Patrick Madrid says: “We call the Pope ‘The Holy Father’ because he
extends heaven’s paternal presence.” [23] He adds, “The Lord kept His promise to be with the
Church always, and this promise has been kept, par excellence, in the office of the
Papacy.”[24] Madrid describes St. Peter’s Basilica and the Vatican as “the universal focal
Page 5 of 29
point of the Christian religion” [25] – even though the Basilica was funded, in part, by the sale
of indulgences. (It was these sales, directed by Julius II and Leo X, that sparked Luther’s
protest in 1517). In the conclusion of his book-length defense of the Papacy against its
critics, Madrid says that Peter “was the first in a two-thousand-year line of bishops of Rome
who stand at the center of the Christian Church. In a sense you can say the popes are its
center.” [26] (Do you see the bait-and-switch being done: the substitution of a human ruler
for God as the head and center of the Church?)
What Madrid says, many have repeated – including the current Pope. On the day after his
election, Benedict XVI told the Cardinals that during “the death and the funeral of the
lamented John Paul II … the entire world looked to him with trust. To many it seemed as if
that intense participation, amplified to the confines of the planet by the social
communications media, was like a choral request for help addressed to the pope by modern
humanity which, wracked by fear and uncertainty, questions itself about the future.” [27]
Ratzinger seemed to put himself forward as the one to answer that “request for help,” by
reason of his election by God to the Papacy:
“If the weight of the responsibility that now lies on my poor shoulders is enormous, the
divine power on which I can count is surely immeasurable: ‘You are Peter and on this
rock I will build my Church.’ Electing me as the Bishop of Rome, the Lord wanted me as
his Vicar, he wished me to be the ‘rock’ upon which everyone may rest with
confidence.”[28]
These, indeed, are new teachings! Who knew that “everyone may rest with confidence” in
the God-appointed Bishop of Rome, or that the mass interest in the funeral of John Paul II
constituted a “choral request for help addressed to the pope by modern humanity”?
Strong leaders need willing followers. In response to the ongoing decay of Roman Catholic
institutions, various Catholic commentators have proposed strict obedience to the hierarchy
as the solution. Archbishop Charles Chaput of the Archdiocese of Denver spoke for them
when – as an antidote to the “prophetic” antics of liberal dissenters in religious orders – he
proposed that we follow one of the “Rules for Thinking with the Church” [29] offered during
the Reformation by St. Ignatius of Loyola. The “Thirteenth Rule,” cited by the Archbishop,
is:
“If we wish to proceed securely in all things, we must hold fast to the following principle:
What seems to me white, I will believe black if the hierarchical Church so defines. For I
must be convinced that in Christ our Lord, the Bridegroom, and in His spouse, the
Church, only one Spirit holds sway, which governs and rules for the salvation of souls.
For it is by the same Spirit and Lord who gave the Ten Commandments that our holy
mother Church is ruled and governed.” [30]
With the call to strict obedience comes the habit of secrecy, as may be required to protect the
assets and reputation of the institution. In October 2003, when John Paul II named 30 men as
cardinals, the oath they all swore included this vow: “not to reveal to any one what is
Page 6 of 29
confided to me in secret, nor to divulge what may bring harm or dishonor to Holy
Church.”[31] This reads like a charter for covering up priestly abuse and hierarchical
malfeasance.
Such policies and propaganda encourage people to focus on, and follow, the Pope – without
considering whether Papal teachings and policies are consistent with the teachings of Christ.
This view of authority and obedience is straight out of George Orwell’s novel 1984. As the
Inner Party inquisitor told Winston, the imprisoned dissident, “Whatever the Party holds to
be truth is truth. It is impossible to see reality except by looking through the eyes of the
Party.” [32] Acceptance of this irrational mind-set prepares the faithful to goose-step off a
spiritual cliff.
Page 7 of 29
The Reality: Papal Sins and Heresies
The Papacy and its history:
Catholic apologists magnify the Pope and the Papacy, saying: “The Pope is the flesh-and-blood
reminder” of the “Church and its teachings. He personifies Catholicism – and for some this is
personally offensive.” [33]
Leaving aside the bait-and-switch tactic (why would the Pope – not Christ – personify
Catholicism?), to exalt the person of the Pope ignores history. The Popes of the 20th Century
were, for the most part, virtuous in their personal lives. Many who preceded them were quite
otherwise. Whatever it was that they personified, it was not from God.
The Papacy from 896 to 1046 AD

Even the Vatican’s apologists acknowledge that the Papacy passed through a dark age from
896 to 1046; they describe the Papacy of the 900s as a “pornocracy,” due to its domination
by the Theophylacts, a corrupt family of Roman nobles. The Papal misdeeds of this era
include: [34]

Boniface VI (896): died after about 15 days in office – the second shortest Papal term of
office in history. He was elected despite having been defrocked twice (once from the
sub-diaconate, and once from the priesthood, and without being canonically reinstated to
orders) by Pope John VIII for immorality.[35]

Stephen VI (896-897): exhumed the corpse of Pope Formosus (891-896), tried it for
offenses against canon law in the “Cadaver Synod,” and had the former Pope’s body
mutilated (the three fingers used for blessing were chopped off) and the remains tossed
into the Tiber. This outraged the population to the point of insurrection. Stephen was
deposed and strangled – and then buried in St. Peter’s.

Sergius III (904-911): jailed and strangled his predecessor Leo V (903), as well as the
antipope Christopher who had overthrown Leo. Sergius reaffirmed the “Cadaver Synod”
verdict against Pope Formosus, and bore an illegitimate son with the Theophylact
noblewoman Marozia; the boy later became Pope John XI.

John X (914-928): In order to gain the release of the French King (Charles the Simple)
from his imprisonment by Count Heribert of Aquitaine, John confirmed the election of
the Count’s five-year-old son as Archbishop of Rheims.

John XII (955-964): elected at age 18, deposed for “perfidy and treason” in 963,
overthrew his successor after a few months, and “died at age twenty-eight – of a stroke
suffered while in the bed of a married woman.” [36] A traditionalist historian says, “The
Lateran Palace was called a brothel in his day, thanks to his diverse taste in lovers – both
Page 8 of 29
in terms of gender and number.” [37] John “did not hesitate to consecrate as bishop a tenyear-old boy as token of his affection, or to give sacred vessels to prostitutes.” [38]

John XIX (1024-1032): won election through bribery.

Benedict IX (1032-1045): According to a traditionalist historian, “his personal life was so
disgusting (filled as it was with mistresses and rumors of incest and sodomy) that one of
the city’s factions was able to rally support against him and drive Benedict out of
Rome.[39] After he fought his way back to power, he soon “accepted a bribe to abdicate
in favor of his godfather, the archpriest John Gratian.”[40]

Gregory VI (1045-1046): John Gratian was deposed for having bought election to the
Papacy.
The Papacy from 1455 to 1555 AD

The Papacy of 1455-1555 likewise earned infamy for its immorality. [41] As is obvious,
various Papal decisions (those that apologists describe as “disciplinary acts”) led directly to
Protestant revolts in Germany and England. During this period, ancient paganism became
respectable in the Vatican; Curial writing referred to “God the Father as ‘Jupiter Optimus
Maximus,’ to the Virgin Mary as ‘Diana,’ to the Apostles as ‘legates,’ and to the bishops as
‘proconsuls.’” [42]

Callistus III (1455-1458): made two nephews cardinals, and made a third nephew the
commander of the Papal army. One of these nephews, Rodrigo Borgia, was made
cardinal-deacon at age 25, and became vice-chancellor of the Holy See at age 26. This
posting – and the immense wealth that the young cardinal was able to gain from it –
paved the way for Rodrigo’s election as Pope Alexander VI in 1492.

Pius II (1458-1464): “known throughout Italy and beyond as a connoisseur, an historian,
and the author of erotic plays and tales.” [43] Pius II made two nephews cardinals; one of
these – who got his red hat at age 21 – reigned for a month as Pius III (1503).

Paul II (1464-1471): according to a liberal historian, he was “among the worst of the
Renaissance popes: a vain, intellectually shallow, ostentatious playboy.” [44]

Sixtus IV (1471-1484): named six nephews to the College of Cardinals; one of these
would later become Pope Julius II. Sixtus’ coronation tiara cost 100,000 ducats – and
this was just the beginning of his extravagances. He “connived at the Pazzi conspiracy to
murder Lorenzo and Giuliano de’ Medici at High Mass at the Duomo in Florence.” [45]
Giuliano died, but Lorenzo survived, and Florence rose against the Pope’s allies. In
response, “the pope placed Florence under interdict, and a two years’ war with the city
began.” [46]

Innocent VIII (1484-1492): won election by bribery, and created a plethora of
unnecessary new posts in the Curia, auctioning them to the highest bidder to raise money.
Page 9 of 29
In 1489, he struck a deal with the Turkish Sultan. The Pope detained the Sultan Bayezit’s
fugitive (and rival) brother in Rome, and the Sultan gave the Pope an initial payment
“almost equal to the total annual revenue of the papal state,” [47] plus an annual fee of
45,000 gold ducats, plus the relic of the Holy Lance, which supposedly pierced the side
of Christ on the Cross. He made Giovanni Medici a cardinal at age 13; the young man
was later elected as Pope Leo X.

Alexander VI (1492-1503): The father of “at least nine illegitimate children,”[48] he won
his election by “generous bribes and promises of lucrative appointments and benefices,”
and soon made clear that “the consuming passions of his pontificate would be gold,
women, and the interests of his family. He named his son Cesare, at age eighteen, a
cardinal, along with the brother of the current papal mistress. He also arranged several
marriages for his daughter Lucrezia and often left her in charge of the papacy, as virtual
regent, when he was away from Rome.” [49] The aforementioned papal mistress was
Giulia Farnese, wife of Orsino Orsini; Romans referred to her sarcastically as “the bride
of Christ.”[50]

Julius II (1503-1513): the nephew of Sixtus IV, and made cardinal by him at age 18.
While a cardinal, he sired three daughters. With the aid of “substantial bribes and
promises of ecclesiastical preferments,” he won unanimous election to the Papacy in a
one-day conclave.[51] Julius donned silver armor and led his armies across Italy to
expand the Papal States. He gave Henry VIII, the King of England, a dispensation to
marry his brother’s widow, Catherine of Aragon. (The dispensation soon backfired.
When Henry sought an annulment from his marriage to Catherine, Pope Clement VII
refused. This led to the Anglican schism of 1534.) Julius laid the cornerstone of the new
Basilica of St. Peter in 1506 – but made the fateful decision to cover the construction
costs by selling indulgences. In the bull Cum tam divino, he also declared Papal elections
invalid if gained through simony – an ironic ruling, given the circumstances of his own
election.
Ironically, the sainted Pope Pius X reversed this decree. In the 1904 decree Vacante Sede
Apostolica, Pius condemned simony, but held that this would not invalidate a Papal
election. His successors did the same. John Paul II ruled in 1996 that “If – God forbid –
in the election of the Roman Pontiff the crime of simony were to be perpetrated, I decree
and declare that all those guilty thereof shall incur excommunication latae sententiae. At
the same time I remove the nullity or invalidity of the same simoniacal provision, in order
that – as was already established by my Predecessors – the validity of the election of the
Roman Pontiff may not for this reason be challenged.”[52]

Leo X (1513-1521): Upon his election, he said, “God has given us the papacy; now let us
enjoy it.”[53] He continued the sale of indulgences to finance construction of St. Peter’s.
It was the marketing of this “spiritual benefit” by the Dominican preacher John Tetzel
that caused Luther to post the “95 Theses” on the cathedral door at Wittenberg in 1517,
starting the Reformation. King Henry VIII publicly opposed Luther and wrote In
Defense of the Seven Sacraments; as a reward for this book, Leo gave the English King
the title of “Defender of the Faith” – a title that the English royalty have continued using
Page 10 of 29
ever since, despite their schism from Rome. One of Leo’s cardinals was his nephew,
Giulio de’ Medici, who was later elected as Clement VII (1523-1534).

Paul III (1534-1549): while serving as a cardinal, he had kept a mistress, by whom he
had four children. Upon his election, the first two cardinals he chose were his teenage
grandsons. Paul “was an ardent believer in astrology, timing consistories, audiences,
even the issue of bulls, according to the most auspicious arrangement of the stars.” [54]

Julius III (1550-1555): “created a scandal because of his infatuation with a fifteen-yearold boy whom he picked up in the streets of Parma, had his brother adopt, and then made
a cardinal and head of the Secretariat of State.”[55] Another biographer describes this
youth, Fabiano (who took the name of Innocenzo del Monte), as a “depraved …
custodian of monkeys,” [56] and a Roman satirist of the time described Fabiano as an
“empty and feminine boy.”[57] Fabiano fell from grace after Julius III died. Pius IV
jailed Fabiano for killing two people at a banquet, and exiled him after his release from
prison; Pius V removed Fabiano’s red hat.
The standards set forth by St. Paul for bishops
Contrast the behavior of these Popes to the standards that St. Paul set forth for bishops:
“The saying is sure: If any one aspires to the office of bishop, he desires a noble task. Now a
bishop must be above reproach, the husband of one wife, temperate, sensible, dignified,
hospitable, an apt teacher, no drunkard, not violent but gentle, not quarrelsome, and no lover
of money. He must manage his own household well, keeping his children submissive and
respectful in every way; for if a man does not know how to manage his own household, how
can he care for God’s church? He must not be a recent convert, or he may be puffed up with
conceit and fall into the condemnation of the devil; moreover he must be well thought of by
outsiders, or he may fall into reproach and the snare of the devil.” (1 Tim. 3:1-7)
Some Popes have been evil, indeed. Their good works notwithstanding (John XII, for example,
supported the monastic reform that began at Cluny, and the Renaissance popes commissioned
great works of religious art), these Popes demonstrate that no earthly religious leader
“personifies Catholicism.” The deeds of these Popes show that Gregory VII (1073-1085) was in
error when he asserted, in the Dictatus Papae, that “the Roman pontiff, if he have been
canonically ordained, is undoubtedly made a saint by the merits of St. Peter.”[58]
Another part of the Dictatus was “the claim that the Pope alone has the right to use the imperial
insignia, or that princes shall kiss his foot;” these were derived from the Donation of
Constantine,[59] a fraudulent document.
The Defenders of the Hierarchy fail in their efforts
Defenders of the Hierarchy say that (1) even the worst of Popes never formally taught heresy,
and (2) that the evil behavior of some Popes does not impair their authority and accuracy as
teachers of the Faith. This defense fails on both counts:
Page 11 of 29
1. Several Popes have indeed fallen into heresy,[60] at least for a time, and one Pope was
anathematized by an Ecumenical Council.

Liberius (352-366): initially opposed the Arian heresy (which denied the divinity of
Christ), and was exiled in 355 by the Arian emperor Constantius II. Under duress,
Liberius approved a semi-Arian creed that had been produced by a church synod, and
excommunicated the orthodox bishop Athanasius. The Emperor allowed the Pope to
return to Rome in 358. Only after the Emperor died in 361 did Liberius return to
orthodoxy, reinstating Athanasius and urging all bishops to adhere to the faith that had
been stated at the Council of Nicaea.

Zosimus (417-418): initially revoked the prior Pope’s condemnation of Pelagius (who
promoted the heresy that men can be saved by their own efforts, without the need for
divine grace). After protests from bishops in North Africa, including St. Augustine), the
Pope reversed himself and restated Rome’s opposition to the heresy.

Vigilius (537-555): vacillated between support for orthodox theology (as taught by
Chalcedon – that Christ is fully God and fully man, thus having two natures) and the
Monophysite heresy, which teaches that Christ has only one nature. (As with Liberius,
coercion by the Emperor explained some of Vigilius’ conduct.)
Vigilius’ greatest crime had been the way he obtained the Papacy: he had aligned himself
with the dissolute Empress Theodora, posed as a Monophysite sympathizer to gain her
support, and went to Rome with her money to buy election as Pope. The clergy there had
already elected Silverius as Pope; the Imperial authorities responded by sending Silverius
into exile and declaring the Holy See to be vacant. Vigilius won the new Papal election,
arrested Silverius as soon as the former Pope returned to Rome, and exiled him again –
leading to Silverius’ early death by starvation. As a historian of the Papacy reports, “To
all intents and purposes, one Pope, and he the son of a pope, had been deposed and
murdered by another.” [61] These acts raise a question: shouldn’t posing as a heretic, and
doing so with such lethal effect, “count” against a Pope in the same way that intentionally
issuing a heretical encyclical would?

Honorius I (625-638): adhered to Monothelitism, which held that there is only one
(divine) will in Christ. After Honorius died, he was solemnly condemned as a heretic by
the Third Council of Constantinople, (680-681 – the Sixth Ecumenical Council). [62]
Pope Leo II (682-683) affirmed the verdict, saying, “We anathematize … Honorius, who
did not attempt to sanctify this Apostolic Church with the teaching of Apostolic tradition,
but by profane treachery permitted its purity to be polluted.” [63] The Seventh
Ecumenical Council (787) restated this condemnation. [64] Even though Honorius did not
formally define his view as Church teaching, [65] this event clearly shows that Popes can
be heretical.
2. “Teaching” involves more that putting orthodox words into an encyclical with the
appropriate canonical formulae. Jesus taught by his acts as well as with his sermons. Any
Page 12 of 29
wise parent, teacher, or manager knows that bad example can – and usually will – negate
even the most inspired or well-intentioned of their words (or teachings) given to those under
their authority. As the Apostle James said: “faith, by itself, if it has no works, is dead.”
(James 2:17). Thus, when Popes lived evil lives – and yet more, when they pursued evil
policies using the power, resources, and authority associated with their office – they were
teachers of evil.
Lord Acton, a Catholic historian in 19th Century England, makes this case for sober and realistic
judgment of the behavior of Popes (and other powerful men):
“I cannot accept your canon that we are to judge Pope and King unlike other men, with a
favourable presumption that they did no wrong. If there is any presumption it is the other
way against the holders of power, increasing as the power increases. Historic responsibility
has to make up for the want of legal responsibility. Power tends to corrupt and absolute
power corrupts absolutely. Great men are almost always bad men, even when they exercise
influence and not authority: still more when you superadd the tendency or the certainty of
corruption by authority. There is no worse heresy than that the office sanctifies the holder of
it.” [66]
Page 13 of 29
The Teachings of the Magisterium, and a History of its Fallibility:
Catholic apologists say:
“When it comes to faith and morals, the Magisterium is our divine guarantee of freedom
from error. There is no other.” [67]
and
“Through the assistance of the Holy Spirit, the Church has for two thousand years clearly
heard the voice of the Great Shepherd.” [68]
That’s true in part: Scripture and Sacraments have indeed been handed down to us, despite the
worst efforts of many hierarchs, scribes, and teachers. But the actual Magisterium of the
Catholic Church, as it has been in history, has included these things, which (at the time) had
every appearance of being official, authoritative, permanent teaching:

Support for Crusades and religious warfare:
In 1095, Pope Urban II called for a Crusade to recapture the Holy Land from the Muslims,
saying “I, or rather the Lord, beseech you to publish this everywhere … Christ commands
it. All who die by the way, whether by land or sea, or in battle against the pagans, shall have
immediate remission of sins. This I grant them by the power of God with which I am
invested.” [69] A present-day Catholic apologist says, “despite their dark moments, the
Crusades were understandable and even necessary.” [70] These “dark moments” included the
massacre of Jews and Muslims when the Crusaders seized Jerusalem in 1099, and the rape
and massacre of Christians of the Eastern Empire, as well as the pillage of Constantinople in
1204 by a wayward Crusading army – an act of aggression that made permanent the schism
between the Eastern and Western churches, and fatally weakened the Byzantine Empire.
By 1291, the last Crusader kingdom in the Levant fell. Popes also called, and gave
indulgences for, Crusades against Albigensians in southern France (1209-1229, called by
Innocent III) and Hussites in Bohemia (1420-1431, called by Martin V), and continued to call
for Crusades against the Turks until the late 1500s. Religious war, when blessed by the
Pope, was part of the “ordinary Magisterium” for at least 500 years.
Ordinary Papal statecraft, outside of declared Crusades, could have similarly gruesome
results. “Successive popes poured money into supporting the Catholic side in the French
Wars of Religion. … In 1572, after the St. Bartholomew’s Day Massacre in France, during
which between 5,000 and 10,000 Protestants had been butchered, Gregory XIII ordered the
celebration of a solemn ‘Te Deum’ of thanksgiving.” [71] Gregory also had a medal struck to
commemorate the event, and commissioned a fresco, The Night of St. Bartholomew, for the
Vatican’s Royal Hall. [72] In the early years of the Thirty Years’ War in Central Europe (a
war in which Germany lost one-third of its population [73]), “Paul V and Gregory XV
between them would pour more than 2,000,000 florins in subsidies to Catholic armies.” [74]
Page 14 of 29
Such was the ordinary Magisterium, in theory and in practice, for centuries – and this
teaching was binding upon the faithful.
The Catholic Church is no longer in the business of war in the name of religion. With the
decree Dignitatis Humanae, issued in 1965 by the Second Vatican Council, the Church
disavowed religious coercion. In his 1991 encyclical Centesimus Annus, Pope John Paul II
said, “I myself, on the occasion of the recent tragic war in the Persian Gulf, repeated the cry:
‘Never again war!’. No, never again war, which destroys the lives of innocent people,
teaches how to kill, throws into upheaval even the lives of those who do the killing and
leaves behind a trail of resentment and hatred, thus making it all the more difficult to find a
just solution of the very problems which provoked the war.” [75] The Pope likewise opposed
the Persian Gulf war that the US started in 2003. Those who promote a crusade against Islam
today are rarely Catholic; they are more likely to be Evangelical Protestant dispensationalists
or extremist Israelis.
The Catholic Magisterium (in this case, on war for the faith), has changed – for the better.

Support for absolute government:
In the West’s ongoing, centuries-long struggle for representative government and human
liberty, the Church often stood for absolute government.
Innocent III (1198-1216) had excommunicated King John of England in 1209 for refusing to
accept the Pope’s choice as Archbishop of Canterbury. After the King submitted to the Pope,
giving his realm to the Pope as a fief, the Pope supported John’s full royal power. Innocent
III declared the Magna Carta void because the barons had forced the king to accept
limitation of his powers, without the consent of the Pope (who was now King John’s feudal
lord). The Pope opposed a charter that said that no one – not even the King – was above the
law. For centuries, Popes acted in the same spirit.
For almost 100 years after the French Revolution of 1789, Popes stood firmly for a
restoration of the Old Regime, the alliance of Throne and Altar. Leo XII (1823-1829)
“reinstated the feudal aristocracy, with privileged positions, in the Papal States;” “Jews were
once again confined to ghettos and their property confiscated;” he enforced “a harsh police
state,” with press censorship, capital punishment, and secret police. [76] Gregory XVI (18311846) held onto the Papal states with the aid of French and Austrian bayonets, and
condemned liberalism in the encyclical Mirari Vos. In 1832, the Pope issued the statement
Superori Anno, denouncing the 1830 Polish revolution against the Tsar (who was then
actively persecuting Catholics). Gregory rejected “those who under cover of religion have
set themselves against the legitimate power of princes,” and warned bishops to resist
“impostors and propagators of new ideas.” [77]
Pius IX (1846-1878) began his reign as a reformer, but reverted to his predecessors’ attitudes
after his narrow escape from a revolutionary siege in 1848. In the 1864 Syllabus of Errors,
Pius condemned the idea that “The Roman Pontiff can, and ought to, reconcile himself, and
come to terms with progress, liberalism and modern civilization.” [78] Pius held onto the
Page 15 of 29
Papal states only with foreign troops; once the French garrison withdrew from Rome in 1870,
the last of “Peter’s Patrimony” fell into the hands of the new Italian kingdom. Pius
excommunicated the leaders of the Italian unification movement, and ordered Catholics not
to participate in the political affairs of the new state. Papal policy and papal teachings – at
the level of encyclicals, which were issued for the whole Church – were consistent in their
opposition to political liberalism of any kind.
The 19th Century Italian insurgents, seemingly, deserved a sentence of excommunication by
Pius IX. However, the Catholics among the Nazi leaders (including Hitler, who was born
Catholic), were never excommunicated by the two Popes who ruled from 1933 to 1945. Nor
did Pius XII ever condemn the Nazis’ aggression against Catholic Poland. [79] Not until June
1945 – with Hitler dead and the Third Reich defeated – did the Pope say that Nazism was “a
satanic spectre … the cult of violence, the idolatry of race and blood, the overthrow of
human liberty and dignity.” [80]
With the Papacy of Leo XIII (1878-1903), a policy change began. In the 1881 encyclical
Diuturnum Illud, Leo said that “the right to rule is from God,” but “that those who may be
placed over the State may in certain cases be chosen by the will and decision of the
multitude, without opposition to or impugning Catholic doctrine.” [81] Pope John XXIII
(1958-1963) said in the 1963 encyclical Pacem in Terris that
“The fact that authority comes from God does not mean that men have no power to
choose those who are to rule the State, or to decide upon the type of government they
want, and determine the procedure and limitations of rulers in the exercise of their
authority. Hence the above teaching is consonant with any genuinely democratic form of
government. … A natural consequence of men’s dignity is unquestionably their right to
take an active part in government.” [82]
This perspective, which supports constitutional government, civil liberty, and human rights,
has been part of Church teaching only since Vatican II.
Again, the Church’s Magisterium changed – for the better, after centuries of standing against
representative and limited government.

Tacit Endorsement of Slavery:
A history of the Church’s stance on slavery – written in 2005 for Crisis, a conservative,
Republican party-oriented Catholic magazine – shows that the Church has had a mixed
record, at best, in dealing with this ancient and brutal human institution.
Author T. David Curp says:
“Theology worked hand-in-hand with Christendom’s strategic imperatives to expand
slavery among Christians at the dawn of the modern era, and even led the papacy to grant
religious approval to slave-taking. … The papacy endorsed Portuguese—and eventually
Spanish—slave-taking out of cruel necessity. Popes Eugenius IV and a later successor,
Page 16 of 29
Sixtus IV, both condemned Portuguese raids in the Canary Islands in the mid–15th
century in places where Christians already lived. But these condemnations came within
the broader context of papal support for a Portuguese crusade in Africa that did include
slave-taking. Eugenius IV and his immediate successor issued a series of bulls, including
Illius Qui (1442), Dum Diversus (1452), and Romanus Pontificus (1455), that recognized
the rights of the monarchs of Portugal and eventually Spain to engage in a wide-ranging
slave trade in the Mediterranean and Africa—first under the guise of crusading, and then
as a part of regular commerce. As Pope Nicholas authorized the Portuguese in Romanus
Pontificus:
‘We [therefore] weighing all and singular the premises with due meditation, and
noting that since we had formerly by other letters of ours granted among other things
free and ample faculty to the aforesaid King Alfonso—to invade, search out, capture,
vanquish, and subdue all Saracens, and other enemies of Christ wheresoever placed,
and the kingdoms, dukedoms, principalities, dominions, possessions, and all movable
and immovable goods whatsoever held and possessed by them and to reduce their
persons to perpetual slavery, and to apply and appropriate to himself and his
successors the kingdoms, dukedoms, counties, principalities, dominions, possessions,
and goods, and to convert them to his and their use and profit….’
The occasional papal pronouncements against slavery earlier in the 15th century and later
in the 16th century sought to regulate particular abuses, but they did not deny Spain and
Portugal the right to engage in the trade itself. All of these bulls were issued just prior to
and after the Ottoman conquest of Constantinople. … The Ottomans’ advance on
Europe, in addition to its general destructiveness, also saw Muslims taking thousands of
Christian slaves each year through piracy, conquest, and the devshirme tithe. As a result,
the pontiffs of the day were in no position to refuse Portugal and Spain—two of the few
great Christian powers enthusiastic about crusading—the opportunity to develop their
economic power in whatever way they saw fit. Far from being an innocent bystander, or
merely silently complicit, the papacy fully participated in the expansion of the European
slave trade.” [83]
Curp defends this stance taken by the Church – and several Popes:
“This was not a product of greed, but of a thoroughly rational and tangible fear of the
consequences of not using every available means to defend a rapidly contracting
16th-century Christendom. Divorced from the context of a Europe under a tightening
Ottoman siege, papal engagement with the slave trade would appear to confirm the
worst prejudices of secular critics. Placed within its historical environment, however,
what we confront is the lay faithful and their shepherds accepting a real evil—
slavery—to avoid their own subjugation to militant Islam.”[84]
Such a utilitarian defense, accepting an evil so that greater good may come of it, is a
standard argument in secular politics. However, this approach is foreign to the message
of the Gospels.
Page 17 of 29
Later Popes – most notably, Gregory XVI, in his 1839 statement In Supremo – did
condemn the slave trade. The “Vicar of Christ” came late to this understanding; the
“heretical” Quakers and Evangelical Protestants in Great Britain had agitated for the
abolition of slavery from 1750 onward. After Brazil abolished slavery in 1889, Leo XIII
issued the encyclical Catholicae Ecclesiae (1890), saying: “the Church from the
beginning sought to completely eliminate slavery, whose wretched yoke has oppressed
many people. … This zeal of the Church for liberating the slaves has not languished with
the passage of time; on the contrary, the more it bore fruit, the more eagerly it glowed.
… We could not repudiate such a laudable inheritance. For this reason, We have taken
every occasion to openly condemn this gloomy plague of slavery.” [85]
Finally, Vatican II issued a condemnation of slavery, torture, and other death-dealing
social evils, in the 1965 decree Gaudium et Spes:
“Furthermore, whatever is opposed to life itself, such as any type of murder,
genocide, abortion, euthanasia or wilful self-destruction, whatever violates the
integrity of the human person, such as mutilation, torments inflicted on body or mind,
attempts to coerce the will itself; whatever insults human dignity, such as subhuman
living conditions, arbitrary imprisonment, deportation, slavery, prostitution, the
selling of women and children; as well as disgraceful working conditions, where men
are treated as mere tools for profit, rather than as free and responsible persons; all
these things and others of their like are infamies indeed. They poison human society,
but they do more harm to those who practice them than those who suffer from the
injury. Moreover, they are supreme dishonor to the Creator.” [86]
Regarding slavery, torture, and coercion of conscience, the Magisterium got it right this
time. Better late than never!

Requiring membership in the Roman Catholic Church for salvation:
Before Vatican II, the formal teaching of the Church about the way to salvation was clear,
and repeated with the highest level of authority for centuries: only those who are members of
the Roman Catholic Church (and accept the authority of the Roman Pontiff) could be saved.

Under Pope Innocent III (1198-1216), the Fourth Lateran Council (1215) said, “One
indeed is the universal Church of the faithful, outside which no one at all is saved.” [87]

In his bull Unam Sanctam (1302), Pope Boniface VIII (1294-1303) said, “We declare,
say, define, and proclaim to every human creature that they by necessity for salvation are
entirely subject to the Roman Pontiff.” [88]

Under Pope Eugene IV (1431-1447), the Council of Florence decreed in 1442 that it
“firmly believes, professes and proclaims that those not living within the Catholic
Church, not only pagans, but also Jews and heretics and schismatics, cannot become
participants in eternal life, but will depart “into everlasting fire, which was prepared for
the devil and his angels” [Matt. 25:41], unless before the end of life the same have been
Page 18 of 29
added to the flock; and that the unity of the ecclesiastical body is so strong that only to
those remaining in it are the Sacraments of the Church are of benefit for salvation … and
that no one, whatever almsgiving he has practiced, even if he has shed blood for the name
of Christ, can be saved, unless he has remained in the bosom and unity of the Catholic
Church.” [89]
This rigorous view, which defined those not visibly in union with the Catholic Church as
damned, began to soften under Pius IX. In his 1863 encyclical Quanto conficiamur moerore,
the Pope said, “they who labor in invincible ignorance of our most holy religion and who,
zealously keeping the natural law and its precepts engraved in the hearts of all by God, and
being ready to obey God, live an honest and upright life, can … attain eternal life.” [90]
The Second Vatican Council was yet more generous in its view of the possibility of salvation
outside the Roman Catholic Church. Although the Council said, “Whosoever, therefore,
knowing that the Catholic Church was made necessary by Christ, would refuse to enter or to
remain in it, could not be saved,” [91] it also said:
“The Church recognizes that in many ways she is linked with those who, being baptized,
are honored with the name of Christian, though they do not profess the faith in its entirety
or do not preserve unity of communion with the successor of Peter. … They also share
with us in prayer and other spiritual benefits. Likewise we can say that in some real way
they are joined with us in the Holy Spirit, for to them too He gives His gifts and graces
whereby He is operative among them with His sanctifying power.” [92]
and
“Finally, those who have not yet received the Gospel are related in various ways to the
people of God. In the first place we must recall the people to whom the testament and the
promises were given and from whom Christ was born according to the flesh. On account
of their fathers this people remains most dear to God, for God does not repent of the gifts
He makes nor of the calls He issues. But the plan of salvation also includes those who
acknowledge the Creator. In the first place amongst these there are the Mohammedans,
who, professing to hold the faith of Abraham, along with us adore the one and merciful
God, who on the last day will judge mankind. Nor is God far distant from those who in
shadows and images seek the unknown God, for it is He who gives to all men life and
breath and all things, and as [the] Saviour wills that all men be saved. Those also can
attain to salvation who through no fault of their own do not know the Gospel of Christ or
His Church, yet sincerely seek God and moved by grace strive by their deeds to do His
will as it is known to them through the dictates of conscience. Nor does Divine
Providence deny the helps necessary for salvation to those who, without blame on their
part, have not yet arrived at an explicit knowledge of God and with His grace strive to
live a good life.” [93]
In other words, there is no automatic damnation for the “pagans, but also Jews and
heretics and schismatics” whom the Council of Florence had cast into the eternal fire.
Page 19 of 29
In this instance, the Council returned to the perspective of Christ, who had said “when I am
lifted up from the earth, will draw all men to myself.” (John 12:32). Centuries of “ordinary
Magisterium” – including Conciliar and Papal decrees – that assumed [94] the perdition of
non-Catholics were thus overturned. Deo Gratias!

Use of torture and capital punishment to combat heresy:
Pope Gregory IX (1227-1241) established the first Inquisition in 1231, with the constitution
Excommunicamus. In 1252, Pope Innocent IV (1243-1254) issued the bull Ad Extirpanda,
allowing the use of torture to extract confessions. These tribunals, often run by Franciscans
and Dominicans, sought out heretics and other offenders against faith and morals. Churchimposed penalties could range from public penance to life imprisonment; those to be
executed were handed over to the secular authorities. Such “rendition” of convicted heretics
was accompanied by a ritual plea for mercy – but woe betide the local official who did not
kill the heretic; he might find himself facing the Inquisitors. [95]
The Roman Inquisition acted under Papal authority; its courts operated until the Papal states
fell to Italian insurgents in the mid-1800s. The Spanish Inquisition was under royal control,
but was established in 1478 with Papal approval. It was Torquemada, the Church-appointed
head of the Inquisition, who suggested to the government that the Jews and Muslims should
be expelled from Spain if they did not convert to Christianity. [96] The Spanish Inquisition
issued its last death sentence for heresy in 1824, and the institution was ended in 1834. [97]
(Its last victim, a schoolteacher, was hanged for substituting “Praise be to God” for “Ave
Maria” in school prayers.) [98] The liberal nationalists of the 1800s, inspired by the French
Revolution, ended a system of organized injustice that professed Christians had kept in
operation for six hundred years.
Church apologists reply that “papal infallibility falls strictly into the province of teaching
doctrine, while the Inquisition was concerned with discipline. … The Inquisition was
merely a legal entity that acted in the name of the pope” to enquire into the guilt of suspected
heretics. [99] Nevertheless, Papal approval of tribunals that “disciplined” heretics with
torture and death was also a Papal statement about faith and morals: that it was just and right
to treat religious enemies in this fashion.
Some Catholics still hold this opinion. Dr. Warren Carroll, the Catholic historian, founder of
Christendom College and speaker for Mother Angelica’s EWTN, wrote that Hitler and Stalin
“would not have been free to gain power in a time which would have taken them at their
word and knew the cost and consequences of their hatred of Christianity, which many of
those condemned by the Inquisition also nourished. Tomás de Torquemada would have
known how to deal – and to deal early – with Hitler and Stalin.” [100]
The Catholic Church now regrets these policies. The 1994 Catechism said, “In times past,
cruel practices were commonly used by legitimate governments to maintain law and order,
often without protest from the Pastors of the Church, who themselves adopted in their own
tribunals the prescriptions of Roman law concerning torture. Regrettable as these facts are,
the Church always taught the duty of clemency and mercy. She forbade clerics to shed blood.
Page 20 of 29
In recent times it has become evident that these cruel practices were neither necessary for
public order, nor in conformity with the legitimate rights of the human person. On the
contrary, these practices led to ones even more degrading. It is necessary to work for their
abolition. We must pray for the victims and their tormentors.” [101] As apologies go, it’s a
start – even if the statement of regret is mixed with excuses for the conduct of Church
authorities.

Violation of Free Will – Censorship:
Beyond all this, there’s the matter of the Index of Forbidden Books, established in 1557 by
Paul IV (1555-1559), last revised in 1948 and (fortunately) abolished in 1966 by Paul VI.
While the Index was in force, Catholics were forbidden on pain of mortal sin to sell, own, or
read the books on the list unless they got permission from their bishop. Violators could be
excommunicated.
What’s noteworthy about the Index is what was included, and what was excluded. English
language books on the banned list included the Anglican Book of Common Prayer (banned in
1714), John Milton’s Paradise Lost, philosophical books by John Locke, Jeremy Bentham,
Bernard de Mandeville, and John Stuart Mill, and The Decline and Fall of the Roman
Empire, by Edward Gibbon. [102] However, two of the deadliest books of the 20th century,
Hitler’s Mein Kampf and the anti-Semitic forgery The Protocols of the Elders of Zion, were
not on the list of books that were forbidden to Catholic readers.

Witch-hunting – Institutionalized Murder:
The hunt for witches was an equal-opportunity obsession in the period from 1450 to 1650;
Catholics and Protestants alike used Inquisitional methods to hunt down and destroy them.
In any case, the Popes of the time stoked the frenzy.

Pope John XXII (1316-1334) issued the bull Super Illius Specula in 1326, [103]
“specifically authorizing the inquisition to proceed against all sorcerers, since they adored
demons and had made ‘a pact with hell.’” [104]

A German inquisitor, Heinrich Institoris, persuaded Innocent VIII to issue the bull
Summis Desiderantes Affectibus in 1484, which gave full Papal support for repression of
witches by the Inquisition. [105] In 1486, Institoris published the Malleus Maleficarum
(The Hammer Against the Witches), with Papal approval and with the 1484 bull as a
preface. [106] A Christian historian of witchcraft reports, “The Malleus was reprinted in
fourteen editions by 1520. Well-organized, impassioned, and enjoying papal approval,
the Malleus became one of the most influential of all early printed books.” [107]
The death toll from the European witch craze was about 30,000 to 50,000 over several
centuries, including Catholic and Protestant regions. [108] The frenzy died down only after
the end of the religious wars in 1648, and with the spread of scientific rationalism.
Page 21 of 29

Institutionalized Anti-Semitism and Ethnic Cleansing:
Conflict between Christians and Jews goes back to the earliest days of the Church; the
Temple authorities arrested Peter and John soon after Pentecost for healing the sick and
preaching the Resurrection in the Temple (Acts 3:4-4:3).
After the Church gained governmental power, and was able retaliate, it did so – thus directly
opposing what Jesus commanded – “Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute
you” (Matt. 5:44). Some of the Church Fathers, including St. Augustine, St. Ambrose, St.
Ephraim the Syrian, St. Jerome, and St. John Chrysostom, wrote anti-Jewish polemics. [109]
The Frankish Synod of Clermont (535) forbade Jews from holding public office; the synod of
Toledo (681) ordered the burning of Jewish books; the Fourth Lateran Council (1215) forced
Jews to wear distinctive badges on their clothing. [110] Under Pope Paul IV (1555-1559),
“the Jews of Rome were herded into ghettos, forced to sell their property to Christians, and
made to wear yellow headgear; copies of the Talmud were searched out and burned.”[111]
Saints, synods, councils, and popes were in agreement: Jews were to be, at best, second-class
citizens of Christendom. In some instances, Popes and other Church authorities spoke
against pogroms – but civil equality for Jews was not considered until the 19th Century, as a
response to the French Revolution.
This habit of oppression reached its climax in the Spain of their Catholic majesties,
Ferdinand and Isabella.[112] (A century earlier, anti-Semitic riots regularly followed
preaching by St. Vincent Ferrer, [113] a Dominican who considered himself to be the angel of
the Last Judgment.[114]) In 1492, immediately after the last Muslim territory in Spain had
been conquered, the government gave Jews a choice: convert to Christianity or go into exile.
About 130,000 Jews were thus banished.[115] The remainder, known to the authorities as
“New Christians” or conversos, were always suspected by the Inquisition of secretly
practicing the Jewish faith; 13,000 were killed in the first 12 years of the Inquisition’s
existence. [116] In 1499, the government gave Muslims the same choice: conversion or exile.
These converts, the moriscos, also were targets for Inquisitors hunting for secret practice of
their old religion.
With religious persecution and ethnic cleansing came institutionalized racism. In 1449,
“Purity of Blood” (in Spanish, limpieza de sangre) laws had been passed to define who was
an “old Christian,” and who was a suspect “new Christian” – or a descendant thereof. Those
without the requisite “pure” ancestry were excluded from universities and from public office.
(Pope Nicholas V (1447-1455) had condemned the 1449 “purity” laws, but his teaching did
not prevail.) [117] The last of the “Purity of Blood” laws were not repealed until 1865.
How does the Church stand on these matters now?
On the one hand, Vatican II places the Catholic Church firmly against religious coercion
(Dignitatis Humanae) and anti-Semitism (Lumen Gentium). The same Council, in Gaudium
et Spes, denounced genocide, “torments inflicted on body and mind, attempts to coerce the
will itself,” and deportation as “infamies indeed” and “supreme dishonor to the
Creator.”[118] Thus, the Church has, after nearly 2,000 years, spoken with its highest level of
Page 22 of 29
authority to renounce the prejudices and practices that were used for centuries to oppress
Jews in Christian lands.
On the other hand … since 1974, there has been a cause for the canonization of Queen
Isabella, the authoress of the aforementioned judicial murders and ethnic cleansing. Her
defenders praise her faith, morality, and charity, and say that “no scandal ever stained her
person.”[119] At the web site that promotes Isabel’s canonization, the founder of the Miles
Jesu “new ecclesial movement,” a defender of her cause says, “The Catholic Spanish
Inquisition, just in terms of the numbers of people executed, is nothing but a kitty-cat, or
even just a little mouse, in comparison with the killing monster of Communism.” [120]

Violation of Free Will – Opposition to Religious Freedom:
In his 1832 encyclical Mirari Vos, Pope Gregory XVI said that the “shameful font of
indifferentism gives rise to that erroneous and absurd proposition that liberty of conscience
must be maintained for everyone.”[121] In his 1864 encyclical Quanta Cura, Pope Pius IX
quoted his predecessor’s 1832 ruling, and added that those who preach “liberty of conscience
and worship” are preaching “liberty of perdition.” [122]
Vatican Council II reversed this teaching, thanks be to God.
The 1965 decree Dignitatis Humanae said, “This Vatican Council declares that the
human person has a right to religious freedom. This freedom means that all men are to be
immune from coercion on the part of individuals or of social groups and of any human
power, in such wise that no one is to be forced to act in a manner contrary to his own
beliefs, whether privately or publicly, whether alone or in association with others, within
due limits. The council further declares that the right to religious freedom has its
foundation in the very dignity of the human person as this dignity is known through the
revealed word of God and by reason itself. This right of the human person to religious
freedom is to be recognized in the constitutional law whereby society is governed and
thus it is to become a civil right.” [123]

In summary …
The above-listed teachings, which were once part of the Magisterium, are – as we now
understand – errors in faith and morals. (Had we been attentive to the Sermon on the Mount and
Jesus’ other teachings, we would have understood this all along.) At the highest level of
authority, its Popes and its Councils, the Roman Catholic Church has erred – and has persisted in
certain errors for centuries. It is manifestly false to claim, as Gregory VII did in his Dictatus
Papae issued in 1075, that “the Roman church has never erred; nor will it err to all eternity, the
Scripture bearing witness.” [124]
Apologists defend the notion of an infallible Papacy by saying that Popes are not protected from
sin in their private lives, in their erroneous opinions that were not given as Church teaching, and
in their disciplinary decisions. As one apologist says, “Papal infallibility, once again, involves
Page 23 of 29
only the formal teaching office of the papacy. It has nothing to do with how popes govern the
affairs of the Church.” [125]
But in the above-listed cases, Popes were writing as if they meant their decrees to be in force
perpetually; they did not say these rulings were temporary concessions to unfortunate
circumstances, or that they were private opinion. Even today, the Vatican says that the laity
must obey Church rulings in “disciplinary matters” with “docility in charity.”[126] No doubt,
those who carried out the Inquisitions thought they were doing just this.
Present-day Vatican officialdom offers that very defense of the Inquisitors and their deeds.
During an early 2006 television program about the Inquisition, the Rev. Joseph Di Noia, the
Under Secretary of the Congregation of the Doctrine of the Faith, said: “It was a mistake to
torture people. However, torture was regarded as a perfectly justified, legitimate way of
producing evidence and it was therefore legally justified.”[127] The Bush Administration
could have made the same relativistic, historical-context defense for the “necessity” for
torturing American war prisoners; the Soviets and the Nazis could have likewise said that
torture was “perfectly justified” in their struggle against enemies of the State.
As noted above, the Church has reversed itself on these prior teachings. Apologists for the
Vatican use tortured logic to explain why (for instance) the prior teaching that “error has no
rights” and that states ought to suppress non-Catholic faiths is not contradictory to the current
teaching that favors freedom of religion and disavows coercion of conscience. Such verbal
gymnastics are no service to Christ, who said, “Let what you say be simply ‘Yes’ or ‘No;’
anything more than this comes from evil.” (Matt. 5:37) Far better for the Church authorities just
to say: “We were wrong before, and have changed what we used to teach – so that we can better
serve Christ.”
Page 24 of 29
The way out of the illusions
As always, the true teachings of Christ provide a sure escape from spiritual illusions and snares.
As Peter and the apostles said to the Temple rulers of their time, “We must obey God rather
than men.” (Acts 5:29)
Christ said, “God sent the Son into the world, not to condemn the world, but that the world
might be saved through him,” (John 3:17) and “Love your enemies and pray for those who
persecute you” (Matt. 5:44). Also, Jesus rebuked his disciples for proposing to “bid fire come
down from heaven and consume them” after a Samaritan village had refused to welcome Jesus
and his followers (Luke 9:52-55). There’s no hint that Christ wanted his followers to use force
against enemies of the Faith.
Christ also said, “If you continue in my word, you are truly my disciples, and you will know the
truth, and the truth will make you free.” (John 8:31-32). Knowledge of truth was to be for all his
followers; truth and spiritual freedom were not to be limited to the Popes and the Bishops.
When the apostle John told Christ, “Teacher, we saw a man casting out demons in your name,
and we forbade him, because he was not following us,” Jesus replied, “Do not forbid him; for
no one who does a mighty work in my name will be able soon after to speak evil of me. For he
that is not against us is for us.” (John 9: 38-40) This is the opposite of the claim, maintained for
centuries by Rome, that adherence to the Roman Catholic Church was a prerequisite for
salvation.
After a squabble among his disciples over who was greatest among them, Christ said: “You
know that the rulers of the Gentiles lord it over them, and their great men exercise authority
over them. It shall not be so among you; but whoever would be great among you must be your
servant, and whoever would be first among you must be your slave; even as the Son of man
came not to be served but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many.” (Matt. 20:25-28)
So much for the idea that Popes and churchmen ought to be temporally rich and powerful!
Contrast the teachings and example of Christ with the record of many Popes and with the attitude
of many Vatican loyalists today – including Opus Dei, the Legionaries of Christ, and other cults
within the Church.
Follow Christ; accept no substitutes!
Footnotes:
Note: Most Internet citations were done from September 2005 through January 2006. Documents may have moved
to different Web pages, or may have been removed from the Web entirely, since then.
[1] From the text of the “Office for Reception and Chrismation into the Russian-Byzantine Catholic Church.”
[2] Vatican I, First Dogmatic Constitution on the Church of Christ, ch. 4, para. 9, July 18, 1870,
http://www.ewtn.com/library/COUNCILS/V1.HTM#6, accessed 01/06/06.
Page 25 of 29
[3] Richard P. McBrien, Lives of the Popes, Harper San Francisco, 2000, p. 395.
[4] Eamon Duffy, Saints and Sinners, Yale University Press, 2001, p. 299.
[5] John Paul II, General Audience, March 24, 1993, “The Holy Spirit Assists the Roman Pontiff,”
http://www.vatican.va/holy_father/john_paul_ii/audiences/alpha/data/aud19930324en.html, accessed 01/06/06.
[6] Catechism of the Catholic Church, article 2037, http://www.vatican.va/archive/ENG0015/__P74.HTM, accessed
01/06/06.
[7] http://www.bettnet.com/blog/index.php/weblog/comments/a_clarification_on_papal_infallibility/, accessed
01/11/06.
[8] Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, “Doctrinal Commentary on the Concluding Formula of the Professio
Fidei,” June 29, 1998, section 11, http://www.ewtn.com/library/CURIA/CDFADTU.HTM, printed 09/19/05.
[9] Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, “Doctrinal Commentary on the Concluding Formula of the Professio
Fidei,” June 29, 1998, section 8, http://www.ewtn.com/library/CURIA/CDFADTU.HTM, printed 09/19/05.
[10] Dr. Ludwig Ott, “The Infallibility of the Church,” Fundamentals of Catholic Dogma, TAN Books and
Publishers, Inc., 1960, p. 299.
[11] Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, “Doctrinal Commentary on the Concluding Formula of the
Professio Fidei,” June 29, 1998, section 6, http://www.ewtn.com/library/CURIA/CDFADTU.HTM, printed
09/19/05.
[12] St. Joan was tried by a Church court, recanted her “heresy,” and was sentenced to life in prison. She later
“relapsed,” and was tried and condemned as a relapsed heretic by a secular court. Without the prior Church
sentence, the secular court could not have executed her for her “relapse.”
[13] Eamon Duffy, Saints and Sinners, Yale University Press, 2001, p. 293.
[14] Eamon Duffy, Saints and Sinners, Yale University Press, 2001, p. 293.
[15] Eamon Duffy, Saints and Sinners, Yale University Press, 2001, p. 294. This hymn was written in the mid1800s by Cardinal Wiseman, of England.
[16] Eamon Duffy, Saints and Sinners, Yale University Press, 2001, p. 299.
[17] Melkite Greek Catholic Church Information Center, “History of the Melkite Greek Catholic Church,” part 8, 24
August 2003, http://www.mliles.com/melkite/historyfrjamesbulletin.shtml, accessed 01/24/06.
[18] Archbishop Elias Zoghby, We Are All Schismatics, Educational Services (Greek-Catholic Diocese of Newton),
1996, p. 31.
[19] Jerry Ryan, “Back to the Future: Christian Unity and the Papacy,” Commonweal, Jan. 15. 1999,
http://www.findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m1252/is_1_126/ai_53889747, accessed 01/24/06.
[20] Eamon Duffy, Saints and Sinners, Yale University Press, 2001, p. 318.
[21] Mark and Louise Zwick, “Our Dear Sweet Christ on Earth, John Paul II, Has Died,” Houston Catholic Worker,
Vol. XXV, No. 4, Special Edition 2005, http://www.cjd.org/paper/jpII.html, accessed 01/12/06.
[22] Stefania Rossini, “The Pope’s Spokesman, in his own words,” Catholic World Report, August/September 2005,
p. 44; see also Navarro-Valls’ resume on his web site, http://www.navarro-valls.info/biography.html, printed
09/15/05.
[23] Patrick Madrid, Pope Fiction, Basilica Press, 1999, p. 13.
[24] Patrick Madrid, Pope Fiction, Basilica Press, 1999, p. 19.
[25] Patrick Madrid, Pope Fiction, Basilica Press, 1999, p. 24.
[26] Patrick Madrid, Pope Fiction, Basilica Press, 1999, p. 307.
[27] Benedict XVI, “You Are Peter,” first address given to the College of Cardinals, April 20, 2005, as reprinted in
Inside the Vatican, May 2005, p. 29.
[28] Benedict XVI, “You Are Peter,” first address given to the College of Cardinals, April 20, 2005, as reprinted in
Inside the Vatican, May 2005, p. 27.
[29] Ignatius Loyola, “Rules for Thinking with the Church,” in “Readings from the Protestant and Counter
Reformations,” http://www.thecaveonline.com/APEH/reformdocument.html, printed 05/08/04; this version lists the
first 13 of Ignatius’ rules.
[30] Archbishop Charles Chaput, “Consecrated life meant to be leaven in the Church,” April 24, 2002, Archdiocese
of Denver, http://www.archden.org/archbishop/docs/4_24_02_consecrated_life.htm, printed 05/08/04. This rule is
part of the Spiritual Exercises of St. Ignatius of Loyola; the full set of eighteen rules may be found on-line at
http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/source/loyola-spirex.html, as of 05/19/04.
[31] ZENIT.org, “Cardinals’ Oath on Receiving Biretta,” October 21, 2003,
http://www.zenit.org/english/visualizza.phtml?sid=43207, printed 09/19/05. This oath was “translated from the
Latin original by ZENIT,” a news agency associated with the Legionaries of Christ.
Page 26 of 29
[32] George Orwell, 1984, New American Library edition, 1961, p. 205.
[33] Patrick Madrid, Pope Fiction, Basilica Press, 1999, p. 18.
[34] Sources used for this history include: Richard P. McBrien, Lives of the Popes, Harper San Francisco, 2000, pp.
143-174 (liberal perspective); Charles A. Coulombe, Vicars of Christ, Citadel Press, 2003, pp. 163-204
(traditionalist perspective); Eamon Duffy, Saints and Sinners, Yale University Press, 2001, pp. 104-114 (centrist,
academic perspective); Claudio Rendina, The Popes: Histories and Secrets, Seven Locks Press, 2002, pp. 210-257
(liberal perspective).
[35] Richard P. McBrien, Lives of the Popes, Harper San Francisco, 2000, p. 146.
[36] Richard P. McBrien, Lives of the Popes, Harper San Francisco, 2000, pp. 157-158.
[37] Charles A. Coulombe, Vicars of Christ, Citadel Press, 2003, p. 179.
[38] Claudio Rendina, The Popes: Histories and Secrets, Seven Locks Press, 2002, p. 226.
[39] Charles A. Coulombe, Vicars of Christ, Citadel Press, 2003, p. 200.
[40] Eamon Duffy, Saints and Sinners, Yale University Press, 2001, p. 111.
[41] Sources used for this history include: Richard P. McBrien, Lives of the Popes, Harper San Francisco, 2000, pp.
260-284; Charles A. Coulombe, Vicars of Christ, Citadel Press, 2003, pp. 322-347; Eamon Duffy, Saints and
Sinners, Yale University Press, 2001, pp. 184-218; Claudio Rendina, The Popes: Histories and Secrets, Seven Locks
Press, 2002, pp. 413-461.
[42] Eamon Duffy, Saints and Sinners, Yale University Press, 2001, p. 188.
[43] Eamon Duffy, Saints and Sinners, Yale University Press, 2001, p. 184.
[44] Richard P. McBrien, Lives of the Popes, Harper San Francisco, 2000, p. 263.
[45] Eamon Duffy, Saints and Sinners, Yale University Press, 2001, p. 189.
[46] Charles A. Coulombe, Vicars of Christ, Citadel Press, 2003, p. 326.
[47] Eamon Duffy, Saints and Sinners, Yale University Press, 2001, p. 196.
[48] Eamon Duffy, Saints and Sinners, Yale University Press, 2001, p. 189.
[49] Richard P. McBrien, Lives of the Popes, Harper San Francisco, 2000, pp. 267-268.
[50] Claudio Rendina, The Popes: Histories and Secrets, Seven Locks Press, 2002, p. 431.
[51] Richard P. McBrien, Lives of the Popes, Harper San Francisco, 2000, p. 270.
[52] John Paul II, Universi Dominici Gregis, para. 78, 1996;
http://catholiculture.com/docs/doc_view.cfm?recnum=5518, accessed 01/11/06.
[53] Charles A. Coulombe, Vicars of Christ, Citadel Press, 2003, p. 337.
[54] Eamon Duffy, Saints and Sinners, Yale University Press, 2001, p. 209.
[55] Richard P. McBrien, Lives of the Popes, Harper San Francisco, 2000, p. 283.
[56] Claudio Rendina, The Popes: Histories and Secrets, Seven Locks Press, 2002, p. 459.
[57] Claudio Rendina, The Popes: Histories and Secrets, Seven Locks Press, 2002, p. 460.
[58] Gregory VII, Dictatus Papae, 1075, translation at http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/source/g7-dictpap.html,
accessed 01/11/06.
[59] Eamon Duffy, Saints and Sinners, Yale University Press, 2001, p. 121.
[60] Sources used for this history include: Richard P. McBrien, Lives of the Popes, Harper San Francisco, 2000, pp.
60-62, 66-68, 90-93, 101-103; Charles A. Coulombe, Vicars of Christ, Citadel Press, 2003, pp. 71-72, 101-103, 113115; Eamon Duffy, Saints and Sinners, Yale University Press, 2001, pp. 32-33, 54-57; Claudio Rendina, The Popes:
Histories and Secrets, Seven Locks Press, 2002, pp. 47-51, 58-60, 89-93, 112-114.
[61] Eamon Duffy, Saints and Sinners, Yale University Press, 2001, p. 55.
[62] Richard P. McBrien, Lives of the Popes, Harper San Francisco, 2000, p. 395.
[63] Charles A. Coulombe, Vicars of Christ, Citadel Press, 2003, p. 126.
[64] Decree of the Second Council of Nicaea, which stated: “Further we declare that there are two wills and
principles of action, in accordance with what is proper to each of the natures in Christ, in the way that the sixth
synod, that at Constantinople, proclaimed, when it also publicly rejected Sergius, Honorius, Cyrus, Pyrrhus,
Macarius, those uninterested in true holiness, and their likeminded followers.”
(http://www.piar.hu/councils/ecum07.htm, accessed 01/23/06).
[65] Charles A. Coulombe, Vicars of Christ, Citadel Press, 2003, p. 115.
[66] John Acton, “Acton-Creighton Correspondence,” April 5, 1887, in Lord Acton, Essays on Freedom and Power,
ed. Gertrude Himmelfarb, Meridian Books, 1957, pp. 335-336.
[67] John Mallon, “The Obedience Test,”
http://www.speroforum.com/site/article.asp?idCategory=34&idsub=127&id=2402, accessed 01/11/06. Mallon is a
contributing editor for Inside the Vatican magazine.
Page 27 of 29
[68] Patrick Madrid, Pope Fiction, Basilica Press, 1999, p. 15.
[69] Urban II, speech at Clermont, in Charles A. Coulombe, Vicars of Christ, Citadel Press, 2003, p. 226.
[70] Patrick Madrid, Pope Fiction, Basilica Press, 1999, p. 195.
[71] Eamon Duffy, Saints and Sinners, Yale University Press, 2001, p. 225.
[72] Claudio Rendina, The Popes: Histories and Secrets, Seven Locks Press, 2002, p. 476-477.
[73] William Shirer, The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich, Pan Books, 1960, p. 122.
[74] Eamon Duffy, Saints and Sinners, Yale University Press, 2001, p. 225.
[75] John Paul II, Centesimus Annus, 1991 encyclical, para. 52,
http://www.vatican.va/holy_father/john_paul_ii/encyclicals/documents/hf_jp-ii_enc_01051991_centesimusannus_en.html, viewed 01/12/06.
[76] Richard P. McBrien, Lives of the Popes, Harper San Francisco, 2000, p. 334.
[77] Eamon Duffy, Saints and Sinners, Yale University Press, 2001, p. 282.
[78] Pius IX, Syllabus of Errors, article 80, 1864, http://www.papalencyclicals.net/Pius09/p9syll.htm, accessed
01/13/06.
[79] Paul Johnson, A History of Christianity, Atheneum, 1976, p. 490.
[80] Paul Johnson, A History of Christianity, Atheneum, 1976, p. 493; quoted from a speech by Pius XII to the
cardinals.
[81] Leo XIII, encyclical “Diuturnum Illud,” paras. 5, 6, in Anthony J. Mioni, Jr., The Popes Against Modern
Errors: 16 Papal Documents, TAN Books and Publishers, 1999, p. 42.
[82] John XXIII, encyclical “Pacem in Terris,” paras. 52, 56, 60, 73;
http://www.vatican.va/holy_father/john_xxiii/encyclicals/documents/hf_j-xxiii_enc_11041963_pacem_en.html,
accessed 01/13/06.
[83] T. David Curp, “A Necessary Bondage? When the Church Endorsed Slavery,” Crisis, September 2005,
http://www.crisismagazine.com/september2005/curp.htm, printed 11/15/05.
[84] T. David Curp, “A Necessary Bondage? When the Church Endorsed Slavery,” Crisis, September 2005,
http://www.crisismagazine.com/september2005/curp.htm, printed 11/15/05.
[85] Leo XIII, “Catholicae Ecclesiae,” 1890, paras. 1, 2;
http://www.vatican.va/holy_father/leo_xiii/encyclicals/documents/hf_l-xiii_enc_20111890_catholicaeecclesiae_en.html, accessed 01/15/06.
[86] Vatican II, Gaudium et Spes, 1965, para. 27,
http://www.vatican.va/archive/hist_councils/ii_vatican_council/documents/vat-ii_cons_19651207_gaudium-etspes_en.html, accessed 01/15/06.
[87] Henry Denzinger, The Sources of Catholic Dogma, para. 430, Herder, 1957, p. 169.
[88] Henry Denzinger, The Sources of Catholic Dogma, para. 469, Herder, 1957, p. 187.
[89] Henry Denzinger, The Sources of Catholic Dogma, para. 714, Herder, 1957, p. 230.
[90] Henry Denzinger, The Sources of Catholic Dogma, para. 1677, Herder, 1957, p. 425.
[91] Vatican II, Lumen Gentium, 1964, ch. 2, para. 14,
http://www.vatican.va/archive/hist_councils/ii_vatican_council/documents/vat-ii_const_19641121_lumengentium_en.html, accessed 01/14/06.
[92] Vatican II, Lumen Gentium, 1964, ch. 2, para. 15,
http://www.vatican.va/archive/hist_councils/ii_vatican_council/documents/vat-ii_const_19641121_lumengentium_en.html, accessed 01/14/06.
[93] Vatican II, Lumen Gentium, 1964, ch. 2, para. 16,
http://www.vatican.va/archive/hist_councils/ii_vatican_council/documents/vat-ii_const_19641121_lumengentium_en.html, accessed 01/14/06.
[94] With a few minor exceptions: for “baptism of blood,” and “baptism of desire.”
[95] Paul Johnson, A History of Christianity, Atheneum, 1976, p. 253.
[96] H. W. Crocker III, Triumph, Forum Publishing, 2001, p. 227.
[97] John Edwards, Inquisition, Tempus Publishing, 2003, pp. 174-175.
[98] Paul Johnson, A History of Christianity, Atheneum, 1976, p. 308.
[99] Patrick Madrid, Pope Fiction, Basilica Press, 1999, p. 240.
[100] Warren H. Carroll, The Glory of Christendom (A History of Christendom, vol. 3), Christendom Press, 1993, p.
609.
[101] Catechism of the Catholic Church, para. 2296, http://www.vatican.va/archive/ENG0015/__P80.HTM,
accessed 01/14/06.
Page 28 of 29
[102] Beacon for Freedom of Expression, list of English language books banned by the Holy See,
http://www.beaconforfreedom.org/search/censored_publications/result.html?author=&cauthor=&title=&country=80
52&language=eng&censored_year=&censortype=&published_year=&censorreason=&Search=Search, accessed
01/14/06.
[103] Society of Jesus USA, “Demonologists and the Devil,”
http://www.jesuit.org/sections/sub.asp?SECTION_ID=194&SUBSECTION_ID=505&PARENT_ID=489, accessed
01/14/06.
[104] Jeffrey Russell, A History of Witchcraft, Thames and Hudson, 1980, p. 76.
[105] Jeffrey Russell, A History of Witchcraft, Thames and Hudson, 1980, p. 79.
[106] Jeffrey Russell, A History of Witchcraft, Thames and Hudson, 1980, p. 79.
[107] Jeffrey Russell, A History of Witchcraft, Thames and Hudson, 1980, p. 79.
[108] Sandra Miesel, “Who Burned the Witches,” Crisis, October 2001,
http://www.crisismagazine.com/october2001/feature1.htm, accessed 01/14/06.
[109] Wikipedia, “Christianity and anti-Semitism,” http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christianity_and_anti-Semitism,
accessed 01/16/06.
[110] Wikipedia, “Christianity and anti-Semitism,” http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christianity_and_anti-Semitism,
accessed 01/16/06.
[111] Eamon Duffy, Saints and Sinners, Yale University Press, 2001, p. 216.
[112] Karen Armstrong, Holy War, Anchor Books, 2001, pp. 458-460.
[113] Karen Armstrong, The Battle for God, Ballantine Books, 2001, p. 7.
[114] Desmond Birch, Trial, Tribulation, and Triumph, Queenship Publishing Co., 1996, pp. 263-264.
[115] Karen Armstrong, The Battle for God, Ballantine Books, 2001, p. 3.
[116] Karen Armstrong, The Battle for God, Ballantine Books, 2001, p. 7.
[117] John Edwards, Inquisition, Tempus, 2003, p. 66.
[118] Vatican II, Gaudium et Spes, 1965, para. 27,
http://www.vatican.va/archive/hist_councils/ii_vatican_council/documents/vat-ii_cons_19651207_gaudium-etspes_en.html, accessed 01/15/06.
[119] Warren Carroll, “Isabel of Spain, the Catholic Queen,” http://www.queenisabel.com/history-03.html, accessed
01/16/06.
[120] Fr. Alphonsus Maria Duran, “Queen Isabel and the Spanish Inquisition,” http://www.queenisabel.com/history05.html, accessed 01/16/06.
[121] Gregory XVI, encyclical “Mirari Vos,” para. 14, in Anthony J. Mioni, Jr., The Popes Against Modern Errors:
16 Papal Documents, TAN Books and Publishers, 1999, p. 7.
[122] Pius IX, encyclical “Quanta Cura,” para. 3, in Anthony J. Mioni, Jr., The Popes Against Modern Errors: 16
Papal Documents, TAN Books and Publishers, 1999, p. 18.
[123] Vatican Council II, Dignitatis Humanae, section 2,
http://www.vatican.va/archive/hist_councils/ii_vatican_council/documents/vat-ii_decl_19651207_dignitatishumanae_en.html, viewed 01/09/06.
[124] Gregory VII, Dictatus Papae, 1075, translation at http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/source/g7-dictpap.html,
accessed 01/11/06.
[125] Patrick Madrid, Pope Fiction, Basilica Press, 1999, p. 241.
[126] Catechism of the Catholic Church, article 2037, http://www.vatican.va/archive/ENG0015/__P74.HTM,
accessed 01/06/06.
[127] Jonathan Petre, “Inquisition was a mistake but legally justified, claims Vatican official,” London Telegraph,
January 30, 2006,
http://news.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2006/01/30/ninq30.xml&sSheet=/news/2006/01/30/ixhom
e.html, accessed 01/30/06.
Page 29 of 29