Posted on 07/09/2015 8:03:43 PM PDT by Morgana
I’m Michael Voris coming to you from London, England.
This country is planted thick with churches and convents and monasteries and practically all of them are stolen property. Buildings that originally were built by Catholic religious orders and everyday Catholics over the course of centuries were ripped off from the Catholic Church in a handful of years because Henry VIII couldn’t control his sexual desires.
So part of the fabric of English Catholicism is this undercurrent of having been victimized by the Protestant, usurping monarchy and greedy noblemen. It’s woven into the very life and language of some faithful English Catholics — even so far as questioning the legitimacy of the royal family because the monarchy was also a victim of theft during the religious battles of England.
But how did all this come to pass almost 500 years ago? How did a country, a nation so faithful to the Church that it was called “Mary’s Dowry,” simply flip so easily to the state-run Protestant entity known as Anglicanism, or the Church of England?
This much is certain: because of the cowardice and political machinations of the Catholic bishops of the time. Those bishops simply miscalculated. They thought that Henry’s threat to the Church would pass soon enough and things would go back to life as usual. What they failed to include in their calculus was all the other characters waiting in the wings to devour the Church — people like Lutheran-in-spirit Thomas Cranmer and the large number of English who had much to profit from a financially weakened Church and so forth. There were many Englishmen just waiting for the moment when they could tear the Church apart and seize Her lands, holdings, properties, buildings, etc. Those bishops, just like many today, failed to see the larger, much broader agenda at work just beneath the surface.
The Church has all kinds of enemies, all types that have an interest in seeing Her be destroyed. Some hate the teachings. Others have a guilty conscience and take it out on the Chuch. Others still are indifferent and simply see the Church as standing in the way of cultural "progress." Others see the Church as an artifact of the Middle Ages whose time has passed, and who should be relegated to history. Many have a specific agenda, such as sodomite marriage, and want the Church out of the debate.
Despite the intentions, they are all motivated by evil, and when people are motivated by evil (and it doesn’t matter if it’s conscious or not), they are capable of anything when put in the right circumstances.
Consider what happened here in this very country: the gruesome martyrdom of Catholics, the outlawing of the Faith, the overrunning of hundreds of monasteries and schools and parishes.
This was a Catholic country through and through, and it was a lustful desire of the Catholic king that brought it all tumbling down.
The son of King Henry VIII, Edward VI, is the one who essentially bulldozed the Church over the cliff here, while after a brief Catholic respite under half-sister Mary, Elizabeth I came to the throne and finished the job. But that coy old witch was very clever indeed.
In order to bring an end to the sectarian revolts, she advanced a hybrid religion, one that looked Catholic on the outside, to win the favor of all the stupid, largely Catholic populace, too uneducated to really notice that underneath the Catholic veneer was a decidedly anti-Catholic religion.
Things appeared rather normal to most people, who went about their business as usual as England was slowly transformed into the non-Catholic nation that it is today, stripped of nearly all its former Catholic glory.
When smart Catholics caught on and began a quiet seditionist movement to keep the Faith alive by sneakily importing English priests from a secret seminary established in France, Elizabeth showed her true colors by capturing and killing many of them. More than 200 years before France’s Reign of Terror against the Faith, Satan had a warm-up act in the Elizabethan terror campaign on these shores.
It would not be long after "Good Queen Bess," as protestant history references her, that Englishmen in search of public office would have to renounce belief in the transubstantiation of the bread and wine into the Body and Blood of Our Blessed Lord.
That this happened under the reign of King Charles II of the Stuarts is one of those historical ironies. As King of England he was also head of the Anglican church (small c), which historians note he roundly despised. But he played the game, even looking the other way when notable English martyr and archbishop of Armaugh Oliver Plunkett was hanged, drawn and quartered at the infamous Tyburn, which Elizabeth had put to good use.
As Charles lay dying, a priest, John Huddlestone, who had saved his life in battle during his youth, was now smuggled in to save his soul. Protestant King Charles II converted to the Catholic faith his last full day on earth, and following absolution and anointing, the Blessed Sacrament was held over him and he made a profession of faith, breaking English law.
Today, Protestant anti-Catholicism has been overthrown by secular anti-Catholicism. A widely acclaimed novel — “Wolf Hall” by author Hillary Mantel — has been turned into a spectacular TV production by the BBC and has now begun airing on PBS back in the States as of Easter Sunday. The novel seeks to deliberately turn history on its ear and depict St. Thomas More as a villainous, rotten man and Thomas Cromwell as an effective administrator having to contest the evil More at every turn. It is very important to note that author Hillary Mantel has said publicly that the Catholic Church is not a place for respectable people.
There is a lesson for Catholics in the West everywhere outside of England to learn from English Catholics: the tide is turning swiftly and strongly against Catholics. Just as happened here almost 500 years ago, the power of the state was used to extinguish Catholic life, and it all began because of King Henry’s lust.
America doesn’t have a king — at least officially, Mr. Obama — but the culture sets patterns and views like a king. Whether those powers are assumed into a single lust-crazed, murderous monarch, or spread out over a society that kills for love of sex, matters little in the end. The powers that be — whether king or culture — cannot let Catholic truth remain, because Catholic truth is an affront to them.
Catholics in America, unlike here in England, can’t easily relate to the reality of having your churches stolen from you and your property ripped from you. But the lesson to be learned from Merry Olde England is this: When the scales tip far enough (and they are tipping most decidedly), anything can happen.
Catholics in the West need to be preparing spiritually for persecution. The forces gathering against the Church from every side may be multi-dimensional, but they are totally united in their goal because of who it is that commands them.
Don’t forget to read Salvation’s link to how Catholics and Protestants are ‘net even’ in the slaughter game.
I’m still trying to see how the Jews play “catch up.”
Another screed by vituperative Voris who seems afflicted by a myopic and biased view of history, which see Rome as the victim and longs for vengeance via a return to the "good ol days" under a Roman monarchy. There should be little doubt that under which he would support the means by which Rome acquired much property and goods.
Pope Innocent IV, Ad extirpanda, papal bull, promulgated on May 15, 1252, by Pope Innocent IV, which explicitly authorized (and defined the appropriate circumstances for) the use of torture by the Inquisition for eliciting confessions from heretics....
The bull conceded to the State a portion of the property to be confiscated from convicted heretics.[3] The State in return assumed the burden of carrying out the penalty. - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ad_extirpanda
• Pope Innocent IV, Ad extirpanda:The head of state or ruler must force all the heretics whom he has in custody,{8} provided he does so without killing them or breaking their arms or legs, as actual robbers and murderers of souls and thieves of the sacraments of God and Christian faith, to confess their errors and accuse other heretics whom they know, and specify their motives, {9} and those whom they have seduced, and those who have lodged them and defended them,as thieves and robbers of material goods are made to accuse their accomplices and confess the crimes they have committed...
TThe head of state or ruler must divide up all the property of the heretics that is seized or discovered by the aforesaid officials, and the fines exacted from these heretics, in the form and manner following: one-third shall go to the government of the state or district. The second as a reward of the industry of the office shall go to the officials who handled this particular case. The third shall be deposited in some secure place to be kept by the aforesaid Diocesan bishop and inquisitors,and spent as they shall think fit to promote the faith and extirpate{11} heretics, this policy prevailing in spite of any statute that has been or shall be enacted against this dividing-up of the heretics' property. - http://userwww.sfsu.edu/%7Edraker/history/Ad_Extirpanda.html
Pope Innocent III, Cum ex Officii Nostri of 1207: In order altogether to remove the patrimony of St. Peter from heretics, we decree as a perpetual law, that whatsoever heretic, especially if he be a Patarene, shall be found therein, shall immediately be taken and delivered to the secular court to be punished according to the law. All his goods also shall be sold, so that he who took him shall receive one part; another shall go the court which convicted him, and the third shall be applied to the building of prisons in the country wherein he was taken. - Cum ex Officii Nostri Pope Innocent III, 1207, Inquisition, by Edward Peters, p. 49 review Living Tradition, Organ of the Roman Theological Forum
• Pope Paul IV, Cum Ex Apostolatus Officio of 1559: Thus We will and decree that the aforementioned sentences, censures and penalties be incurred without exception by all members of the following categories:
(i) Anysoever who, before this date, shall have been detected to have deviated from the Catholic Faith, or fallen into any heresy, or incurred schism, or provoked or committed either or both of these, or who have confessed to have done any of these things, or who have been convicted of having done any of these things...
all Kingdoms, Duchies, Dominions, Fiefs and goods of this kind shall be confiscated, made public and shall remain so, and shall be made the rightful property of those who shall first occupy them if these shall be sincere in faith, in the unity of the Holy Roman Church and under obedience to Us and to Our successors the Roman Pontiffs canonically entering office.
Canons of the Ecumenical Fourth Lateran Council, 1215: We excommunicate and anathematize every heresy that raises against the holy, orthodox and Catholic faith ...
Those condemned, being handed over to the secular rulers of their bailiffs, let them be abandoned, to be punished with due justice, clerics being first degraded from their orders. As to the property of the condemned, if they are laymen, let it be confiscated; if clerics, let it be applied to the churches from which they received revenues. But those who are only suspected, due consideration being given to the nature of the suspicion and the character of the person, unless they prove their innocence by a proper defense, let them be anathematized and avoided by all 1-intil they have made suitable satisfaction; but if they have been under excommunication for one year, then let them be condemned as heretics. — http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/basis/lateran4.asp
Both sides? What sides? You mean a king who was more Catholic than Protestant and executed Catholics on one side and Lutherans on the other? For in reality he acted like a pope.
If he did convert at the end (Vorbis provides zero sources) than it was not from a faith many defend here.
So many Catholics don’t recall the Spanish Inquisition.I’m okay with the deaths of those Catholics because Catholics were okay with the deaths of those in Spain.
These kinds of discussions always strike me as a bit off. I am not saying that this side or that side did not do something wrong, or that Galileo wasn't mistreated, or that the Inquisition wasn't bad (perhaps horrible), or that Henry VIII wasn't a lecherous murderer, but it all misses the point a bit. People want so badly to see everything as a religious issue, and in so doing completely forget that they are also just people. History is not moved entirely by faith, or even largely in all honesty. In most events like these politics is the real mover rather than religious belief itself, and this is applicable to both sides. People kill people because they feel threatened by them, and when your religion is also part of the state apparatus, as it was most often back then, that means people will die for preaching "heresy." It happens, and religion is involved, but it hardly means that Protestantism teaches people to kill Catholics, or vice versa. It is just people doing what people do, and we really should keep that in mind. After all, all those Protestants who were killing Catholics in England under Henry VIII and his children were often born and raised as Catholics, and the Catholics returned the favour at the earliest opportunity.
HEY!!!!!
What are you doing on the RF making sense like that?!?!?!?!
Don’t you know that’s not allowed?
It’s in the RF Guidelines somewhere.
I’m sure I read it somewhere there in the past.... at one time.... maybe.....IIRC....
I think it’s this the sort of thing that makes the RF look bad. It’s not discussion about beliefs. or doctrine. It’s the accusations. It’s the “My religion is better than yours” and the “Your ancestors were worst than mine” stuff.
There was evil and inexcusable acts done by both sides and it’s always a power and control thing. And frequently, religion is used for the justification of it.
And it’s WRONG when done by both sides, and both sides need to admit their own culpability in it. Denying that the Catholic church played a role in the Inquisition, doesn’t convince anyone that they were innocent in it. History has that too well established.
It would be refreshing for a Catholic to admit that the church did it and said it was wrong for doing it.
But I thnik the thin that they fear is that by admitting that their church was wrong in one area means that they have to admit that it was wrong in other areas. And some Catholics simply cannot deal with that thought. So they over react and act like the jealous spouse who criticizes their spouse themselves, but heaven help the other person who makes the same criticism. They’ll rip them apart.
I don’t appreciate such language on the Religion Forum.
Heck; who DOES want to face the HORRORS that their chosen church has committed!?!?!
Or does the word DAMN cause a shiver down your spine?
How convenient!
No; it is a indication of the powerlessness of Catholicism to change lives!
When Luther points these sins out, Rome gets 'embarrassed' and creates the Counter Reformation to make it's red face cool off.
DUH!
I'll bet MOST of them would NOT think of using the word EMBARRASSED to describe it!
Why should Citizens in every country be taught to love the Lord and His Church every day. Why is it that some people do not love the Lord and do not study and obey the Magisterium? Because it's a heresy?
The tract was quoted; not the actual words of Jesus.
It was a commentary about the wolves.
SQUIRREL!
So true!
The Catholics HAVE learned the lesson well!
Well; for myself, I consider that my quantity doesn't lessen my quality of posting.
But that would be EMBARRASSING!
I received a lecture from a Catholic priest about Henry as a serial killer while standing in what's left of Glastonbury Abbey. It (the lecture) was pretty funny.
islamist facilitator?
I never cease to be amazed at how some here can go on and on about “Catholic bashing” whenever there is even the slightest bit of disagreement on tenets of the Christian faith, yet never seem to recognize when they do the exact same thing against non-catholic Christians. Apparently, it’s not bashing when they insist ONLY Catholics believe the correct things.
Funny how all that history is so easily swept under the rug.
https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/vituperative
vituperative
marked by harsh, spoken, or written abuse; abusive, often with ranting or railing
It does appear Voris is missing sight of the forest for all the trees.
What's missing also is the more modern (since Vatican II) Roman Catholic published viewpoints, as in spite of themselves (the Roman Catholic Church) thinking themselves The OTC (up one side and down any and all others -- find a new angle of any worth --- they rush to claim that, too) for the rest of Christianity to be "part of" or else "mysteriously" connected to themselves.
Which would leave Anglican Church property still property of the Church of God if we are to accept RCC definition of what Christ's own Church is comprised of, at least in that one small way, regardless if much of the rest of RC-centric claims are set aside, so what's he talkin' 'bout Willis, I would like to know?
Not really, I'd rather not be told over and again what the po' wittle willy woris-es of the World are blabbering on about, I think we already know all which we need to, of RadTrad parochialism. The near constant reminders do serve as a type of warning though (like the brightly marked creatures of the wild broadcast warning -- don't bite, i'm poison, i might bite you i'm venoumous?)
Dang that Vatican II. just dang it. it get's in the way of perfectly justified(?) rants.
here's a little song for wittle woris
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.