The Catholic church's track record on Inquisitions is not one anyone should wish for.
Funny the difference between Protestantism and Catholicism.
Really, why don't you explain this "difference"?
Can you cite specific cases from similar eras where Catholics and Protestants treated heretics differently?
Perhaps you would like to discuss the case of Michael Servetus. He was found guilty in abstentia of heresy by the Catholics in France based on the letters sent to them by John Calvin and sentenced to death. However, Servetus had escaped to Geneva, where he was tried by the Protestants, again sentenced to death based on letters written by Calvin and burned at the stake.
The TRUTH is that torture and execution of heretics was ACCEPTED by both Catholics and Protestants until at least the 17th century.
Catholics call for the heavy hand of Rome to crack down on people and force them into line.
Oh and what do Protestants prefer be done with heretics? When some Protestant suggests that Jesus Christ was nothing more than a "good man" whose teachings about things like sex are "outmoded" is the Protestant a heretic or just someone to sing an extra verse of "Kumbaya" for?
There is a tendency for all to judge the historical world through a 21st century lens and be shocked and revolted. The fact is that life was brief and brutal for all.
The fact is that capital punishment was a nearly universal punishment for all crimes. Heresy was treated as the most heinous of crimes by Protestant and Catholic alike. If one could be executed for taking ones purse or life, how much greater the punishment for the taking of ones soul.
Outside of the Catholic Church mercy was a rare commodity. The prevailing thought was that animals deserved deserved no mercy because they lacked a soul. Those who had willingly forfeited their soul had willingly assumed the status of animals. Fair and just by modern standards? No, but those weren't modern times or people.
I've read through the entire thread and it's just mind numbing to see the same Genevans saying the same things over and over again without variation, never correcting or adjusting their words. May as well call it what it is and have done with it, it's hate speech. Whether by accident or design it's degrading and offensive.
It's an orgiastic feast of ignorance.
When I watch secularists carry on like that it's depressing to know that creatures of God have sunk so low, to see it in people who profess Christ in one breath and total ignorance in the next it's just horrifying.
On the other hand, I'm reminded of a scene in the Madness of King George:
[Margaret Nicholson has attempted unsuccessfully to kill the King]
Margaret Nicholson: I have a property due to me from the Crown of England! Give me my property or the land will be drenched in blood!
George III: Will it, madam?
[he picks up the extremely small knife]
George III: Well, not with this it won't. It's a fruit knife, wouldn't cut a cabbage.
[pause]
Margaret Nicholson: [quietly] Oh.
Somehow they need to understand that all they're armed with is a fruit knife and they're stabbing themselves with it.