[Diamond]

Thank you for the links. For the record, George Bancroft was not a Calvinist, but it is interesting to note that when an historian such as Bancroft is quoted here the only papist response thus far consisted of an Alinskyite type insult accompanied by a link to a 67 page tract by an obscure lunatic whose thesis was that John Calvin was the true father of communism. Go figure.

Cordially,

[daniel1212]

a link to a 67 page tract by an obscure lunatic whose thesis was that John Calvin was the true father of communism. Go figure.

Never knew of that, but while some RCs (while advocating for a censorious Catholic monarchy) distance themselves from the Divine right of kings and autocratic aristocratic rule - which type of thing many early Prots had to unlearn from Rome in making men as popes, yet does this kind of leadership sound compatible with the constitutional republic of America?

Pope Gregory XVI: It is insanity to believe that liberty of conscience and liberty of worship are the inalienable rights of every citizen. . (Pope Gregory XVI, “Mirari Vos,” August 15,1832)

Pope Pius IX, Error Condemned: Every man is free to embrace and to profess that religion which, led by the light of reason, he shall consider to true . -- Allocution "Maxima quidem," June 9, 1862; Damnatio "Multiplices inter," June 10, 1851. (Ven. Pope Pius IX, “Syllabus of Modern Errors,”December 8, 1864; http://www.papalencyclicals.net/Pius09/p9syll.htm)

• Pope Pius IX, The Syllabus (of Errors): [It is error to believe that] Hence it has been wisely decided by law, in some Catholic countries, that persons coming to reside therein shall enjoy the public exercise of their own peculiar worship.” (Section X, Errors Having Reference to Modern Liberalism, #78. http://www.ewtn.com/library/PAPALDOC/P9SYLL.HTM)

Pope Pius IX, Error condemned: In this age of ours, it is no longer expedient that the Catholic religion be the only religion of the State, to the exclusion of all other cults whatsoever. In certain regions of Catholic name, it has been praiseworthily sanctioned by law that men immigrating there be allowed to have public exercises of any form of worship of their own. (Pope Pius IX, “Syllabus of Modern Errors,”December 8, 1864)

• Pope Leo X: That it is against the will of the Spirit to burn heretics at the stake is condemned as false. (Pope Leo X, “Exsurge Domino,” 1520)

• Pope Innocent IV, Ad extirpanda: The head of state or ruler must force all the heretics whom he has in custody...to confess their errors and accuse other heretics whom they know, and specify their motives,..Those convicted of heresy by the aforesaid Diocesan Bishop,surrogate or inquisitors, shall be taken in shackles to the head of state or ruler or his special representative, instantly,or at least within five days, and the latter shall apply the regulations promulgated against such persons [burn them alive]...(http://userwww.sfsu.edu/%7Edraker/history/Ad_Extirpanda.html;

French RC bishop and theologian,Jacques-Bénigne Bossuet (French: (September 1627 – April 1704) was a strong advocate of political absolutism and the divine right of kings. (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jacques-B%C3%A9nigne_Bossuet)

French RC Jean Bodin (1530-1596),who in 1576 published Six livres de la république (Six Books of the Commonwealth). Bodin insisted that sovereignty (i.e. the ultimate supreme power in any state) was absolute and indivisible. - https://faculty.history.wisc.edu/sommerville/351/351-172.htm

Dictatus papae: That of the pope alone all princes shall kiss the feet.

That a sentence passed by him may be retracted by no one; and that he himself, alone of all, may retract it. >That he himself may be judged by no one.

That no one shall dare to condemn one who appeals to the apostolic chair. Dictatus papae [1075] (a compilation of 27 statements of powers arrogated to the Pope that was included in Pope Gregory VII's register under the year 1075):http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/source/g7-dictpap.asp

And Bellarmine held that even heretical popes cannot be deposed:

) the manifestly heretical Pope...can and must be deposed by the Church. To my judgment, this opinion cannot be defended

Now, a Pope who remains Pope cannot be avoided, for how could we be required to avoid our own head? How can we separate ourselves from a member united to us?

...that the Pope heretic can be truly and authoritatively deposed by the Church, is no less false than the first... it must be observed in the first place that, from the fact that the Pope deposes bishops, it is deduced that the Pope is above all the bishops, - http://www.cmri.org/02-bellarmine-roman-pontiff.html