Have you ever read the pathetic excuses put forth by catholics to make their bloody history go away? The crusades were WAR, period. A true Christian never supports war.
They admit:
"For starters, the Crusades to the East were in every way defensive wars."
Oh, so because it was a defensive war it was ok? I guess Jesus was just kidding around…
"Then Jesus said to him, “Put your sword back into its place. For all who take the sword will perish by the sword.”(Matthew 26:52)
They say:
"They were a direct response to Muslim aggression—an attempt to turn back or defend against Muslim conquests of Christian lands."
Sounds just like Peter’s logic in defending Christ, doesn’t it? Of course he was wrong, Christ said so.
They say:
"With enormous energy, the warriors of Islam struck out against the Christians shortly after Mohammed’s death. They were extremely successful. Palestine, Syria, and Egypt—once the most heavily Christian areas in the world—quickly succumbed.
By the eighth century, Muslim armies had conquered all of Christian North Africa and Spain. In the eleventh century, the Seljuk Turks conquered Asia Minor (modern Turkey), which had been Christian since the time of St. Paul. The old Roman Empire, known to modern historians as the Byzantine Empire, was reduced to little more than Greece.
In desperation, the emperor in Constantinople sent word to the Christians of western Europe asking them to aid their brothers and sisters in the East.
That is what gave birth to the Crusades. They were not the brainchild of an ambitious pope or rapacious knights but a response to more than four centuries of conquests in which Muslims had already captured two-thirds of the old Christian world. At some point, Christianity as a faith and a culture had to defend itself or be subsumed by Islam. The Crusades were that defense."
Oh I see! A defensive war is a justified war! I guess Christ was was wrong…
"Then Jesus said to him, “Put your sword back into its place. For all who take the sword will perish by the sword.”(Matthew 26:52)
A pope wouldn’t entertain WAR would he?
"Pope Urban II called upon the knights of Christendom to push back the conquests of Islam at the Council of Clermont in 1095."
In other words he called them to WAR! I guess Christ was just kidding…
"Then Jesus said to him, “Put your sword back into its place. For all who take the sword will perish by the sword.”(Matthew 26:52)
How did the church who says it is the only church of salvation respond?
"The response was tremendous. Many thousands of warriors took the vow of the cross and prepared for war. Why did they do it?"
Why DID they do it??? Because they were not and are not True Christian’s!
How do they explain it?
"Crusading," Professor Jonathan Riley-Smith has rightly argued, was understood as an “an act of love”—in this case, the love of one’s neighbor. The Crusade was seen as an errand of mercy to right a terrible wrong. As Pope Innocent III wrote to the Knights Templar,
"You carry out in deeds the words of the Gospel, ‘Greater love than this hath no man, that he lay down his life for his friends.’"
OOOOOOOOHHHHHHH. Forgive me. We can murder when it is an act of love. Surely Christ must have been speaking “metaphorically”. Isn’t that the catholic answer to almost every sin they commit that is prohibited by Scripture.
I remind you Christ said:
"Then Jesus said to him, “Put your sword back into its place. For all who take the sword will perish by the sword.”(Matthew 26:52)
My intention was to go through this entire joke of an article but I must admit it is to troubling to me when I read it. Catholism was out of control from it’s beginning as it is today. They have mastered the art of BS, to put it mildly, when it comes to their MANY unscriptural actions throughout history.
Here is the link if you want to read the rest of this lame attempt to justify war (murder) in the name of catholicism:
crisismagazine.com/april2002/cover.htm
May Chist our Lord speed His return and have mercy on those who are liars inside but bless you with their lips.
