Christian faith: Calvinism is back

[raumzeitmc2]

raumzeitmc2,
I read you post a few times before responding. I tried to read it with a charitable mind, but your post made me sick to my stomach each time I read it. The same feeling I get reading disgusting anti-catholic rantings.

You base your opinions on out dated and narrow history. Walsh wrote his book in 1937. Too much up to date scholarship has come about since then.

Fr. Mark

Fr. Mark, why call basic historical facts “rantings” ? Again, let’s look at that passage from William Walsh’s Philip II, which you seem to think is outdated:

… well-organized bands of Calvinists fell upon the Catholic churches, convents, schools and libraries.

At Montpellier they sacked all the sixty churches and convents, and put one hundred-fifty priests and monks to the sword. …

At Montauban they dragged the Poor Clare from their convent, exposed them half-naked to the jibes of the paid mob, shouted insults at them and told them to get married. At Castres, in December, a Reformed Consistory or Sanhedrin, ordered the city officials to take every one found on the streets to Huguenot sermons. Priests were dragged from the altars, the Poor Clare were scourged at the whip’s end, peasants were driven with blows to hear the preachers inveigh … against the Mass, Confession, the Pope. The fields and vineyards around Catholic villages where the people refused to listen to the preaching were burned or cut down.

Within a year the Calvinists, according to one of their own estimates, "murdered 4,000 priests, monks and nuns, expelled or maltreated 12,000 nuns, sacked 20,000 churches, and destroyed 2,000 monasteries " … The rare manuscript collection of the ancient monastery of Cluny was irreparably lost, with many others. Sacred vessels from the churches were melted into money to pay German mercenaries, who were urged to be ruthless.

The Persecution of Catholics in France by the Protestant Calvinists

Two things:

1. If you believe this information outdated and / or incorrect, please document this.
2. Otherwise, assuming Walsh is correct, what possible justification could there be for such Calvinist barbarity toward Catholics?

Have you ever read about Pope Adrian VI, a pope during the Reformation. He is reputed to have said, the reformation is God’s judgement on the Church for her wrongdoings.

Way ahead of ya!

But whatever may have been Adrian’s thoughts regarding God’s “judgment” on the Church, it’s scarcely credible that he could ever have thought, even in his wildest imaginations, that such “judgment” should include the revolting - and not to mention, **UNCHRISTIAN ** - murder of large numbers of innocent priests and the raping of many innocent nuns!

No, my friend, the Good God would never judge or reform his beloved bride in such an UNCHRISTLIKE way!

To see how he does reform, we read the lives of the saints. Take St. Philip Neri for example, the “second apostle to Rome.” Here we find God’s true reformer!

According to Cistellini, the first title given to Philip was “Reformer of Rome.” He cites Bremond, who sad that Philip was “one of the greatest architects of the counter-reformation, perhaps the greatest of them all, for surely no one else did so much to change the appearance of the eternal city at a time when everything seemed hopeless. When Philip came from Florence to Rome, a reform of the curia seemed impossible; when he died in 1595 it was an accomplished fact.”

Philip Neri: The Fire of Joy, 1995, T. & T. Clark Publishers, ISBN 0567293033 ISBN 9780567293039, p. 101.

Or that other great and true reformer, St. Charles Borromeo:

But, after all, the most reliable test of the character of a reformer is the results of his reform. Here the contrast between the true and the false shows itself most clearly. St. Charles even during his lifetime had the happiness of seeing the city of Milan transformed by means of his unwearied labours. It was not like the same city. Piety had taken the place of indifference, and a tone of high morality succeeded to the gross licence which had previously prevailed. The scandalous lives of the clergy had been exchanged for regular discipline and exemplary zeal. “The clergy,” says his biographer, “were so reformed that strangers thought that all the Milanese priests belonged to strict religious orders.”

The Tercentenary of a True Reformer, in The Month: A Catholic Magazine and Review, 1884, Rev. Joseph Stevenson, p. 448.

And many others…

But to reiterate my main point: it was the Calvinists who were the unjust aggressors; the Catholics the *innocent * victims.

Now Fr. Mark, there is no “hate” in saying this, there simply is none! It’s just a plain historical fact. Further, I happen to love my Protestant friends, and enjoy very much interacting with them. But that doesn’t alter the fact that the historical record has been appallingly skewed and ought to be corrected.

I would think you would agree.

God bless.

 

[SyCarl]

Fr. Mark, why call basic historical facts “rantings” ? Again, let’s look at that passage from William Walsh’s Philip II, which you seem to think is outdated:

Two things:

1. If you believe this information outdated and / or incorrect, please document this.
2. Otherwise, assuming Walsh is correct, what possible justification could there be for such Calvinist barbarity toward Catholics?
   Way ahead of ya!

But whatever may have been Adrian’s thoughts regarding God’s “judgment” on the Church, it’s scarcely credible that he could ever have thought, even in his wildest imaginations, that such “judgment” should include the revolting - and not to mention, **UNCHRISTIAN ** - murder of large numbers of innocent priests and the raping of many innocent nuns!

No, my friend, the Good God would never judge or reform his beloved bride in such an UNCHRISTLIKE way!

To see how he does reform, we read the lives of the saints. Take St. Philip Neri for example, the “second apostle to Rome.” Here we find God’s true reformer!

Philip Neri: The Fire of Joy, 1995, T. & T. Clark Publishers, ISBN 0567293033 ISBN 9780567293039, p. 101.

Or that other great and true reformer, St. Charles Borromeo:

And many others…

But to reiterate my main point: it was the Calvinists who were the unjust aggressors; the Catholics the *innocent * victims.

Now Fr. Mark, there is no “hate” in saying this, there simply is none! It’s just a plain historical fact. Further, I happen to love my Protestant friends, and enjoy very much interacting with them. But that doesn’t alter the fact that the historical record has been appallingly skewed and ought to be corrected.

I would think you would agree.

God bless.

Let’s look at what the Catholic Encyclopedia has to say on it. I would hardly call it a pro-Protestant source.

Francis I, who until then had been divided between his will to meet the wishes of the pope and the expediency of winning to himself the support of the Lutheran princes of Germany against Charles V, made up his mind to defer on this occasion to the demands of the exasperated Catholics. In the January following he took part in a solemn procession during the course of which six heretics were burned; he let the Parliament arrest seventy-four of them a Meaux, of whom eighteen were also burned; he himself ordered by edict the extermination of the heretics and of those who should harbour them, and promised rewards to those who should inform against them…Alarmed at their progress, Francis I, who had just concluded a treaty with the pope (June, 1538), thenceforward took a decidedly hostile attitude towards Protestantism, and maintained it until his death (31 March, 1547). In 1539 and 1540 the old edicts of toleration were replaced by others which invested the tribunals and the magistrates with inquisitorial powers against the heretics and those who shielded them…he magistrates were everywhere extremely zealous in enforcing the repressive edicts. At Paris, Toulouse, Grenoble, Rouen, Bordeaux, and Angers, numbers of heretics and hawkers of prohibited books were sent to the stake. At Aix the Parliament passed a decree ordering a general massacre of the descendants of the Waldenses grouped around Mérindol and de Cabrieres, its enforcement to be suspended for five months to give them time for conversion. After withholding his consent to this decree for five years the king allowed an authorization for its execution to be wrung from him, and about eight hundred Waldenses were massacred — an odious deed which Francis I regretted bitterly until his death. His successor, Henry II, vigorously maintained the struggle against Protestantism. In 1547 a commission — the famous Chambre Ardente — was created in the Parliament of Paris for the special purpose of trying heretics; then in June, 1551, the Châteaubriant Edict codified all the measures which had previously been enacted for the defence of the Faith. This legislation was enforced by the parliaments in all its rigour. It resulted in the execution of many Protestants at Paris, Bordeaux, Lyons, Rouen, and Chambéry, and drove the rest to exasperation…After the accession of Francis II, and through the influence of the Guises, who were all-powerful with the king and strongly devoted to Catholicism, the edicts against the Huguenots were rendered still more severe. Antoine* du Bourg was burned, and a royal edict (4 September, 1559) commanded that houses in which unlawful assemblies were held should be razed and the organizers of such assemblies punished with death. Embittered by these measures, the Huguenots took advantage of every cause for discontent afforded by the government of the Guises. After taking counsel with their theologians at Strasburg and Geneva, they resolved to have recourse to arms.

newadvent.org/cathen/07527b.htm

This brings the history up to the point at which you start.

From this it would hardly seem that the Catholics were the persecuted victims depicted. Unfortunately in situations such as it is the poor commoners, on both sides, who suffered.

 

[Dale_M]

I didn’t know Catholics ever cared about what Jews had to say. If anyone’s lacking “the fullness of truth,” it’s got to be them, right? (Joking a little).

In a more serious vein, though, it seems (to me) that Catholics on this forum typically have a pretty low view of the Jews. When one person out of 100 tells you to study Judaism in order to know what you’re talking about and the other 99 refer to them as “whitewashed sepulchres,” make much of their eventual rejection of Christ, and consistently put them down when other topics arise on which their perspective might be considered valuable (ie., the OT canon)…

I sometimes caution new members that the Catholics you encounter here at CAF are probably not like most Catholics you will encounter in real life, particularly the Catholics in this forum or any of the Apologetics forums.

The Catholic Church had a history of tolerating antisemitism, and you still encounter it in some of the fringe traditionalist groups. However, Vatican II, in the 1960s, reset Catholic-Jewish relations and the Vatican makes a real effort at improving relations or mending them when offense is taken.

Mentioning the Catechism of the Catholic Church, which is the official statement of what Catholics believe (or ought to believe) might be good here. The Church recognizes there is goodness and truth in other religions, although human errors and misconceptions are also present. However…

839
…When she delves into her own mystery, the Church, the People of God in the New Covenant, discovers her link with the Jewish People,326 "the first to hear the Word of God."327 The Jewish faith, unlike other non-Christian religions, is already a response to God’s revelation in the Old Covenant. To the Jews “belong the sonship, the glory, the covenants, the giving of the law, the worship, and the promises; to them belong the patriarchs, and of their race, according to the flesh, is the Christ”,328 "for the gifts and the call of God are irrevocable."329

840
And when one considers the future, God’s People of the Old Covenant and the new People of God tend towards similar goals: expectation of the coming (or the return) of the Messiah. But one awaits the return of the Messiah who died and rose from the dead and is recognized as Lord and Son of God; the other awaits the coming of a Messiah, whose features remain hidden till the end of time; and the latter waiting is accompanied by the drama of not knowing or of misunderstanding Christ Jesus.

vatican.va/archive/ccc_css/archive/catechism/p123a9p3.htm#II

The Church recognizes that Christianity has a special relationship with Judaism.

 

[raumzeitmc2]

Let’s look at what the Catholic Encyclopedia has to say on it. I would hardly call it a pro-Protestant source.
newadvent.org/cathen/07527b.htm

This brings the history up to the point at which you start.

From this it would hardly seem that the Catholics were the persecuted victims depicted. Unfortunately in situations such as it is the poor commoners, on both sides, who suffered.

If you go back and read through the passage you provided, you’ll see that in every instance it was the civil authorities, the State, not the Church, which put heretics to the fire. You can see clearly it was the State by from the following except from the Huguenot article you referenced:

Francis I … ordered by edict the extermination of the heretics … Francis I … took a decidedly hostile attitude towards Protestantism … the old edicts of toleration were replaced by others which invested the tribunals and the magistrates with inquisitorial powers against the heretics …At Aix the Parliament passed a decree ordering a general massacre of the descendants of the Waldenses … etc.

And the State had every reason to do so; for it was defending itself, not against simple, peaceful heretics, but against violent revolutionaries!

Now to give you some small idea of what the the State, the Church, indeed the whole of the Christian order was up against in those times, I’m posting a section from W. T. Walsh’s Philip II, ch. 18, Trouble in the Low Countries [1560-1562], pp. 352-355.

Philip was lenient, but not from choice. If he had had plenty of money, he probably would have wasted little time in persuasion with the heretics of the north. He understood better than most modern historians the significance of the revolutionary movement. Hence, early in 1563, he sent Margaret a list of suspects in Antwerp, many of them refugees from Spain, and urged her to look into their intrigues…

The chief target for the King’s intolerance in this important long letter was the “cursed sect of the Anabaptists,” which was extending itself in Holland and Zeeland. “It is a great shame, wrote Philip, “that this cursed sect, which even the heretics of Germany cannot endure, finds a refuge and shelter in my Estates.” The international character of the conspiracy was evident. He was informed that the heretics of the Netherlands were in communication with those of Franc, and bade her to stop this. As for the sect of the Anabaptists, he requested her to exterminate the vile thing.

The modern reader who shrinks from all this as another example of medieval bigotry, difficult to understand and impossible to condone, has forgotten who and what the Anabaptists were. To Philip, and most of the men of his time (including Luther and William of Orange) those fantastic forerunners of the Jacobins of 1792 and the Communists of twentieth-century Russia and Spain were enemies of God and man, whom no one in his sane senses could tolerate.

Philip could remember the time (he was then seven) when Melchior Hoffmann, one of those furriers who traveled from one end of Europe to the other, let it be know through Lower Germany and the Netherlands that he was a Prophet to whom the Word of the Lord had come, bidding him establish the New Jerusalem in Strasburg. His program was simplicity itself, with some remarkable resemblances to that of Mohammed. He undertook to send through the world from the New Jerusalem a hundred eighty-four Horsemen of Extermination, who with Elias and Enoch should pass through the world with the sword, “vomiting flame to destroy the enemies of the Lord.”

Enoch presently appeared in the person of a baker, John Matthiessen. This latter transferred the New Jerusalem to Münster, in Westphalia, where his emissaries found allies in a cloth merchant named Knipperdollinck, who had been active in propagating Lutheranism, and a tailor of Leyden, one John Bockelsohn or Bokelzoon. So successful was their propaganda in Münster that Knipperdollinck was elected burgomaster, and the city passed into their hands. Bockelsohn now revealed himself as the King of Sion, Ruler of all the Earth, and Son of David, while Matthiessen disclosed that he was the Prophet Moses, come to organize a massacre of all the ungodly.

Continued below.

 

[raumzeitmc2]

Continued.

The Reign of Terror which followed would seem incredible if there were not more modern instances to demonstrate the depths of human degradation and blood-lust. The King of Sion commanded all gold, silver and jewelry to be turned over to his treasury. Communism was proclaimed, with polygamy, community of women, and world-conquest. Rothman, an ex-chaplain, had four wives. The King of Sion had sixteen. Mass executions began.

The corpses of the ungodly piled up, rotting, in the streets. When the chief wife of the King of Sion objected, he cut off her head in the marketplace before a select group of his Loyalists. There followed a delirium of blood-letting, with the usual accompaniments of mass drunkenness, mob insanity, indescribable scenes of sadism and bestiality. This went on until a force of landsknechte took the city and slew the leaders and instigators of the anarchy.

The story of Münster alone, to those who were near enough to it to comprehend its horrors and their causes, explains a great deal about Philip II and other men of his sort. To them it was the logical outcome of any departure from the sane unity of the Catholic Church.

No one who knew the facts could separate if from Lutheranism and Calvinism and the ancient hatred of the Talmud. These elements were all bound up together in the Münster experiment. The germ of a sinister and growing chapter in modern history was there. The Catholic who loved Christian order and peace instinctively wished to destroy it before it should spread and destroy the world.

It was enough for Philip that Anabaptists were preaching in the Netherlands; the slaughter, the communism, the burning of churches and the torturing of priests and nuns, the anarchy and sex orgies would follow in due time, as a crisis follows pneumonia. It is doing him no injustice as a man of humane instincts and common sense, therefore, to say that he tolerated the Revolution for several years only because he lacked force with which to suppress it. Yet he did tolerate it. It is unhistorical to pretend that he was a tyrant in any sense in which a man of the sixteenth century (with no heretical axe to grind) would have understood the word.

The results of his tolerance convinced him more and more that it was a mistake. The heretics were not looking for toleration, or freedom of worship, or equality, or any of the other fine things they talked about. As Professor Merriman has acknowledged, “before long it became evident that some of the revolutionists would not be content with liberty to exercise their own faith, but were even intent on the destruction of Catholicism.”

 

[SyCarl]

If you go back and read through the passage you provided, you’ll see that in every instance it was the civil authorities, the State, not the Church, which put heretics to the fire. You can see clearly it was the State by from the following except from the Huguenot article you referenced:

And the State had every reason to do so; for it was defending itself, not against simple, peaceful heretics, but against violent revolutionaries!

Now to give you some small idea of what the the State, the Church, indeed the whole of the Christian order was up against in those times, I’m posting a section from W. T. Walsh’s Philip II, ch. 18, Trouble in the Low Countries [1560-1562], pp. 352-355.

The state was not defending itself as the portion I quoted took place before the excerpts you posted.

It is quite convenient to blame the state and not Catholics when the state was Catholic. You should note that Francis I was following the wishes of the Pope as the first sentence in the portion I quoted shows. It worked similarly during the crusade against the Albigensian heresy. Pope Innocent III called for a crusade. The subsequent atrocities were committed by the crusading forces but again the state was Catholic.

I am not saying Protestants did not commit atrocities but showing that both sides did.

 

[Contarini]

=

1. If you believe this information outdated and / or incorrect, please document this.

Walsh’s reference is too vague and difficult to check. To make a convincing case, *you *have to provide plausible evidence in the first place. When your only source is a historian writing decades ago, whose primary motivation was clearly to defend the Catholic Church, and who cites a source that is inaccessible to most of us, then you haven’t made your case.

A more recent (and in my opinion more reliable) scholarly source for this topic is Natalie Zemon Davis, in her 1973 article “Rites of Violence,” published in 1977 as part of her book Society and Culture in Early Modern France. Unfortunately, “Rites of Violence” is not one of the sections of the book available online. An abridged version of the article (without footnotes) is available here. Note on pp. 299-300 her assessment that Protestants were more likely to destroy religious property, and Catholics more likely to kill people, and her suggestion of the reason why (that besides being more numerous and powerful, Catholics saw the persons of heretics as contaminating, while Protestants were more offended by the ritual acts and objects of Catholicism–this explains why when Protestants did kill Catholics, they usually went after clergy and religious).

Nowhere does she explicitly refute the figures that Walsh gives, but she is clearly dealing with some of the same events, and I think I’m justified in saying that her account supersedes Walsh’s. She is a more recent scholar and is respected throughout the scholarly world, not just by Catholic apologists.

Walsh, like Belloc, was responding to a bigoted and distorted “Whig” Protestant narrative (by folks like Lea, for instance). Catholic historians of the early 20th century did good service in questioning this narrative. But the conversation among historians has moved beyond this–Davis’s work is a good example (though hardly the most recent). That I think is part of what Fr. Mark means by saying that Walsh is “outdated.” Furthermore, Davis did careful work in the archives at Lyons to investigate the social context of religious change (including religious violence) in 16th-century France. Historians of Walsh’s era tended to rely mostly on published sources.

I know that conservative Christians of all stripes love to use 19th and early-20th century sources, because they are more useful for folks with an axe to grind. But that makes them less convincing for those of us who don’t have that particular axe to grind. Generally speaking, more recent scholarship is more reliable. That isn’t always the case, of course, and we certainly shouldn’t throw out older scholarship. But when you have a historian from the 30s throwing out rather extravagant estimates of how many people the Protestants killed, and a historian from the 70s making more moderate statements based on archival research, I think the latter is clearly to be preferred.

Edwin

 

[raumzeitmc2]

The state was not defending itself as the portion I quoted took place before the excerpts you posted.

Actually, Sy, the historical fact of the matter is that the state, as well as the Church, had been under attack for *centuries prior *to the periods either of us referenced. Indeed hatred for the Catholic Church extends all the way back to Calvary!

This hatred manifested itself in the killing of Christ by the Jews and the Romans, and it has continued manifesting itself down the succeeding ages, not by killing the Head, but by seeking the destruction of the members. And this continual war against the Church, as Walsh tells us, was primarily waged by the Jews:

“Even as good Jews would help to furnish the sinews of the Church in many ages, so men remarkably like those scribes and pharisees whom Christ had called the children of the devil would *perpetuate the hatred *that once crucified Incarnate Love.” Philip II, p. 240.

Unfortunately, these same types of* bad Jews* played a highly influential and important role in the Protestant Reformation, contributing much to its success. So much so in fact, that the Protestant Reformation may even be considered, in a very real sense, a *Jewish *cause!

It is quite convenient to blame the state and not Catholics when the state was Catholic. You should note that Francis I was following the wishes of the Pope as the first sentence in the portion I quoted shows. It worked similarly during the crusade against the Albigensian heresy. Pope Innocent III called for a crusade. The subsequent atrocities were committed by the crusading forces but again the state was Catholic.

Well of course the state was Catholic! All of Europe was Catholic! And had been for some1500 years (or at least began to be from the founding of the Catholic Church in Rome by the apostles). And it should certainly come as no surprise that Popes would be involved, to greater or lesser degrees, in the affairs of Catholic Europe. I don’t see how we could expect it to have been otherwise. Nothing necessarily wrong with that. Such has been the case even in our time where Popes have played a role in world affairs. Here’s an example:

Wartime Correspondence Between President Roosevelt and Pope Pius XII, 1947, Myron C. Taylor.

I am not saying Protestants did not commit atrocities but showing that both sides did.

That’s undoubtedly true. But again (for the umpteenth time), it was the Protestants who were the unjust aggressors; the Catholics were simply defending themselves. Let me quote from the great Catholic historian Ludwig von Pastor:

The spiritual affinity with Paul IV., whom Pius V. venerated in many respects as a father, 2 shows itself in no small degree in the manner in which he fulfilled his task of guarding the treasure of faith in the Church and of protecting her against the assaults of the religious innovators. The means he employed in so doing were entirely in keeping with the character of a time when force and compulsion were used to subdue spiritual revolt, the strongest measures seeming all the more necessary as the attacks of the innovators were always increasing in violence.

In the new and ever extending form of Protestantism founded by Calvin there existed a far more dangerous, systematic and consistent enemy than in Lutheranism, which was now growing torpid, and was being torn to pieces by disputes within itself.

Calvinism, with its rigid organization, its harsh doctrines, its demand for the bloody extermination of Catholics, 1 and its propaganda, was fanning to fever heat the lust of Protestantism to attack the old Church.

An international monument was thereby called into being to such an extent that Geneva became almost a second Rome, and Calvin another Pope, who carried on a correspondence in every direction with the whole of Europe.

In Germany and Scandinavia, Protestantism in its Lutheran form had already gained a firm footing, and Calvinism therefore threw itself with all its force upon the west of Europe, in order completely to annihilate the Catholic Church beyond the Alps. Together with the Germans, the Romans, as well as the Slavs and Magyars were always being more and more involved in the religious changes, and led into opposition to the Papacy.

A third form of Protestantism had at the same time arisen in England, in the Episcopal State Church. The one point on which the reformers were agreed was the complete subjection and eradication of Catholic worship, the practice of which was in many places, especially in England, Ireland, Scotland, Denmark and Sweden, even punishable by death. The Catholics were, therefore, carrying on *a war of self-preservation *when they sacrificed everything to prevent the inroads of Protestantism, or to drive it out where it had already obtained a footing.

The history of the popes from the close of the Middle Ages, 1899, vol. xv, Introduction, xli-xlii.

To Contarini:

I’ll try to answer your post, if not tomorrow, hopefully within the next couple of days (busy, busy!).

God bless, folks.

 

[Holly3278]

Calvinism and its doctrine of “predestination” has always struck me as a very heretical and unorthodox doctrine and movement. To me, the very idea of “predestination” goes against the fundamental Christian idea of free will!

 

[who0Oshhh]

who0Oshhh,

could you go into that compatabilist approach more? I’ve never heard of it. How does that compare with liberation free will?

This is an article that outlines the two issues pretty well.
theopedia.com/Libertarian_free_will

Libertarian free will basically states that in order to say a person has free will, you have to be able to say that person was “able to do otherwise.” And in order to preserve this ability to do otherwise (or not act at all), free will has to be free of predetermination by God. You see this more in liberal Protestantism, but you also see it among Evangelicals that are theologically conservative without being from a strong Reformed/Calvinist background. In the page I linked to, there’s an objection to this point of view that I hadn’t seen before I saw it here, and I think it’s kind of interesting. One of the big reasons some people support an understanding of libertarian free will is that they believe you can’t assign any kind of moral value to a person’s actions if you aren’t “able to do otherwise” and therefore unable to claim responsibility for what you did. The third and final objection on the page relates to this, because God (by definition of who He is) can’t ever sin or do anything evil by either omission or commission. But if the LFW logic holds true in God’s case, He’s either unworthy of praise for His moral perfection or He actually is, at all times, capable of being something other than perfectly holy and sin-free.

The compatibilist view has pretty deep roots in the doctrine of total depravity. Just as God, by nature, is incapable of sin, man has a moral nature according to which a much different set of choices are made. It’s a bit like being stuck in a pit with no means of getting out. Do you have free will? Yes, you do, just as much as a person stuck in an actual pit. But do you have the means to get out of the pit? Nope.

Compatibilism and libertarian free will isn’t exclusive to religious topics, btw. The problem of reconciling determinism and free will is a pretty active topic among philosophers even if they’re atheists. You’ve probably heard of Daniel Dennet, one of the New Atheists. Philosopher, currently the face of secular humanism, participated in an open forum discussion with Dawkins, Harris, and Hitchens that led to those men being referred to as “The Four Horsemen.” That guy. He’s a compatibilist. He’s responsible for a particular kind of compatibilist “mesh theory.” He and H. G. Frankfurt (who wrote “On Bull…”) are two of the main compatibilists I know of that have nothing to do with religion. They go back and forth with a couple of other guys who support the other side of the issue.

Arminianism is another branch of the discussion that isn’t quite libertarian free will, but it’s too synergistic to call it compatibilist. It’s kind of tricky to place, and that’s why there’s so much debate between Calvinists and Arminians. The “hair’s breadth” that separates Arminian theology from the Calvinist understanding of total depravity is “universal prevenient grace.” I don’t know how much you’d really want to get into the Calvinist-Arminian thing, though- that’s just one issue of five. If I were you, I’d just go through Jimmy Akin’s “Tiptoe Through Tulip.” I don’t know how much that’d really help you if you wanted to tiptoe through the Articles of Remonstrance, though. Taken all together, it’s kind of a lot to go through.

As an aside, I have no idea where such strong critique of Judaism comes from either. I only seem to find it on these forums.

I guess I kind of see where it’s coming from- I mean, I’m not a Jew. It’s not like I do every single thing a Jew does. A lot of it is there, though, and I do have reasons for holding fast to some things but not others.

The thing is, though, Catholics are doing the same thing- but a little differently. You hold to some things and not others as well, but it’s grouped a little differently. Some of the things that I have in category A (things I keep) slide over to your category B (things you don’t keep), and vice versa.

But then when certain issues come up- typically, the ones that I have in category A but you have in category B- I try to give reasons for an A perspective that depend on the issue, and the Catholic will sometimes give reasons for a B perspective based on where it’s coming from- basically a genetic argument pertaining to authority. We all know where you look to for authority, and it’s not the Jews.

The thing with Judaism, though, is that it predates Catholicism by quite a bit. I get that you believe you have a group of “deciders” at the helm that are always capable of busting out an infallible decision, and these decisions are largely responsible for your division of Category A and Category B. But when you’re talking to a Protestant, you know I don’t believe in the infallibility thing. Which doesn’t mean they can’t be right- just that they can be wrong. So you have to convince me that your “deciders” were and are right.

There are times that it goes that route- though it’s more likely to go the simpler route of trying to convince me that “your guys” are always right and I should just have faith in that. But there’s also times where the inclusion of a particular item in your Category B is explained in a manner that demonizes Judaism and levels a kind of genetic argument against their authority. As if to say “It comes from Judaism, Jews did this rejected that killed Jesus are this and that, and that is why we won’t have it.” This doesn’t make too much sense in light of the existence of Category A right alongside Category B, and that is the type of argument I wish I could see a lot less of- especially when someone starts out the right way and then decides to add this in. That’s completely unnecessary.

 

[blazerdave]

Guess who’s back
Back again
Calvin’s back
Tell a friend

 

[TriuneUnity]

Guess who’s back
Back again
Calvin’s back
Tell a friend

Guess who just got back today?
That wild-eyed Frenchman that had been away
Hasn’t changed, hasn’t much to say
But man, I still think that predestinarian is crazy

He was asking if there was a Presbyterian church around
Where it was, where it could be found
Told him Providence Reformed Church is downtown
Driving all the Wesleyans crazy

John Calvin’s back in town
John Calvin’s back in town
I said
John Calvin’s back in town
John Calvin’s back in town
John Calvin’s back in town
John Calvin’s back in town
John Calvin’s back in town
John Calvin’s back in town

 

[gurneyhalleck1]

There’s a lady who’s sure all that predestination she’s told
and she’s buying the Westminister Confession…

When she gets there she knows
all her free will has been closed
and she’s buying the Westminister Confession

There’s a sign on the wall
And she wants to make sure
Because sometimes catechisms and papal bulls are misleading

In a barren, bland, undecorated church
there’s a preacher who sings
sometimes all of our grace is irrestable

Oooh, the elect makes me wonder

Oooh, the elect makes me wonder

There’s a feelin’ I get when I look to the West
And the grace that is calling is
irrestible

In my thoughts I have seen
simony and popes through the trees
and the voices of total
human depravity

Oooh, Geneva makes me wonder

And it’s preached to us that soon
if we all call the tune
and grace, not our own wills or freedom
will lead us to reason

And a new day will dawn
for the elect who are drawn
by the TULIP we nurture in the Institutes

If there’s a bishop in your hedgerow don’t be alarmed now
it’s just a recalcitrant for Queen Mary
yes there are two paths you can go by but in the long run
you, only God, can change the road you’re on…you’re predestined!

and she’s climbing a stairway to Calvin…

Guess who just got back today?
That wild-eyed Frenchman that had been away
Hasn’t changed, hasn’t much to say
But man, I still think that predestinarian is crazy

He was asking if there was a Presbyterian church around
Where it was, where it could be found
Told him Providence Reformed Church is downtown
Driving all the Wesleyans crazy

John Calvin’s back in town
John Calvin’s back in town
I said
John Calvin’s back in town
John Calvin’s back in town
John Calvin’s back in town
John Calvin’s back in town
John Calvin’s back in town
John Calvin’s back in town

 

[TriuneUnity]

This one is for you, gurney…given the Schori thread…LOL

The Anglican Communion (to the tune of the Church’s One Foundation)

The Anglican Communion
Was mightily distressed
When bishops of ECUSA
Their heresies expressed,
And in Convention showed not
Repentance or regret,
But chose to walk their own path,
Firm in their own ways set.

Political correctness
And chic diversity –
These are our church’s hallmarks,
And quite our cup of tea.
We follow where the winds blow,
We are the church of NOW.
We’re new Episcopalians
And trendier than thou.

Our gospel is inclusive.
(The other one’s passé.)
We welcome all the sexes –
Transgendered, lesbigay.
And though we’re loudly preaching
Our relevant good news,
We are a tad perplexed by
So many empty pews.

“To God alone be glory” –
This used to be our song.
With Katharine Jefferts-Schori
It likely won’t be long
Before we change our lyric
And sing another tune –
Not Father, Son and Spirit,
But Mother, Child and Womb.

Our church has no foundation
And Christ is not her Lord.
She is our new creation
By our own mighty word.
The Bible’s too oppressive,
And morals leave us bored.
Who then is our salvation?
It’s our own selves – adored.

There’s a lady who’s sure all that predestination she’s told
and she’s buying the Westminister Confession…

When she gets there she knows
all her free will has been closed
and she’s buying the Westminister Confession

There’s a sign on the wall
And she wants to make sure
Because sometimes catechisms and papal bulls are misleading

In a barren, bland, undecorated church
there’s a preacher who sings
sometimes all of our grace is irrestable

Oooh, the elect makes me wonder

Oooh, the elect makes me wonder

There’s a feelin’ I get when I look to the West
And the grace that is calling is
irrestible

In my thoughts I have seen
simony and popes through the trees
and the voices of total
human depravity

Oooh, Geneva makes me wonder

And it’s preached to us that soon
if we all call the tune
and grace, not our own wills or freedom
will lead us to reason

And a new day will dawn
for the elect who are drawn
by the TULIP we nurture in the Institutes

If there’s a bishop in your hedgerow don’t be alarmed now
it’s just a recalcitrant for Queen Mary
yes there are two paths you can go by but in the long run
you, only God, can change the road you’re on…you’re predestined!

and she’s climbing a stairway to Calvin…

 

[gurneyhalleck1]

Now THAT is a keeper!!! LOL LOL

This one is for you, gurney…given the Schori thread…LOL

The Anglican Communion (to the tune of the Church’s One Foundation)

The Anglican Communion
Was mightily distressed
When bishops of ECUSA
Their heresies expressed,
And in Convention showed not
Repentance or regret,
But chose to walk their own path,
Firm in their own ways set.

Political correctness
And chic diversity –
These are our church’s hallmarks,
And quite our cup of tea.
We follow where the winds blow,
We are the church of NOW.
We’re new Episcopalians
And trendier than thou.

Our gospel is inclusive.
(The other one’s passé.)
We welcome all the sexes –
Transgendered, lesbigay.
And though we’re loudly preaching
Our relevant good news,
We are a tad perplexed by
So many empty pews.

“To God alone be glory” –
This used to be our song.
With Katharine Jefferts-Schori
It likely won’t be long
Before we change our lyric
And sing another tune –
Not Father, Son and Spirit,
But Mother, Child and Womb.

Our church has no foundation
And Christ is not her Lord.
She is our new creation
By our own mighty word.
The Bible’s too oppressive,
And morals leave us bored.
Who then is our salvation?
It’s our own selves – adored.

 

[gurneyhalleck1]

The Episcopal Church and Schiori (sung to the tune of Led Zeppelin’s “Immigrant Song”)

Ahhhhhhh hah! Ahhhhhhhh hah!

We come from the land of the ice and snow
where theology is liberal
and Ducan and Rowan’s eyebrows GROW!
Hammer of the fog…
We drive our mission to no new lands
fight no hordes, just bring law suits
judge, bailiff and attorneys I am coming…

Always confused…
to ordain ladies or nah-ot
our only goal will be the
non-implosion of us all!

Ahhhhhhh hah! Ahhhhhhhh hah!

Come from the land of rain and dew
where prayer book’s altered and the
theology is too!
How green is your money, can almost speak to me now
Suing you to bend and break, we are your litigation overlords!

So now you better stop! Breakin’ off and forming your own dioceses!
Lady priests, abortion, pansexuals, and cross-dressers will win the day
despite all of your splinterin’

wwooooooo wwhooooo

whooooooo whooooooo bam…

 

[blazerdave]

Well done, gentlemen!

 

[blazerdave]

By the way TriuneUnity, our own hymnal has a somewhat different text

Our church is mighty spikey
with smells and bells and chants,
And Palestrina masses
that vex the Protestants.
O happy ones and holy
who fall upon their knees
For solemn Benediction
And mid-week Rosaries.

Though with a scornful wonder
men see our clergy, dressed
In rich brocaded vestments
as slowly they process;
Yet saints their watch are keeping
lest souls be set alight
Not by the Holy Ghost, but
by incense taking flight.

Now we on earth have union
with Lambeth, not with Rome,
Although the wags and cynics
may question our true home;
But folk masses and bingo
can’t possibly depose
The works of Byrd and Tallis,
or Cranmer’s stately prose.

(Here shall the organist modulate)

So let the organ thunder,
sound fanfares “en chamade;”
Rejoice! For we are treading
where many saints have trod;
Let peals ring from the spire,
sing descants to high C,
Just don’t let your elation
Disrupt the liturgy.

 

[raumzeitmc2]

Walsh’s reference is too vague and difficult to check.

Perhaps, but listen to what Walsh says about his references (or lack thereof) in his introduction to the “Notes and Bibliography” section, Philip II:

It would be pedantic to attempt a general bibliography for this work, when such excellent and exhaustive ones are available in the fourth volume of Professor R. B. Merriman’s The Rise of the Spanish Empire, in Espasa’s Encilopedia Universal Ilustrada, and in the catalogues and bibliographies of many libraries.

Hundreds, thousands of volumes could be cited; but to what end? The need is not for more commentaries on commentaries, nor for further accumulation of mere facts, but for a clear and accurate examination of contemporary sources now accessible in many of the great libraries.

When I went to the Library of Congress for a copy of the only reliable contemporary King Philip II, which, as Professor Merriman says, is so indispensable that the historian must have it constantly at his side, I found the leaves of the third volume still uncut after their fifty-four years of dignified seclusion, and there was no copy of the fourth volume.

I had a similar experience at Yale University Library when preparing a life of Isabella; I was the first to cut the leaves of the second volume of Bernaldez’ História de los reyes católicos, though the library stamp showed that it had been there for thirty-one years.

Most readers of biography have little or no interest in notes; but scholars and students will wish to know, and I hope to check and reexamine my sources on matters of importance, especially those so much confused by controversy. For these later I hope the following pages will furnish a minimum selective bibliography that will also be sufficient. I make no claim to exhaustive knowledge of this vast subject. I have sought only to establish and to verify the reality of its essential parts. (p. 727)

To make a convincing case, *you *have to provide plausible evidence in the first place. When your only source is a historian writing decades ago, whose primary motivation was clearly to defend the Catholic Church, and who cites a source that is inaccessible to most of us, then you haven’t made your case.

But Walsh is not the only one source; there are many others. And among them one finds virtually universal agreement that first Protestant’s were indeed violent and unjust aggressors. Dave Armstrong has an excellent summary of some of a few of them:
The Protestant Inquisition

But getting back to what Walsh wrote in Philip II, chapter XV, *Catherine de’ Medici *[1560] (p. 289):

Within a year the Calvinists, according to one of their own estimates, [19] murdered 4000 priests, monks and nuns, expelled or maltreated 12000 nuns, sacked 20000 churches, and destroyed 2000 monasteries with their priceless libraries and works of art. The rare manuscript collection of the ancient monastery of Cluny was irreparably lost, with many others. Sacred vessels from the churches were melted into money to pay German mercenaries, who were urged to be ruthless. [20].

Walsh cites the following (notes, p. 739):

1. Albert le Mire: Nouvelle Collection de memoires relatif a l’histoire de France, ch. XI, p. 512. Cabrera [de Córdoba] says more than 9,000 religious and 3,000 priests killed, I, 299.
2. Cabrera, I, 299.

I haven’t, as yet, found the le Mire reference, but did find that of the “Spanish historian and first biographer of Philip II,” Luis Cabrera (1559-1623).

Cabrera writes:

Con escándalo y temor de Europa arruinó y violó su primero ímpetu las iglesias y monasterios, echando en el rio y quemando las reliquias de los santos, matando más de nueve mil religiosos y más de tres mil sacerdotes.

Historia de Felipe II, Rey de España, Vol. 1, Luis Cabrera de Córdoba, p. 230.
Filipe Segundo, Rey de España, 1876, vol. 1, ch. XV, p. 314.

Google gives an adequate translation of the Spanish, adequate enough to at least confirm Walsh:

With shock and fear of Europe and violated his first ruined churches and monasteries momentum, throwing in the river and burned the relics of saints, killing more than nine thousand men and over three thousand priests.

The page numbers in the above editions of Cabrera differ from those given by Walsh, undoubtedly because he was using the earlier editions of Cabrera.

 

[raumzeitmc2]

Continued response to Contarini:

A more recent (and in my opinion more reliable) scholarly source for this topic is Natalie Zemon Davis, in her 1973 article “Rites of Violence,” published in 1977 as part of her book Society and Culture in Early Modern France

… Nowhere does she explicitly refute the figures that Walsh gives, but she is clearly dealing with some of the same events, and I think I’m justified in saying that her account supersedes Walsh’s.

I saw nothing in Davis’ work which superseded Walsh in his essentials.

But in any event, a far more telling work, and by another recent and perhaps even more respected scholar is Norman Cohn’s (1915-2007) The Pursuit of the Millennium: Revolutionary Millenarians and Mystical Anarchists of the Middle Ages, (1957, 1961, revised and expanded in 1970).

From the Forward:

The publication of a third edition of the Pursuit of the Millennium has provided an opportunity for a thorough revision. Almost a quarter century has passed since I began work on the book, and thirteen years since I finished it. It would be a poor commentary on the progress of scholarship, or on my mental elasticity, or on both, if I could find nothing in it now to modify or clarify. In point of fact I have found plenty. The new version has thirteen chapters instead of twelve, and a different Introduction and Conclusion; two other chapters have been substantially altered; and innumerable minor changes have been made throughout. Some readers may like to know what, in general terms, all this amounts to. The changes, then, can be summarized as follows.

In the first place, the results of recent research have been taken into account. The Pursuit of the Millennium is still the only book on its subject, i. e., the tradition of revolutionary millenarianism; and mystical anarchism as it developed in western Europe between the eleventh and the sixteenth centuries. But there have been many fresh contributions, ranging from short articles to long books, on individual aspects and episodes of that story. … As the Pursuit of the Millennium never was intended to be a general history of religious dissent or ‘heresy’ in the Middle Ages, most of the recent research in that field – which is abundant – leaves its argument untouched.

Cohn did extensive and groundbreaking research into the numerous fanatical sects and movements of Europe from the 11th to the 16th century. What he has to say will absolutely astound! The hidden information he uncovered sheds tremendous light on the true nature of the so-called “Reformation.”

One need only compare the writings of the various millennial sects and self-appointed “prophets” chronicled and depicted in Cohn’s book with those of men like Luther and Calvin et al to see a striking similarity in fanaticism! Indeed, one could even argue that the Reformers simply continued the same centuries old tradition (by deluded and fanatical minds) of wild ravings and violent persecution against the Christian social order in general, and the Catholic Church in particular.

But don’t take my word; read the book for yourself. And I encourage others also to read what they can online and then get a copy.

Regarding Cohn’s sources, this is from the *Introduction: The Scope of this Book *(pp. 17-18):

No other overall study of these medieval movements exists. The more strictly religious sects which appeared and disappeared during the Middle Ages have indeed received ample attention; but much less attention has been given to the story of how, again and again, in situations of mass disorientation and anxiety, traditional beliefs about a future golden age or messianic kingdom came to serve as vehicles for social aspirations and animosities. Though there is no lack of excellent monographs dealing with single episodes or aspects, the story as whole remained untold. The present work aims, so far as may be, at filling that gap.

To open up this largely unexplored field entailed combing many hundreds of original sources in Latin, Greek, Old French, sixteenth-century French, and medieval and sixteenth-century German, both High and Low. Research and writing took, in all, some ten years; and it was because that seemed long enough I decided – reluctantly – to limit the investigation to northern and central Europe. …

The raw material has been supplied by contemporary sources of the most varied kinds – chronicles, reports of inquisitorial investigations, condemnations uttered by popes, bishops and councils, theological tracts, polemical pamphlets, letters, even lyric poems. Most of this material was produced by clerics who were utterly hostile to beliefs and movements which they were describing; and it has not always been easy to know just how much allowance to make for unconscious distortion or conscious misrepresentation.

But fortunately the other sine also produced a large body of literature, much of which has survived the sporadic efforts of secular and ecclesiastical authorities to destroy it; and so it has been possible to check clerical sources not only against one another but against the written pronouncements of quite a number of millenarian prophets. The account given here is the end-product of a long process of collecting and collating, appreciating and re-appreciating a vast mass of evidence. If in the main it is an unhesitating account, that is because almost all the major doubts and queries which arose in the course of the work had answered themselves before the end. Where uncertainties still remain they have of course been indicated.

God bless.