Did Pope Gregory IX declare black cats to be evil?

[zenyattafan]

I know this is an odd question. My 16-year-old son just came to me and told me the History Channel showed a preview of an upcoming show and wants to know if its true that Pope Gregory IX declared all black cats to be evil and ordered them killed. I Googled for the full story but all I can find is secular and anti-Catholic views on the subject, which I’m not even about to read. Can anyone give an explanation on the full story?

 

[Michelle_Arnold]

Just because a view of the subject is secular doesn’t make it not worth reading. In my Googling, I found a calm, relatively objective overview of the subject on Wikipedia (source). But you are right that there are indeed some hysterical, anti-Catholic pages on the subject as well. I simply recommend sifting carefully rather than refusing to read any of it.

According to the Wikipedia source, Pope Gregory IX released a papal bull around 1232, titled Vox in Rama (Latin, “A voice in Rama”), that condemned a contemporary surge in devil worship. In the course of describing the actions of groups engaging in devil worship, the claim was made that black cats were used in the rituals and the devil was likened to a cat. So far as I can tell from the limited information available online, the Pope was not condemning black cats or ordering their extermination. He was describing their use in evil rituals, which apparently unfortunately inspired people to fear black cats and to kill them.

Recommended reading:

How do you find reliable Catholic information online?
How do I learn to read with discernment?