They did because the Pope told them to,I always thought the Pope was supposed to be infalliable not just some guy in a funny hat.Wow, how cruel were these morons,which Pope stopped it? and which Pope was correct,the one who gave permission or the one who stopped it?
2007-08-26 01:38:18 · 21 answers · asked by Anonymous in Society & Culture ➔ Religion & Spirituality
Infallible. With his taste in hats?
That's funny.
Love and blessings Don
2007-08-26 01:44:11 · answer #1 · answered by Anonymous · 3⤊ 2⤋
Actually, the Catholic church by and large did not burn witches and did not torutre during the inquisition (mostly, if someone wouldn't convert, they would simply take their land holdings, a reason they DID NOT want to torture, because compelling land owners to convert would circumvent the real reason for the inquisition, which was to seperate non-Christians from their money), at least according to scholarly texts of the time. Not to say that the Catholic Church is a wholly innocent institution, but the myth that the Catholic Church burned witches was largely perpetuated by rival churches, particularly the Protestent church, who, ironically, did espouse burning witches and did so in Europe and in this country! Do a little research.
2007-08-26 08:46:46 · answer #2 · answered by shightfuhk 2 · 3⤊ 0⤋
You should know that people who lived in Middle Ages and Early Modern period had a quite different standard of human rights compared to (most of) our current standard and the Pope is only infalliable under certain, very very specific circumstances.
FYI, during early 18th century, the witch-hunt subsided. The last execution for witchcraft in England took place in 1716, when Mary Hicks and her daughter Elizabeth were hanged. Jane Wenham was among the last subjects of a typical witch trial in England in 1712, but was pardoned after her conviction and set free. The Witchcraft Act of 1734 saw the end of the traditional form of witchcraft as a legal offence in Britain, those accused under the new act were restricted to people who falsely pretended to be able to procure spirits, generally being the most dubious professional fortune tellers and mediums, and punishment was light.
Helena Curtens and Agnes Olmanns were the last women to be executed as witches in Germany, in 1738. In Austria, Maria Theresa outlawed witch-burning and torture in the late 18th century; the last capital trial took place in Salzburg in 1750. The last execution in Switzerland was that of Anna Göldi in 1782, at the time it was widely denounced as state-sponsored murder throughout Switzerland and Germany, and not technically a witch trial since explicit allegations of witchcraft were avoided in the official trial.
Salem witch trials had nothing to do with the Pope or the Roman Catholic church as they were entirely held by Puritan Protestants in Essex, Suffolk and Middlesex Counties of Massachusetts in 1692 and 1693.
Please visit the links below for further reading of witch-hunt.
2007-08-26 09:44:35 · answer #3 · answered by Duke of Tudor 6 · 1⤊ 0⤋
Wow.
I've never heard that it was Catholics who tortured and burned witches. (I assume you mean the famous Salem witch trials.)
Since it wasn't the Catholics, then the Pope had nothing to do with it.
The Pope is only infallable under certain, very specific circumstances.
The morons were 100% cruel.
2007-08-26 08:49:03 · answer #4 · answered by lfh1213 7 · 3⤊ 0⤋
First of all, the pope isn't always infallible. He is only infallible when speaking from the chair of St. Peter, when teaching of faith & morals. Not in his every day to day words.
Second, it wasn't Catholics that burned witches, it was Protestants in the 1600s.
Protestants don't follow the pope.
I suggest you read more and read from the right resources.
2007-08-26 08:45:38 · answer #5 · answered by Anonymous · 4⤊ 0⤋
Because the protestants did it better.
...Luther believed that witches should be burned even if they harmed no one, since they made pacts with the devil. He was personally responsible for at least four witch burnings in Wittenburg.
Calvin ... himself said on one occasion:
"The Bible teaches us that there are witches and they must be slain ... this law of God is a universal law."
Another prominent Protestant, John Wesley (1703-1791), the founder of the Methodist Church, wrote that anyone who denied the reality of witchcraft was:
in direct opposition not only to the Bible, but to the suffrage of the wisest and best of men in all ages and nations ... Thus giving up of witchcraft is in effect giving up the Bible. Salem Mass.
2007-08-26 08:52:42 · answer #6 · answered by Anonymous · 3⤊ 0⤋
Your first clue that you were wrong should have been that the RCC condones witchcraft in the white magic performance of transubstantiation. Check it out, and you will see that it is nothing more than a magic trick done to turn ordinary bread and wine into body and blood. Having been brought up with the practice of the mass (prayer for the dead) I am always amazed at God's grace in helping me escape.
If he ever did burn 'witches' it would more than likely have been someone who refused his infallibility, and would not agree that transubstantiation was valid. Check out Foxe's Book of Martyrs for more info on that.
The Pope is antichrist, and may God allow me to say it, and proclaim it, until my dying day!
2007-08-26 08:53:06 · answer #7 · answered by Notfooled 4 · 1⤊ 2⤋
Well, personally I wouldn't do it cuz I have no right to condemn others. Me and my friends respect people and do not judge others just because their beliefs are different.
Too bad the Catholics in the Middle Ages weren't like that... *sigh*
I really find it extremely annoying on how different we are from the people in the Old Ages.
2007-08-26 08:46:07 · answer #8 · answered by Otaku in Need 4 · 1⤊ 0⤋
if you thought it was catholics burning withches in the ( SALEM) with trials you need to reread your history again !!!
HAngings were done by people afraid of what they do not know about /the unknown ...just like most of the racist nonsence I see sometimes on here
BY the way Luther was not Catholics ....do you know the difference ? between groups that claim to be christians and the religion catholicsm which goes under christian as many other religions ?
2007-08-26 09:13:46 · answer #9 · answered by HAPA CHIC 6 · 2⤊ 0⤋
Religious figures have revelations when faces with legal issues. A local church figure had a revelation to allow Blacks in the congregation. It was praised as Divine wisdom. In reality the church was threatened with a civil rights lawsuit.
Some revelation, huh?
2007-08-26 08:47:09 · answer #10 · answered by Anonymous · 1⤊ 0⤋
Actually look at the big "witch hunts" in the USA and UK and you'll find that it wasn't the Catholics who were instigating them. Also most victims of witchunts were hanged, not burned. Heretics tended to get burned.
2007-08-26 08:46:52 · answer #11 · answered by James Melton 7 · 2⤊ 0⤋