History and Theology: catholic church

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Catholics

The Wisdom Of The Popes

Pope Stephen V (885-891): The popes, like Jesus, are conceived by their mothers through the overshadowing of the Holy Ghost. All popes are a certain species of man-god? All powers in heaven, as well as on earth, are given them.

Pope Paul V (1605-1621): The doctrine of the double motion of the earth about its axis and about the sun is false, and contrary to holy scripture.

Pope Gregory XVI (1831-1846): From the polluted fountain of indifferentism flows that absurd and erroneous doctrine, or rather, raving, which claims and defends liberty of conscience for everyone. From this comes, in a word, the worst plague of all, namely, unrestrained liberty of opinion and freedom of speech? It is in no way lawful to demand, to defend, or to grant unconditional freedom of thought, or speech, of writing, or of religion, as if they were so many rights that nature has given man.

Pope Pius XI (1922-1939): Benito Mussolini is a gift of Providence, a man free from the prejudices of the politicians of the liberal school.
- John Dollison, Pope-Pourri

The Catholics have a Pope. The Protestants laugh at them, and yet the Pope is capable of intellectual advancement. In addition to this, the Pope is mortal, and the church cannot be afflicted with the same idiot forever. The Protestants have a book for their Pope. The book cannot advance. Year after year, and century after century, the book remains as ignorant as ever.
- Robert Ingersoll

If the Pope is infallible, how do you explain his choice of hats?
- Tim OʼBrien

The Popeʼs pointy white hat is nothing more than a designer dunce cap.
- Skip Church

Excerpts From “The Lost Encyclical Against Penicillin” (A Parody)

Beloved children, I [the Pope] write to you today to offer you loving guidance against the unnatural use of antibiotics. God created bacteria and viruses for the purpose of infecting organisms sometimes seriously, sometimes less seriously - and we must never presume to interfere with the right order of Godʼs creation. Just as all forms of birth control go against the natural purpose of conjugal relations - namely, procreation - so the use of all forms of man-made antibiotics interfere with the God-given design of bacteria and viruses and how He intends them to interact with the human body. Each and every bacteria-body interaction must remain open to the transmission of bacteria. It is immoral to impede development of a natural process. That is why we have so exhaustively spoken out against artificial birth control and now antibiotics. We cannot impede a process that God has created. No impeding, no impeding! God created syphilis to infect sexually immoral people, and cause them suffering and eventual death. In no way should a man-made antibiotic interfere with this God-given process. Also, the fear of syphilis is a natural encouragement toward marital fidelity, which could not otherwise hold its own in a free market.
- Christopher Durang, Free Inquiry, Spring 1996

My Mom and Dad were Catholics and used the rhythm method of birth control. At the end of eight years they had their own rhythm section.
- Steve Wolski

If God is Catholic how come he only had one child?
- Source unknown

Mother Teresa used to say, “God always provides. He provides for the flowers and the birds, for everything in the world that he has created. And those little children are his life. There can never be enough.” On the other hand, scientists who study birds have found that one-third of adult birds and four-fifths of their offspring die of starvation every year. (David Lack, “Of Birds and Men,” New Scientist, Jan., 1996).
- Frank Miele, “Mother Not So Superior?” The Skeptic, Vol. 4, No. 2, 1996

The Wisdom Of Mother Teresa (And Skip Church)

Mother Teresa On Aids: It is the retribution for “improper sexual misconduct.”

(Then what were the Black death, smallpox, influenza, measles, mumps, polio, and TB “retribution for?” - Skip)

Mother Teresa On Poverty: It is very beautiful for the poor to accept their lot. The world is much helped by the suffering of poor people.

(And the more poor people who “accept” their suffering, the more rich people there will be who manipulate them to their own greedy ends. The rich complain that the poor want something for nothing. But the rich often stop at nothing to get everything. - Skip)

Mother Teresa On the Intense Pains of a Man with Cancer: You are suffering like Christ. Therefore Jesus must be kissing you.

(Mother Teresa, who happens to be against the use of anesthetics, told this story herself, during a taped interview, and even told the interviewer the suffering manʼs reply to her. After she said, “Jesus must be kissing you,” the man replied, “Then I wish heʼd stop.” - Skip)

Mother Teresa On Overpopulation: There is no problem of overpopulation, only of Godʼs will.

(So if you live in a developing country whose population growth is outpacing its food production and economic growth, then you ought to throw away those rubbers and birth control pills, and get down on your knees and embrace starvation and poverty, because according to Mother T. thatʼs “Godʼs will.” - Skip)

- Mother Teresaʼs statements are drawn from The Missionary Position by Christopher Hitchens

Now thereʼs the Vatican Bank, and all that money-laundering, and the Mafia. Jesus overturned all the tables in the temple, and now they have the Vatican Bank.
- Eddie Izzard, Dress to Kill (the book)

Millions of dollars are spent on each Vatican road show, money that could help the poor, who are rapidly inheriting the earth.
- Kate Clinton, Donʼt Get Me Started

Some 400 U.S. Catholic priests have been charged with child molestation in the past decade, and the church has paid an estimated $400 million in damages and costs. One priest, James Porter, is accused of abusing perhaps 100 victims in three states - including a boy with a full body cast who couldnʼt move to resist.
- James A. Haught, “The Moralizers: Crooks, Quacks, Kook, Creeps, and Cruds in the Clergy,” The Humanist

Pope Finally Apologizes After Two Thousand Years Of Catholic Atrocities

The Catholic Church is the single largest Christian denomination in the world today, larger even than the membership of all Protestant denominations combined. Not surprising considering the Catholic Churchʼs two millennia of political power brokering, heresy snuffing, book banning, Jew hating, witch burning, female subjugating, gay-bashing, war mongering, slavery-promoting (well, 1800 years of slavery-promoting), wealth stealing, genocidal vigor.

But the real topper came in March of the year 2000 when Pope John Paul II asked for the descendants of the multitudes who were hurt, enslaved, stolen from, and killed by Catholics to please forgive the one true church of Christ, the Catholic Church. How "big" of the Pope to repent for every Catholic atrocity in history, especially after two thousand years of stepping on peopleʼs toes has helped produce the biggest church the world has ever seen.

If only one of the earlier Popes had repented and tried to set things right sooner. Like in the fourth century when the first Christian to become a Roman Emperor was persuaded by Catholic bishops to issue a decree outlawing all rival Christian sects (“the Novatians, Valentinians, Marcionites, Paulians, Montanists,” etc.), and decree that they were “in league with the devil,” and “commanded all their houses of prayer be made over to the Catholic Church; that no facility whatever be left for any future gathering,” and had over 3000 Christians executed because their interpretation of the Bible did not agree with the Catholic one. Yup, that might have been a good time to begin apologizing.

Comedian Emo Philips provides the most apt analogy to the Popeʼs “forgive us,” speech. Emo once said, “When I was a kid, I used to pray every night for a new bicycle. Then I realized that the Lord, in his wisdom, didnʼt work that way. So I just stole one and asked him to forgive me.”
- Skip Church

Popeʼs Mea Culpa - A PR Stunt

Exactly two years have passed today since Pope John Paul II launched his great apology drive for the past “errors” of the Roman Catholic church. One more reconfirmation of the new course took place last Sunday, when he celebrated public penitence in St. Peterʼs Basilica. Meeting with harsh criticism since the beginning, the papal apology has meantime developed somewhat more precise outlines. “We ask forgiveness for divisions between Christians,” the Pope said, “for the use of violence in the name of truth, and for the diffidence and hostility against followers of other religions.” According to a document by the Vaticanʼs international theological commission, the historical sins are classified into seven categories, including divisions within Christianity, proselytizing by force, the inquisition, anti-Jewish prejudices, sins against minorities, women and human rights.

The Popeʼs Mea Culpa successfully avoids too close contact with the historical truth and has to be taken as a mere PR stunt. Nothing was for example heard again of the conference, scheduled for last October and proudly announced by the historical-theological commission of the Vatican, for which allegedly 50 renowned historians had been invited to scrutinize the bloody work of the Inquisition in Spain. But the Popeʼs project to square accounts with history before the new millennium dawns is not just superficial, it is pure hypocrisy. While crocodile tears are shed about the victims of the Holocaust, John Paul does not hesitate to beatify his predecessor Pius XII who collaborated with German, Italian and Croatian fascists during the second world war and rescued them after their defeat.

But the Vaticanʼs soft spot for mass murderers does not end there. The recent case of Father Athanase Seroma, shows how little the papal Mea Culpa is worth. Father Athanase Seroma played a leading role in the 1994 genocide that devastated Rwanda and is currently hiding under the name Don Anastasio Sumba Bura in northern Italy. According to many eyewitnesses, he organized the Nyange genocide in which between 2000 and 2500 Tutsi refugees were killed from April to July 1994. The African Human Rights group which produced a 22-page report about the events in Nyange in which Father Seromba, among other priests, had been involved, found that several of them are now living in Italy. The African Human Rights group asked the Pope more than half a year ago to launch an inquiry into the matter, but never received a reply. Maybe, decades later, a new pope may appear with a new apology!
- Sanal Edamaruku, ed., Rationalist International, Bulletin #33, March 16, 2000

Aztec Extremists Cut Out Visiting Popeʼs Heart (Satire)

Mexico City - Exacting retribution for Catholic explorer Hernando Cortezʼs destruction of their civilization, Aztec extremists cut out visiting Pope John Paul IIʼs heart in a ritual ceremony Monday. “For nearly 500 years, we have been brutally oppressed by the Catholics, enduring slavery, inquisition, rape, disease, forced conversions and random terror,” said Aztec high priest Xalpatlahuac, holding aloft the still-beating heart of the pope, who was making his fourth trip to Mexico since ascending to the papacy in 1979. “In the name of all those who have died, I sacrifice this heart to the sun god Huitzilopochtli.” The 78-year-old Polish pontiff was riding through the streets of downtown Mexico City in his popemobile when the extremists seized him and carried him off to a nearby Aztec pyramid. He was then pinned down by four priests, and, after a brief struggle, his chest was carved open with a sacrificial obsidian knife. The Catholic Church has not responded to the extremistsʼ demand that $14 billion in plundered Aztec gold be returned.
- The Onion, Vol. 33, No. 3 (Jan. 27, 1999)

Catholicism

People who do not live in Rome
but pretend to
are called Roman Catholics.

And they have a great many fathers
who dress like ladies
and do not have children.

This is so that ladies who have children
without a father
can call them God.
- Edwin Brock, Paroxisms: A Guide to the Isms

The trinitarian believes a virgin to be the mother of a son who is her maker.
- Francis Bacon

The Vatican came out with a new rule. No surrogate mothers. Good thing they didnʼt make this rule before Jesus was born.
- Elayne Boosler

The Vatican recently admitted that Catholic churches in Third world countries are failing to inspire their parishioners to practice only Vatican approved methods of birth control. Isnʼt it about time the Vatican threw in the towel, or “the sponge” on this one? In fact, I think itʼs time for the Catholic Church to start selling condoms in the shape of the Popeʼs mitered hat with cross-shaped ribs running down the sides (for her pleasure, and an added “heavenly” dispensation).
- Skip Church

I would welcome from the Pope some appreciation for the goodness of sexual pleasure - any bodily pleasure, come to think of it. - Luke Timothy Johnson, “A Disembodied ‘Theology of the Body’: John Paul II on Love, Sex & Pleasure,” Commonweal, Jan. 26, 2001

The fact that women who endured twelve to sixteen years of Catholic schools are not all virgins or prostitutes is a miracle.
- Martha Manning, Chasing Grace: Reflections of a Catholic Girl, Grown Up

Catholics used to have this place called Limbo, for little babies who died before they were baptized. The nuns assured us that no one was mean to them in Limbo, that they were well taken care of. But you had the idea that they were taken care of in the hospital-nursery kind of way rather than the at-home-snuggling-with-people-who-love-you kind of way?

[Though Limbo no longer officially exists, Catholics still believe in a celestial waiting room called Purgatory where you have to spend centuries doing penance before being allowed into heaven.] You got time off from Purgatory by making the sign of the cross, which earned you three years - seven years if you used holy water. Repeating holy phrases (ejaculations) qualified for all kinds of reprieves, although it was hard for me to imagine that when my mother yelled, “JE-sus, Ma-RY, and JO-seph! Didnʼt I tell you kids not to swing from the railing!” she was actually accumulating grace.
- Martha Manning (see above)

Following the Vatican declaration that women cannot become priests because they do not resemble Christ, sources reported that Colonel Sanders declared he would not employ anyone who didnʼt resemble a chicken.
- Jane Curtin

What do a Catholic priest and a Christmas tree have in common?
Both have balls just for decoration.
- Source unknown

The Catholic Church is against birth control so the number of Catholics keeps growing. But fewer are becoming priests. Pretty soon theyʼll have one priest for every fifty-thousand Catholics, and only a priest can consecrate hosts (those unsalted Ritz crackers they serve at Mass). So Catholics will have to rent football stadiums to attend Mass with the ONE priest in their vicinity. The priest will be on the fifty-yard line with buckets of hosts to be consecrated. Then hot-dog vendors will haul the buckets around, shouting, “Get your hosts here! Hot Hosts! Get ʻem while theyʼre consecrated!” Maybe theyʼll fling ʻem across seats right into peopleʼs mouths. “One body of Christ on angelʼs wings, Over here!”
- Skip Church

Roman Catholics believe they drink blood and eat human flesh during Holy Communion. Protestants say the ritual is “symbolic.” But to the Roman Catholic, the bread miraculously becomes the flesh and blood of a dead Jew, i.e., the late Redeemer of Biblical fame. Why they wanna eat a dead Jew is another question…
- Robert Anton Wilson

A Catholic is a person who eats small pieces of bread on Sunday mornings and pretends to be a cannibal.
- Edwin Brock, “Catholicism,” Paroxisms: A Guide to the Isms

I was raised Catholic and received the Body and Blood of Christ every Sunday at Communion until the age of 30, when I became a vegetarian.
- Joe Queenan

I might have joined the Catholic Church if it was just a little different. If at Communion the Host was fudge, Iʼd be there for that. “Body of Christ, with or without nuts?”
- Rick Reynolds, Only the Truth is Funny

Christianity being proved ‘true’ by the persecution of Christians

“This makes me think that Christianity is even more true as persecution is expected for Christians and this is yet more evidence as verifying its truth.”

Human beings have “suffered” at each otherʼs hands for as long as human beings have had hands. “Suffering” for almost any conceivable reason, including “suffering for the Gospel,” is therefore not unique. Throughout history and in fields of human endeavor as diverse as religion, politics, science, art, and education, great minds have suffered at the hands of little minds; great hearts and souls have suffered at the hands of the heartless and the soulless; obstinate hearts, minds and souls have suffered at the hands of equally obstinate hearts, minds and souls. Those inflicting the suffering often thought they were “right” to do so. And those experiencing it took succor in believing that their faith, or ideas, or actions, were “right.”

Speaking of non-Christians who have suffered: Jews have suffered for over a thousand years at the hands of Babylonians,Greeks, Romans, Catholics, Protestants, Eastern Orthodox Christians, Moslems, and Germans. Which reminds me of the Jewish story of a rabbi facing the Inquisition, who was asked to deny his faith. He asked for time to think it over. The next morning he said, “I will not become a Catholic, but I have a last request - before Iʼm burnt at the stake my tongue should be cut out for not replying at once. To such a question ‘No!’ was the only answer.”

Christian antisemitism has been the cause of much Jewish suffering over the past 1900 years. And, like the modern day disavowal of the importance of pro-slavery Biblical passages, most of todayʼs Christians disavow the importance of anti-Jewish New Testament passages, which is certainly an improvement over the past. Still, neither the antisemitic passages, nor the pro-slavery passages, have been erased from the Bible, and some people continue to find such passages “divinely inspired.” According to the author of Antisemitism in the New Testament, “Nearly every book in the New Testament expresses slander and contempt for Jews. Most Christians have maintained that the New Testament is not anti-Jewish but that antisemitism arose as a result of the misunderstanding of it. Examination of the contents of the New Testament does not support this claim.”

And what about the religion known as “Bahaism?” It began when the Persian holy man, Ali Muhammad (1819-1850) set out to reform Islam and bring people back to the worship of a purely spiritual God (not unlike how Jesus set out to reform the Judaism of his day). His movement caused much religious ferment. This led to his execution in 1850 by order of the Shahʼs chief minister and at the instigation of Muslim clerics who saw his movement as a threat to orthodox Islam. Besides Ali Muhammad, 20,000 of his followers were martyred for their beliefs. Yet the “Bahai” religion survived, and it has communities in 205 countries.”

The early Mormons were persecuted by the “orthodox” Christian majority, and the founder of Mormonism was killed by a mob. Yet that religion continues to do quite well.

And what about agnostics, atheists, “heretical” Christians and “heretical” Muslims, all of whom have suffered at the hands of “orthodox” Christians and “orthodox” Muslims for daring to speak and publish their “blasphemous” or “heretical” ideas? Christians and Muslims have publicly burnt the books of their critics, so that even today, the words of Christianityʼs earliest critics only survive in the form of excerpts in the works of their Christian opponents. In colonial America, there were laws that made “blasphemy” a crime punishable by death. Even up till the early 1900s, the authors of “blasphemous” literature in Great Britain and America could be put on trial, fined, and/or imprisoned for their “crime.” Some Muslims still view “blasphemy and heresy” as crimes deserving the death penalty.

As I said above, human beings have “suffered” at each otherʼs hands for as long as human beings have had hands. “Suffering” for almost any conceivable reason and belief is therefore not unique.

Moreover, the blood of the martyrs did nothing to keep Islam from taking over North Africa, a major Christian stronghold in Africa, out of which Augustine and Ambrose and Origin and other church fathers, bishops, and leaders dominated.

Nor did those Christians martyred in Japan keep the Buddhist religion from remaining dominant. You see, the blood of martyrs is not always the seed of the church. Rival religions and political systems can overpower Christianity. In fact, Islamʼs rise was swifter than Christianityʼs. And so was communismʼs. And after the fall of communism as a political system, it has still left behind billions of agnostics and atheists.

Persecution and Religious Bigotry

Kevin: Ed, The quotes of Jesus you cited do not establish that Jesus told his followers to persecute anyone. They show that Jesus himself made judgments about certain people.

Ed: You originally said that Jesus was just judging their “teaching” (sic), but now you admit he was judging the people themselves. Well, thatʼs a step toward reality.

Now consider why the words of the Bible have led to so much persecution over so long a period of time, and why Christianity (just as equally if not more-so than all other other religious or political movements with absolutistic teachings) has waded in blood, slavery and bigotry for two thousand years. (Compare the far fewer wars that Buddhists have fought over their religion. In fact, there as a wise Buddhist king who reigned in India and brought peace to rival religious sects, but making laws of sane tolerance, during the same time when Europeans were suffering the Inquisition, Calvinʼs insufferable laws and persecutions in Geneva, Lutherʼs anti-Jewish venom and anti-Catholic venom and anti-peasant venom, and anti-anyone-who-disagreed-with-the-Apostleʼs-Creed venom—since Luther signed a paper demanding the death penalty for anyone who did not accede to the Apostleʼs Creed, and when Catholic and Protestant Christian nations were engaged in a Thirty Years War)

Indeed, there is no evidence that Christianity today would Be a “world religion” unless it HAD taken control of the reigns of government and (one sect of Christians, the Catholic one) instituted itself as the supreme religion by means of force (outlawing paganism and all rival Christian sects), accommodation (to pagan festivals and ideas), and bribery (the first Christian Roman Emperor spent lots of money, offering a gold coin and a robe to “converts” or at least to get pagans to outwardly acknowledge Christianity). [See the historian William Ramsayʼs book Christianity And Paganism In The Fourth To Eighth Centuries]

Furthermore, it is because of the absolutistic demands made in the Bible, linked with hellish fear for society as a whole, and fear for the souls of Christian kids (if “non-Biblical beliefs” ever “got loose”) that drives people and societies over the edge. Absolutistic fears drive the engines of bigotry and persecution. And thereʼs also the Bibleʼs judgmentalism. For all that Jesus SAYS about “not judging,” he does a helluva lot of it himself, and weʼre supposed to be like Jesus, (especially when the “Holy Spirit” moves us).

One might also consider the words of the Bible in which God commands the destruction of the worship places of rival religions (which the first Christian Emperor made into a command to destroy non-Christian temples, art and literature), or biblical commands to execute those who believed differently or who blasphemed the God of the Bible. Even in the N.T., God strikes Anais and Saphiris dead because they held back some money from the common church fund. (By the way, that story was one that C. S. Lewis found unbelievably reprehensible, along with the alleged city-wide slaughters and treacheries of Joshua, neither of which Lewis believed to be true history nor attributable to a moral Beingʼs just commands.)

Kevin: I concede that if we assume that Jesus is not God, then this seems inconsistent. But if he is, then it is entirely within his prerogative to do things himself that are not the prerogative of his followers.

Ed: Like telling Christians to “love their enemies,” while God gets to Damn his for all eternity. But my point is not what individual Christians do or how they shall act. Letʼs assume that on an individual basis they act like saints (they do Not all act like saints of course, far from it, as history shows, but rather many have acted more like devils). Still the question remains how should a Society act? What laws should IT make? Do you think society would work better if all thieves and murderers went free? Forgive and love all your enemies? Every last one in all cases? All they have to do is repent? (And how do you know their act of repentance is genuine or not?) Is that your proposed answer to the question of what laws society should institute? Well Luther and Calvin proposed that the answer was this…

It was the duty of individual Christians to love their neighbors and enemies in so far as the case may be non-religious personal affronts, but when the neighbors become blasphemers and affronted God or his holy Book, then it is the duty of each Christian to serve God rather than man, and not accept such blasphemy, and it is likewise the duty of civil magistrates to do their duty and follow Godʼs laws in the O.T. when it comes to blasphemy, in order to preserve society, and keep it from being judged by God for being too lax. This is also the view of Missouri Synod Lutherans and Conservative Reformed Churches, and the Reconstructionist Christian movement. Go argue with THEM is you want, or read chapter two of Leaving The Fold, and learn the exact Scripture verses that Luther and Calvin used and what argument they made, based on the Bible. If you think Luther and Calvin were wrong, argue with THEM and with fellow living Christians. Iʼm not making this stuff up. God to the Chalcedon Report webpage, argue with those Reconstructionists. Tell them how wrong they are. Go ahead, and get their Scriptural replies in return. If you can make some converts out of them, I for one will bless you. Reconstructionism is even being funded by some Christian millionaires who are trying to elect Reconstructionists to American government posts, like in California. I have an article on that I can send you.

Ed: Not to forget the parable about cutting off oneʼs offending hand lest you go to hell with both hands, which has inspired some to fear hell so much that they cut off their own hand

Kevin: I suspect that Jesus was speaking in hyperbole here, or else he would have, for example, told John to cut out his own tongue for speaking overly harshly about some people.

Ed: Of course he was speaking in hyperbole. The point is that it is such strong hyperbole it has inspired people “cutting things off” (like hands and penises in the case of Origin, and Skoptsie Russian Christians and in various isolated cases since then), and “cutting off” relatives and friends, etc. Itʼs the fear of eternal hell that this hyperbole is emphasizing, and fear as I said drives people crazy. Fear is the mind killer as the author of Dune once put it. If God inspired the Bible then he must have known the power of hyperbole and its effects, and foreseen the disasters that lay in wait after composing such a fear-based verse. Of course, such talk was common in the apocalyptic days of first century Palestine. Just compare the books of Enoch (which even the author of Revelation copied from), or passages in the Dead Sea Scrolls (another apocalyptic group awaiting the end of the world). The soon end of the world was the Reason why you had to save your own soul and avoid hell at all costs by acting so completely nice to even your enemies, and turning the other cheek, because otherwise you would be cast into the fire after the Son of Manʼs soon arrival. In other words, Jesusʼ perfectionistic teachings are based on the premise that the world was soon going to be judged, and we shouldnʼt judge but wait for God to soon do so, and we should keep ourselves as pure as possible because the final judgment was near.

Ed: as well as figuratively cutting off their own relatives from their family, all because they Jesus said so. Not to mention Jesusʼ teachings that he has come to bring fire to the earth and how he wished it was already kindled, along with the teaching that every branch that does not bring forth fruit shall be cast into the flames, and his teachings about families hating one another and coming to set a father against his own children, and vice versa.

Kevin: I think these types of things can be a result of families being divided over Jesus; not that this is Godʼs preference.

Ed: Of course families were divided over “Jesus.” Jesus is portrayed in the synoptic Gospels as an apocalyptic prophet expecting to initiate what is called “the tribulation” in his lifetime. As in verses in which Jesus said, “I have come to set father against son, mother against daughter, etc.” and, “I have come to cast fire on the earth.”

“Think not that I am come to send peace; I came not to send peace but a sword.” “He that hath no sword, let him sell his garment and buy one.”

“But those mine enemies, which would not that I should reign over them, bring hither, and slay them before me.” (spoken in a parable in Lk.) “If a man abide not in me, he is cast forth…and men gather them into the fire, and they are burned.” (a verse in John cited by the Inquisition) Jesus looked at the Pharisees “with anger” Mk. 3:5, called them blind fools and sons of vipers and sons of the devil, and called his generation an evil and adulterous one (as all of todayʼs apocalyptic prophets call our own generation), and said that certain towns of his day deserved and would receive greater judgment than Sodom. And in one spectacular curse, Jesus says, “Depart from me ye accursed into the hellfire prepared for the devil and his angels.”

Need I discuss the self-fulfilling nature of how the divisive apocalyptic categorizations that Jesus employed also created centuries of human strife?

Ed: And Jesusʼ teaching found only in the Gospel of John in which Jesus speaks condemnations on the whole Jewish people rather than just the clergy, declaring numerous times “the Jews” this, and “the Jews” that.

Kevin: Letʼs have a little context though. The apostles were all Jews. This leads me to think that Jesus was talking about a group in general, not about each and every member of the group, else the Twelve should have packed it in right then. I think he was saying that a personʼs identity as Jew would not cut it; this idea is hardly unique to John.

Ed: This idea of blackening a whole “peopleʼs identity” (as you admit) happens to be the very essence of bigotry.

Ed: Of course, one may argue about the “analyses” of these and other verses. But if you think Jesusʼ message was simply one of “love, love, love,” then you havenʼt read everything Jesus said and did, including his using a whip of cords in his Temple tantrum.

Kevin: I dodnʼt say that Jesusʼ message was “love love love” and nothing else. Clearly he spoke of judgment too. Just because the idea is distasteful it doesnʼt mean itʼs untrue.

Ed: “Distasteful?” No, itʼs reprehensible, especially in the fearful effects it has produced in the human psyche. It was C.S. Lewis who once admitted in a letter (written near the end of Lewisʼ life) to his universalistic friend, Dom Bede Griffiths (who hosted a Christian-Hindu ashram in India): “Even more disturbing as you say, is the ghastly record of Christian persecution. It had begun in Our Lordʼs time - ‘Ye know not what spirit ye are of” (John of all people!) I think we must fully face the fact that when Christianity does not make a man very much better, it makes him very much worse…Conversion may make of one who was, if no better, no worse than an animal, something like a devil.”

Ed: Neither have you considered the dilemmas faced once Christianity became a nationwide power instead of merely a minority of individual Christians. Once “Christian” governors and governments arose, they had to decide what laws to make, and they had to use their own “analytical” judgment to formulate laws based on “the Bible.”

Kevin: I too would place the word “Christian” in quotes in this context. Indeed, how could people who profess to follow the one who said “My kingdom is not of this world; if it were then my servants would fight” proceed to rule tyrannical regimes? Only with a great deal of rationalization.

Ed: The fact that you canʼt imagine “how they could” strikes me as the most naive answer imaginable. You havenʼt considered the psychological effects that all the apocalyptic preaching and raving in the N.T., and pictures of a “jealous” God as portrayed by jealous men in the O.T., has had on humanity? Page after page the Bible depicts God as a mass murderer, and in the N.T. as inventing an eternal hell and judging everyone and “casting” them out, and you say, “Gee, how could anyone ever get the idea that the Bible is about maintaining the reign of a tyrannical king, kingship, or government?”

Ed: Well, you canʼt make laws out of the N.T. because it doesnʼt deal with them. Only the O.T. contains inspired laws for a “nation,” such as killing blasphemers and stoning anyone who threatens the life of your child (how much more a threat is it to teach heresies that threaten the Eternal Life of a personʼs child?) Hence, Christians made laws condemning and Persecuting And Punishing/Executing non-Christians. Read Luther and Calvin for the Scriptural justifications of such laws, or read chapter two of Leaving The Fold in which I cite Luther and Calvinʼs Scriptural justifications for such laws.

Kevin: These laws were given to a specific people in specific circumstances, and misappropriated by an imperialistic church trying to legitimize the acquisition of wealth and power. Contrast this with, say, the Celtic church, whose humility, detachment from wealth and power, and self-sacrifice to scholarship and missionary activity shamed the “servant of the servants of God” enthroned in Rome, whose worldview was adopted by some of the reformers later on (specifically, re: church and state).

Ed: So, instead of whining about how the Bibleʼs been “misappropriated” (sic), why not tell me exactly HOW do you set up laws for a kingdom in THIS world based on the Bible? Which laws do you make and enforce, and WHY those and not others? Huh?

Glad to hear you align yourself with Celtic Christianity rather than some megalomaniac Catholic church hierarchy. At least your heart is in the right place, though I believe the heart of a person like ou would also be in the right place even if you werenʼt a Christian, but a devout Buddhist or Taoist or Confucian, or even charitable atheist.

Of course, since you praised Celtic Christianity so highly, I can almost hear you adding that the Irish “saved” civilization, like the claim made in the book of the same title. But of course, one has to wonder how civilization got into such trouble that it needed “saving” after Christians have been ruling it for a thousand years prior to the Irish having to “save” it. For instance, the rise of Christendom a thousand years earlier, in the Roman world, led to the burning of the central pagan portion of the library of Alexandria (with the bishopʼs approval), and led to the library falling into a state of disrepair and disuse until some Moslems came around and burned down what little was left, and how Christians burned the books of Greek and Roman Christian critics, killed pagan philosophers and mathematicians like Hypatia in the street, and replaced the pursuit of pagan learning and scholarship and mathematics and politics with vast treatises on the dangers of religious heresy, the dangers of not maintaining oneʼs virginity, and signs of Jesusʼ soon coming, and warnings of Satanʼs snares (he was everywhere!). You can read Augustineʼs works for yourself, they are on the web, and see which of them is not concerned with Satan, virginity, and rooting out Christian heresies of one sort or another. No wonder the Roman Empire fell. Problems were not dealt with as they should, but were instead preached to the people in churches across the empire as being either signs of Jesusʼ soon return, or of Godʼs or Satanʼs wrath. Again, you should consult the recent book by William Ramsay I mentioned above.

As for the rebirth of civilization in Europe, I watched the series Connections on PBS (and read the book) and learned that the revival of learning in Europe (after Christianityʼs thousand year blight of diseased minds that hunted cats because they were “emissaries of Satan,” which led to the abundance of rats and fleas on the rats that spread the great plagues),as I was saying, the revival of learning in Europe coincided with some Christian crusaders taking the city of Seville from the Moslems, a city which contained the largest collection of classical literature that had been preserved since the Fall of the Roman Empire, by Moslem scholars, not Irish priests. This windfall soon reignited scholarship in Europe, Praise The Romans And Greeks who originally wrote such books, and praise those Moslems who preserved such literature essential to getting civilization back on track after a thousand years of Biblical darkness.

Kevin: As to the perceived universality of the Mosaic law, consider that Moses himself appears to have been the offspring of a union later proscribed by the Mosaic law. This alone, apart from the NT, should be sufficient clue that the Mosaic law was intended to be limited in scope.

Ed: If itʼs so “limited in scope” then I suppose Luther and Calvin were idiots to point out that Jesus said, “Not one jot or tittle of the law will pass away until all things have been fulfilled,” and, “whomever teaches this little one to disregard even the least of the law, it would be better for him if a millstone were placed around his neck.” And Paul who wrote, “Do we by this, obviate the law of Moses? No!”

Instead of hemming and hawing about the O.T. only being “limited in scope” please tell me Exactly How Limited. And tell me why youʼre at it how Christian people could NOT read the O.T. and understand that a society Needed to make and obey specific laws to please God and avoid Godʼs wrath or Satanʼs ruin? The question remains WHICH laws can a society of concerned Bible readers ignore, and which should it enforce? Christians have NEVER agreed on that, nor does the Bible (nor the inspiration of the Holy Spirit which “leads us into all truth”) seem capable of leading to any ultimate agreement on such matters, yet laws must be made. Laws against killing for instance. Thatʼs not “limited in scope” is it? What about “killing someoneʼs immortal soul” by the spread of “false doctrine” that “kills souls?” All the original American colonies and nations of Europe at that time had laws against non-Christian words and publications, not just non-Christian acts. Those laws go back as for a thousand years to Constantineʼs edicts against paganism and all Christian sects other than the Catholic church. During those thousand years the Catholic and Protestant churches of Europe grew powerful and wealthy. There was NO religious competition. It had been outlawed for a thousand years. Since the advent of the Age of Reason and democracies (democracies/republics being post “kingship” and hence, post Biblical, mentalities), the Christian churches had not had the power to outlaw rival sects nor rival religions, and so in a mere hundred years, the previous two thousand is being undone, quite quickly, I might add. It took earliest Christianity three hundred years before it gained the clout to outlaw paganism and rival Christian sects. Even then, it took another four hundred to complete the near obliteration (and accommodation) with paganism, and Christianity was rent with further schisms after that time. But in a mere two hundred years, since Deists in Europe first began questioning the Bible, and opened the way for historical scholarship and examination of the Bibleʼs documents, the Christian world is having to react to more different religions and challenges than can be counted. In four hundred more years, If Laws For Religious Tolerance Remain In Place, Christianity today (the phenomenon, not the magazine), will cease to exist, and have been replaced by perhaps 100,000 or more different sects (in the past five years the number of Christian sects have grown, according to the last two printings of Oxfordʼs Christian Encyclopedia, from 20,000 to 30,000!), and a wide variety of alternative religions and non-religions.

Mutual Animosities of the Protestant Reformers

I have no problem if this was true, but is it? I am not aware that the two main “Reformers”, Luther (1483-1546) and Calvin (1509-1564), had anything to do with each other. Not only were they two different generations (Luther being ~26 years older that Calvin), in two different countries (Eastern Germany and Switzerland), and AFAIK never met, I would be surprised if Luther could even read Calvinʼs French and I am not sure that Calvin could read Lutherʼs German.

Luther and Calvin did have something to do with each other. They read each otherʼs writings, and each reacted to the otherʼs teachings (especially concerning the Lordʼs Supper) and to each otherʼs personalities, as evidenced in letters they wrote to others, including Calvinʼs correspondence with Melanchthon, Lutherʼs close associate. Calvin even attempted a “compromise” interpretation of the Lordʼs Supper (that was published not long before Lutherʼs death) in an attempt to reconcile Lutherʼs view with his own and with that of the Zwinglianʼs. Calvin sent a copy of that treatise to Melanchthon to share with Luther, but was not pleased with Melanchthonʼs nor Lutherʼs reaction. Calvin and Lutherʼs acrimonious opinions of each other and of each otherʼs interpretations of the Lordʼs Supper, appears below.

At the end I also list a website where more quotations can be found from different works that further document what I originally said, namely that “the Reformers” [not simply Luther and Calvin, but other Reformation leaders as well] sometimes employed degrees of theological and personal recriminations toward each other that might shock not a few readers who have never studied that particular phase of “Christian” history. (Which also makes me suspect that at least one attraction of “Christianity” or “Islam” or other such faiths is the fact that people can call each other neat sounding theological names like “heretic,” and also threaten each other with “Godʼs wrath” without such speech ever going to court. But then “Communism” also had itʼs own ideological code words of reprobation, like “decadent.”)

The passages below are drawn from _History of the Life, Works, and Doctrines of John Calvin_ by J. M. V. Audin, translated by Rev. John McGill (Louisville: B. J. Webb & Brother, 1850). Citations for each quotation can be found at the bottom of each page in Audinʼs work.

[Audin, p. 158-159]
[On Jan. 12, 1538] Calvin [wrote] in a confidential letter to his friend, Bucer. “If Luther can, in the same embrace, bind us and our confusion, my heart will be overwhelmed with joy; but there is no one but himself in the church of God…What are we to think of Luther? In truth, I know not: I believe that he is a pious man; I would wish only that they are mistaken in representing him as they do (and the testimony is that of his friends,) as foolishly obstinate; and his conduct is well calculated to accredit these suspicions. They inform me that he boasts of having compelled all the churches of Wittenberg to recognize his lying doctrine; strange vanity! If he be tormented by so great a desire of glory, all serious hope of peace in the truth of the Lord must be renounced; with him there are not only pride and wickedness, but ignorance and hallucination the most gross. How absurd was he as first with his bread, which is the true body! If now he believes that the body of Christ is enveloped in the material substance, it is a monstrous error. Ah! If they wish to inculcate such absurd doctrines to our Swiss, what a beautiful path to concord do they prepare! If, therefore, thou hast over Martin any influence, labor to chain to Christ, rather than to the doctor, all those souls with whom he has so unfortunately contended: let Martin at length give a hand to the truth which he has manifestly betrayed. As to myself, I can well render testimony, that, from the day on which I first tasted the word of truth, I have not been abandoned by God, to the point of not comprehending the nature of the sacraments and the sense of the Eucharistic institution.”

[Audin, p. 403-408]
At the death of Zwingli, the church of Zurich was divided into various sects: the Significatives, the Tropists, the Energicals, the Arhabonarians, the Adessenarians, the Metaphorists, the Iscariotists, and the Nothingarians. The dispute for the moment tranquilized, was revived again on the slightest historical accident. Melanchthon vainly endeavoured to appease his master [Luther]. Luther declared, that, as long as there remained a drop of blood in his veins, or sufficient ink in his inkstand to fill his pen, he would wage war against the Sacramentarians. In 1543, he wrote to Foschauer, that the Saxon church could not live in peace with the heretical church of Zurich. And in his annotations on Genesis, published the year following, he acted the part of the Eternal Judge, and condemned [his fellow Protestant Reformers] Zwingli, Oecolampadius, and their adherents, to eternal flames… The Zurichers commenced the contest with a pamphlet, the whole venom of which is in the title: “A summary of the teaching of the evangelists of Zurich, chiefly regarding the Lordʼs Supper, against the calumnies, the outrages, and the insolence of doctor Martin.”… Luther did not take up the gauntlet; but…some days prior to his death, he wrote: “Happy the man who has not walked in the counsel of the Sacramentarians, who has not been found in the ways of the Zwinglians, who has not seated himself in the chair of the Zurichers.” Calvin for a moment flattered himself with the hope of reconciling divided minds by means of his hermaphrodite system. Farel advised his friend [Calvin] to go to Zurich, where his word, sustained by the Holy Ghost, would operate a reconciliation… Calvin is tormented in contemplating this “son of Peleus,” as he calls Luther, who listens to no advice, and marches upon his path, without fear of thickets and mountains. He would have Luther approximate to Zwingle, and to effect this approximation, he believe in the omnipotence of his treatise on the Lordʼs Supper, which is welcomed no where. “But of what terrible malady is your Pericles ill?” Calvin wrote to Melanchthon [i.e., “Pericles” being a reference to Luther]. “Whom has he [Luther] induced to think with him, by all his tumults of words? Let him play his real game of a furious fool. Certes [i.e., Melanchthon], I revere him, but he does me wrong. And what is most unfortunate is, that no person is found to repress, or even to calm an impetuosity so insolent.” [Calvin to Melanchthon, Jan. 28, 1545] The Genovese reformer [Calvin] was still more confidential with Bullinger, because he was acquainted with the dispositions of his correspondent. He has no fear now that his revelations will be abused; he [Calvin] writes:
“I learn the Luther, with his insolent petulance, attacks us all together: I cannot decently hope that you will observe silence; for, after all, it is not just to be treated so badly, and not dare defend oneself. I acknowledge that Luther is a man of fine genius, that he has receive extraordinary gifts from heaven, that he has an admirable fortitude of soul, a constancy above all trial, and that to this day he has combated the Antichrist. I have frequently said, that, were he to treat me as an incarnate demon, I would still not the less rank him as a great servant of Christ, but also great for his faults. Would to God he had employed against the enemies of the truth that bile, which he does not cease to pour out against the servant of Christ.” [Calvin to Bullinger, Nov. 25, 1544]
During ten years the private opinion of Calvin regarding Luther had undergone no variation. Already, in 1538, he [Luther] was a man of vanity and falsehood, laboring under gross hallucination, an absurd doctor, who maintained that material bread is the body of Christ; an insolent opponent of the truth. [Calvin to Bucer, Geneva, Jan. 12, 1538] But language changes with circumstances. It happens that Calvin needs Lutherʼs patronage for his book against the Nicodemites; now, the writerʼs words [Calvinʼs words] are sweet as honey… This morose monk [Luther] died, bequeathing to Leo Judae, Calvin, and the Sacramentarians the following testament, written in his [Lutherʼs] own hand:
“Seeing the heresies heaped upon heresies on every side, and that the devil puts neither limit nor term to his rage and fury, in order that after my death they may not be able to make use of my writings to defend the errors of the sacramentarians, as has already been done by some brainless fellows, corrupters of the supper of the Lord and of baptism; I have desired, before God, and before men, to make my confession, in which, with the Lordʼs aid, I wish to persevere and present myself before the tribunal of Jesus Christ…- I say likewise, of the Lordʼs Supper; that in it, the true body and the true blood of Jesus Christ in the bread and wine, is eaten and drunk, even though those who give and those who receive it have lost faith, or abuse the sacraments…and if, in the struggle of my death, temptation should force from my mouth anything contrary to this, I disavow it, and by the confession which I make, I protest that such thing can only come from satan: So help me God. Amen.” [Luther in 3 parte de caena — Tran. De FL. De Remond]
Protestants would have us believe that, before his death, Luther denied some of his dogmas, and especially his formulary respecting the real presence; they stand in need of this apostasy in order to exalt Calvin. In default of official testimony, they have culled from an obscure writer an anecdote, which they quote in order to prove that Luther did not regard Calvin as a heretic. We ask nothing better than to recount this little story. [The “little story” is a bit too long to repeat here along with Audinʼs comments. — Ed. Babinski]… But the spectacle of those intestine divisions [amongst Protestant Reformers], doctrinal transformations, antilogies, of those prodigies of variations, retractations, and contradictions, does not in the least alarm Protestant historians, who, with great coolness, propound the statement: That there is unity between the two churches, the reformed and the protestant church, if not of teaching, at least of faith in Jesus Christ. But then we will ask Calvinʼs last biographer, to explain to us the anger of John of Noyan against Westphalius, Pighius, and Gentilis, all Protestants, who apparently believed in Jesus Christ and in the merits of his blood?

[Audin, p. 84-85]
We have beheld Luther at Marbourg, at the colloquy imagined by Philip of Hesse, refuse to give the kiss of peace to the Sacramentarians, whom Calvin represents, and in leaving for Wittenberg, devote them to the wrath of God and men…
Has not Luther just torn out the page in Calvinʼs Institutes of the Christian Religion — where Calvin speaks of the bread and wine of the Eucharist as mere emblems — as a page inspired by the evil spirit?…
If King Francis I embraces the symbol of Calvin, Luther threatens the King with reprobation. If the King listens to Luther, Calvin damns him irremediably, for allowing himself to be seduced by “the detestable error of the Real Presence.” Apostles of the Lord agree then among yourselves. You both tell me, take and read, here is the book of life, the bread of truth, the manna of the desert. I listen to you, and your word throws my soul into an abyss of doubts. — Who then will cause to shine “that first star of day,” as Calvin calls his gospel.
“I will” says Osiander, “but accept my essential justice.”
“I will,” says Calvin, “but reject the justice of the heretic Osiander, and accept my gratuitous justice.”
“I will,” says Melanchthon, “but remain in the papacy, for the church must have a visible head.”
“I will,” says Calvin, “but reject the pope, the prince of darkness, the anti-christ of flesh and bone.”
“I will,” says Luther, “but believe that with your lips you receive the body and blood of Christ.”
“I will,” says Calvin, “but believe that your mouth only touches the symbols of the flesh and blood, and that faith alone has the power to transform them into reality.”
Where then did the first star of day stop in its course?
“At Zurich,” says Zwingle.
“At Bale,” says Oecolampadius.
“At Strasbourg,” says Bucer.
“At Wittenberg,” says Luther.
“At Neuchatel,” says Farel.
But in what Bible shall I read the word of God?
“In Lutherʼs Bible,” says Hans Lufft, his printer.
“In the Geneva Bible,” say Calvin and Beza.
“In the Bible of Zurich,” exclaims Leo Judae.
“In the Bible of Bale,” answers Oecolampadius.
“In truth,” says Beza, “the translation of Bale is pitiful, and in many passages offensive to the Holy Spirit.”
“Cursed be the Geneva translation,” says the colloquy of Hamptoncourt, “it is the worst that exists.”
“Be on your guard,” says Calvin, “against the Bible of Zwingle, it is poison; for Zwingle has written “that Paul did not recognize his epistles as holy, infallible scripture, and that immediately after they had been written, they had no authority among the Apostles.”

[Audin, p. 486-487]
All who have known him withdraw from him [Calvin], because they are unable to endure his arrogant speech, his bilious egotism, his bursts of vanity, and his immeasurable pride. Melanchthon reproaches him with a moroseness which nothing can bend. Bucer, with the disease of evil speaking which has passed into the very blood, like the virus of a mad-dog. Papire Masson, with an insatiable pride and thirst for blood, under the mask of modesty and simplicity; Balduinus, with an intolerable self sufficiency of which every one complains.

If he be such as his [Calvinʼs] admiring biographers represent him to us, how did it happen, that one by one he lost all his friends, even the most devoted? Caroli, at the disputation of Lausanne, had tendered him [Calvin] the noblest pledges of devotedness. And Caroli, whom at first he had lauded, at length was nothing better than “a mad dog.” The reason, is that Caroli was unwilling to sell his liberty to the reformer. Castalion was one of his beloved disciples, whom he had placed at the head of the college of Geneva; but Castalion falls into disgrace with Calvin, because he understands the descendit ad infers of the Athanasian creed differently from him…Pighius, whose learning he [Calvin] has admired, is transformed into a beardless scholar, as soon as he questions the reformerʼs authority. Bucer is compelled one day to explain: “thou [Calvin] lovest and thou hatest without any other motive than that insupportable self-love, which annoys all that are acquainted with thee.” Luther, whom at first he regarded as an angel [after first reading Lutherʼs works], soon becomes a wicked woman, who would do much better to employ the fist she has receive from God in correcting her own faults, than to be sustaining her shameless blasphemies of the real presence. Search all the pages of Protestant or reformation biography, and you will not encounter a single reputation that he [Calvin] has not attacked, torn to pieces, vilified. He calls, “Luther, in ridicule, the Pericles of Germany; Melanchthon, an inconstant person and a coward; Osiander, an enchanter, a seducer, a savage beast; Augiland, minister at Montebeliard, proud, strife making, wrathful; Capmulus, a nobody; Heshus, a stinking babbler; Staincer, an Arian; Memnon, a miserable Manichean.” Hence they were wont to say at Geneva: “better be in hell with Beza, than in paradise with Calvin.” [Beza thought ill of the same people and ideas that Calvin did. After Calvin died, Beza became Calvinʼs biographer. But the saying went in Geneva that even “being in hell with Beza was better than being in heaven with Calvin.” — Ed Babinski]

[Audin, p. 530-532]
Pope Paul III, when dying, forgave all his enemies after the example of the Saviour on his cross…including all those who had caused him to suffer in this life: without this evangelical wish, the Catholic priest never would say to the soul: Depart, Christian soul. Calvin treated Pope Paul III as Luther did Henry VIII, covering his face with mud. [And] Calvin in his last hour, pardoned nobody. Would Beza, who undertakes to describe the last moments of his friend; have forgotten to record the words of mercy which he should have heard?…On the 27th of May, 1564 [Calvin]…had ceased to breathe. “On that day,” says Beza, “the sun went down, and the greatest luminary that ever came into the world for the direction of the church of God was withdrawn into heaven. On that night and the following day, there were great lamentations throughout the city: the prophet of the Lord was no more.” [Beza, The Life of Calvin] Beza adds, “There were many strangers who came from a distance and marvelously desired to see him [Calvin], dead as he was, and urged to be allowed this…But, to prevent all calumny, he was taken away about 8 in the morning, and about two hours before noon, he was borne in the usual manner…to the common burial place…” This “calumny” of which Beza here speaks was public rumor, which recounted strange things regarding the last moments of the reformer. It was said that no one had been allowed to enter the death chamber, because the body of the deceased bore traces of a desperate struggle with death, and showed a decomposition in which the eye would have seen visible signs of divine anger, or marks of an infamous disease; also, they had hastened to veil the face of the corpse with a black cloth, and to bury it before the rumor of his death had been spread through the city, so great fear had they of indiscreet looks [at the face and body]! But it chanced that a young student, having glided into the chamber of the dead man, lifted the cloth, and beheld the mysteries which it was their interest to keep concealed. No one had asked him to reveal the secret. He wrote: “Calvin died, smitten by the hand of and avenging God; the victim of a shameful disease which ended in despair.” [Joann. Harennius, apud Pet. Cutzenum.] This student was Harennius, who had come to Geneva to attend the lessons of the reformer.

[Audin, p. 550]
When at a later period, thanks to the efforts of the synod of Dort, thought was allowed to scrutinize the Genevese Confession [i.e., The Confession of Faith that Calvin authored for the people of Geneva when Calvin was the chief preacher and spiritual authority there], see how, each day, some one or other of the articles of the Confession has been given up, till of all Protestant cities Geneva has become the least Calvinistic…However the Reformation may seek to hide itself beneath the mantle of Zwingle, of Luther, of Calvin, of Oecolampadius, or of Knox, it cannot enjoy a dogmatic existence except by the favor of princes: its kingdom is of this world.

[Audin, History of the Life, Works, and Doctrines of John Calvin, p. 548-549]
Calvinʼs word, having been brought to the low countries [Holland, et al] and subjected to examination, had been found insufficient…Each city of Holland had an “apostle sent by God”…[and] of all of Calvinʼs books the only one that they considered the work of the Lord was Calvinʼs Treatise Concerning the Duty of Public Magistrates to Punish Heretics, which each Protestant sect translated in order to put it in practice against those who dissented.* Bogermann, professor of Fancker, wrote comments on the pamphlet, and added some new texts to prove that the civil power has the right to put to death the blasphemer of Godʼs name. He called every one a blasphemer who did not think with him on the subject of grace. [Two Protestants] Jacob Arminius and Franz Gonar, revived the subjects of dispute that had occupied Luther [a Protestant] and Erasmus [a Catholic]. Franz Gomar damned Arminius, who maintained the liberty of the will; Arminius doomed to the flames Fanz Gomar, who preached the doctrine of serf-will. There were intolerants and tolerants, rigid Calvinists and moderate Calvinists, lapsarians and supralapsarians.

[*Footnote by Audin at the bottom of page 549, “We refer those of our readers, desirous to become acquainted with the variations of the Reformation, to the German book of Hoeninghaus, _My Excursion Through Protestantism, or the Necessity of a Return to the Catholic Church, Demonstrated Exclusively by the Avowals of Protestant Theologians and Philosophers_. It is one of the finest books of the epoch, unfortunately almost unknown in France.”]

To learn more about the mutual animosities of the Protestant Reformers visit “Van Allens: Protestant Division and Mutual Animosities”