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“The social question is the center of all contemporary endeavors. But we consider Jewish business practices to be the real core of the social question.” So Georg Ratzinger begins his book Jewish Business Practices. An indictment of immoral business activities practiced by Jews, Ratzinger, the great-uncle of Pope Benedict XVI, gets to the core of the conflict between Jews and Christians in the nineteenth century. While condemning anti-Semitism, Ratzinger explains Jewish behavior to be rooted in the rejection of Christ. Benedict described his great-uncle as someone who because of his “achievements and his political standing also made everyone proud of him.”…
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Video based on the article.
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Tim O’Neill, the owner of the website History for Atheists, provides a useful summary disproving the claim that the European Wars of Religion were primarily driven by religion, when in fact there were multiple factors that contributed to the conflict. Below are his comments on the subject: To begin with, if the Reformation was supposed to have unleashed the violent forces inherent in religious differences, it is very strange that it took about three decades to do so. The first war usually cited as one of the Wars of Religion is the Schmalkaldic War of 1546-47, between the Holy Roman…
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John Oswalt the key of the house of David may have been a literal key of considerable size slung from the shoulder (so Skinner). But equally likely the reference here is symbolic. The authority to admit people to or exclude them from the king’s presence is vested in, or put on the shoulder of (9:5 [Eng. 6]), the one “who is over the house.” Obviously, this authority constituted tremendous power and required great character if it was not to be abused (cf. Gen. 39:6, 8). By the same token, the one to whom such power was given could know the…
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Historical Testimony to an Infallible Primacy. Probably the earliest implicit attestation of papal infallibility came from Tertullian after his breach with Rome over the remission of adultery, declared to be valid, by Pope St. Callistus. “An edict has been published,” he protested. “The Pontifex Maximus, that is, the bishop of bishops, has made a decree: ‘I remit to such as have done penance the sins of adultery and fornication.” The ironical implication was that Callistus professed to be infallible in settling the issue under dispute, which Tertullian (already a heretic) simply denied. Soon after, during the rebaptism controversy in Northern…
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St. Lorenzo da Brindisi was a Franciscan with immense bravery. His most courageous act was charging head-on towards Ottoman forces during the siege of Székesfehérvár, armed only with a crucifix: It was on the occasion of the foundation of the convent of Prague (1601) that St. Lorenzo was named chaplain of the Imperial army [of Holy Roman Emperor Rudolph II], then about to march against the Turks. The victory of Lepanto (1571) had only temporarily checked the Moslem invasion, and several battles were still necessary to secure the final triumph of the Christian armies. Mohammed III had, since his accession…
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Benjamin Franklin once wrote of the surprising event of those who return to Indian society in a letter: When an Indian Child has been brought up among us, taught our language and habituated to our Customs, yet if he goes to see his relations and make one Indian Ramble with them, there is no perswading him ever to return, and that this is not natural [to them] merely as Indians, but as men, is plain from this, that when white persons of either sex have been taken prisoners young by the Indians, and lived a while among them, tho’ ransomed…
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The eminent Catholic scholar Francis Dvornik was renowned for his work on Byzantine history. One area of study he contributed to was the history of the association with the apostle Andrew with Constantinople. He writes: Many scholars have supposed that because of the impression which the display of the apostolic character of the Roman See had made during the Acacian Schism in Byzantium, the Greeks had invented the legend that their See was also founded by an Apostle, St. Andrew, the brother of Peter. Because St. Andrew was the first to be invited by the Lord to join Him, and…
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The Jesuit Francis Sullivan was an authority on the Catholic magisterium. In his book, Creative Fidelity: Weighing and Interpreting Documents of the Magisterium, he addresses the issue of the decree Haec sancta, which some have claimed to support conciliarism. Below is the relevant text in his book. Council of Constance (1414-1418) We come now to the most controversial of councils, and the most controversial of decrees of councils, in the history of the church. This council has the merit of having brought an end to the disastrous schism which had divided the western church for almost forty years. The cardinals…
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The Benedictine priest John Chapman gave a nuanced understanding of the condemnation of Pope Honorius. He corrects the false interpretations given by some Catholic apologists on the heretical Pope: St. Agatho died before the conclusion of the council. The new pope, Leo II, had naturally no difficulty in giving to the decrees of the council the formal confirmation which the council asked from him, according to custom. The words about Honorius in his letter of confirmation, by which the council gets its ecumenical rank, are necessarily more important than the decree of the council itself: “We anathematize the inventors of…
Eclectic Anecdotes
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