Repression and Power

It was, the annalist of the city Worms tells us, the year of Our Lord 1231:

There came by divine permission a miserable plague and most harsh sentence. For indeed there came a certain friar called Conrad Dors, and he was completely illiterate and of the Order of Preachers, and he brought with him a certain secular man named John who was one-eyed and maimed, and in truth utterly vile. These two, beginning … firstly among the poor, said that they knew who were heretics; and they began to burn them, those who confessed their guilt and refused to leave their sect. … And they condemned many who, in the hour of their death, called out with all their heart to our Lord Jesus Christ, and even in the fire strongly cried out, begging for the help of the holy Mother of God and all the saints.

THE CATHARS

The Inquisition of Southern France Cathars:

The Socio-Economic Pressures and Religious Obligation as Driving Force behind the Papal Inquisition against the Cathars and the Testimonies of the Inhabitants of Southern France.

“The Penance of all the Cathari is, beyond all doubt, false, vain, delusive, and noxious. For in order to constitute true and fruitful penance, three things are required, namely, the contrition of heart, the confession of the mouth and the satisfaction of works,” 

Rainer Sacconi, a Catholic priest on Cathars

In the year 1209, Arnauda da Lamotha of Montauban and her sister Peirona arrived at the house of Raymond Aymeric in Villemur, a region in the Midi-Pyrenees of southern France. Both women were asked by Raymond to swear themselves to God and the Gospel, and to refrain from eating meat, eggs, and cheese. The women promised not to swear or lie, not to give themselves to any passion and never to leave the sect in fear of punishment. After reading a prayer together, Raymond kissed both women on the mouth before witnesses while the women stood together with their shoulders turned sideways. The participants of this particular event were known as the Albigensians or Cathars. The ceremony performed by Raymond was referred to as consolamentum, which was an initiation ceremony for a widespread heretical sect in the medieval Europe.

“THEY ARE WORSE THAN SARACENS WITH THEIR STRONG HAND AND THEIR ARM STRETCHED IN FIGHT”: MULTIFACETED CONTEXT OF THE ALBIGENSIAN CRUSADE Fatih DURGUN∗

Uluslararası Sosyal Araştırmalar Dergisi 

The Journal of International Social Research 

Cilt: 10 Sayı: 48 Volume: 10 Issue: 48 

Şubat 2017 February 2017 

http://www.sosyalarastirmalar.com Issn: 1307-9581

Abstract The Albigensian Crusade was an internal campaign against the Albigensian/Cathar heretics in the south of France through the alliance of the Papacy and French Monarchy between 1209 and 1229. The Albigensians posed a great threat to the institutional Church with their unorthodox beliefs such as the rejection of baptism and church hierarchy. The reasons for the Albigensian Crusade are still a source of debate among the historians though there are many studies on the subject. This paper will try to contextualise the Albigensian Crusade by examining multifaceted factors that resulted in the mass persecution of the heretics. It will be argued that it is crucial to discuss the interaction of various factors such as the rising power of the Papacy, Crusading ideology, medieval heresy and socio-economic and political conditions in the region to understand fully the Albigensian Crusade. 

Inquisitors Between Two Worlds Jean-Paul Rehr, Université Lumière Lyon 2/CIHAM

[Note: this is the original English version of an article translated to French for Raison Présente to 

appear in Winter 2019-20. Citations should refer to the French version.] 

i. The Problem of Inquisition in History 

“The Inquisition is a subject of so particular a nature, that any one who attempts to write upon it 

with impartiality, will find he has undertaken a very difficult province.” So begins the section on 

Inquisition in the handsomely illustrated eighteenth-century international bestseller, Cérémonies et 

coutumes religieuses de tous les peuples du monde by the Protestants Bernard Picart and Jean Frederic Bernard (in Amsterdam, fleeing the French counter-reformation). In their attempts to “objectively” present world religions, in what is in effect one of the earliest of works of comparative religion, they struggled with the 500-year history of Catholic Inquisitions. 250 years later, the historian Edward Peters remarked in his majesterial Inquisition (1989) that the task was no easier for the modern historian, as the myth and history of inquisition “are closely intertwined, and to extricate one from the other is to touch something that still resonates in modern conciousness and emotion; it also raises the charge that the historian is simply creating an uncomfortable new myth to replace the old”. 

Breaking News Release – Tuesday, March 10, 2020 Co-Conspirators in Genocide may be arrested and their assets seized by March 31; Notice of Default issued to them by International Court

Vancouver:

An international court has found twelve co-conspirators in the genocide of native people to be in legal default for failing to reply to a Notice of Liability issued to them by Reverend Kevin Annett on February 26.

According to a Default Notice issued today by the court, the co-conspirators have until March 31 to admit their wrongs and issue reparations, or face court-ordered financial foreclosure and arrest.

The Co-Conspirators include former Canadian Prime Minister Jean Chretien and top officials of the United Church of Canada, the RCMP and Weyerhauser Ltd.

HOLY HERETICS IN LATER MEDIEVAL ITALY

Download Heretics 1905 by G. K. Chesterton, Free Book | Medieval …
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appeal of martyrs is grounded in their willingness to violate socio-cultural norms and, as a consequence, become extra- ordinary individuals.¹ Some early Christian theologians, such as Clement of Alexandria (d. c.215), believed that all faithful Christians would necessarily break free of the regulations and codes of society and achieve moral perfection through an ascetic lifestyle.² Not all Christians, however, shared Clement’s opti- mism or penchant for self-denial. Martyrs therefore were, and are, considered exceptional individuals and models of comport- ment for lesser mortals. They remained popular subjects of ven- eration even after the spread of Christianity rendered martyrdom all but obsolete within western Europe. The Middle Ages did produce some new Christian martyrs there: for example, the ninth-century martyrs of Muslim-ruled Co ́rdoba; various Viking victims, such as St Edmund; the ‘holy innocents’, or chil- dren purportedly killed by Jews; and individuals like the mur- dered archbishop Thomas Becket.³ Yet by and large it was not 

Photo essay: Rural women, human rights

UN WOMEN

Date : 22 February 2018

She is a rural woman who works from daybreak until sundown and often beyond. She may run a small business or cultivate a field or both to support her family. Long hours are spent collecting water and fuel, and preparing food. She sees to the raising of children. She tends livestock. 

Without rural women and girls, rural communities would not function. Yet women and girls are among the people most likely to be poor, to lack access to assets, education, health care and other essential services, and to be hit hardest by climate change. On almost every measure of development, rural women, because of gender inequalities and discrimination, fare worse than rural men.

Historical background – Istanbul Convention Action against violence against women and domestic violence

COUNCIL OF EUROPE

As Europe’s leading human rights organisation, the Council of Europe has undertaken a series of initiatives to promote the protection of women against violence since the 1990s. In particular, these initiatives have resulted in the adoption, in 2002, of the Council of Europe Recommendation Rec(2002)5 of the Committee of Ministers to member states on the protection of women against violence, and the running of a Europe-wide campaign, from 2006-2008, to combat violence against women, including domestic violence. The Parliamentary Assembly has also taken a firm political stance against all forms of violence against women. It has adopted a number of resolutions and recommendations calling for legally-binding standards on preventing, protecting against and prosecuting the most severe and widespread forms of gender-based violence.

Burning the Bible: Heresy and Translation in Occitania 1229 – 1250 Peter B. Nowell Burning the Bible: Heresy and Translation in Occitania 1229-1250

“Canon 14. We prohibit also that the laity should be permitted to have 

the books of the Old or the New Testament; unless anyone from 

motives of devotion should wish to have the Psalter or the Breviary 

for divine offices or the hours of the blessed Virgin; but we most 

strictly forbid their having any translation of these books.” (The Council of Toulouse, 1229.)¹

Persecution of Cathars, Albigenses and Waldenses Christian Heresy Persecution of Cathars, Albigenses and Waldenses

Abstract 

Four Church Councils in 1119, 1139, 1148 and 1163 declared the Cathars to be heretics. The Council of Toulouse in 1119 and then the Lateran Council of 1139 urged the secular powers to proceed violently against heresy—they did not. Even so, Cathars were burned or imprisoned in many places, but, William IX of Aquitaine and many of the nobles of the Midi continued to protect them. They valued their industry and integrity in a corrupt world. The French bishops at the Council of Tours (1163) discussed the presence of Cathars in Cologne, Bonn and Liege. They called them Manichæans, a taunt, for they knew they were not, and the Cathars called themselves the Good Christians. From 1180 to 1230, the Catholic Church enacted legislation against heresy, and set up a permanent tribunal, staffed by Dominican friars. It was the Inquisition. 

The Church had great faith in punishment for the body as a cure for rebellion in the spirit.