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Character of the Papacy

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Seventh-day Adventist Publishing Association · Battle Creek, Mich. · Mar 31, 1874

FromReview and Herald, Vol. 43, No. 16.

Read the full edition

Character of the Papacy.

By John Norton Loughborough

CONCERNING the character of the great apostate papal church, and some of its popes, we will quote a few statements from De Cormenin. Of the rise of the power, he says:—“The emperors beheld with contempt, sometimes with indignation, the progress of this new religion, which was elevating its worship on the ruins of the gods of the empire. . . . We arrive at the epoch when Constantine placed Christianity upon the throne. From thence we see Christians, animated by a furious zeal, persecuting without pity, fanning the most extravagant quarrels, and constraining pagans, by fire and sword, to embrace Christianity.”
Again, he says: “The bishops commenced toward the close of the second century to claim for themselves a jurisdiction over other churches; which they had not received from the apostles; and, in the third, had already abandoned the precepts of humility taught by Christ.”
In speaking of the corruptions of the papacy in the thirteenth century, he quotes and indorses the words of Matthew Paris: “All belief is annihilated; . . . and greedy priests can devour without sin the substance of the people and the Lord. Evangelical charity has now taken its flight toward the heavens; ecclesiastical liberty has disappeared, religion is dead, and the holy city has become an infamous prostitute, whose shamelessness surpasses that of Sodom and Gomorrah.”
This De Cormenin, although a Catholic, was not blinded, but could see some of the wrongs in his own church. In the preface to his history, he says of the history of the popes: “It runs through a long series of ages during which the bishops of Rome, whose mission was to announce to men a divine religion, have forgotten it in their pride of power, have outraged the morality of Christ, and become the scourge of the human race. . . . The thunders launched from the Vatican by sacrilegious priests, overthrew kingdoms, and covered Europe, Asia, and Africa, with butcheries, wars, and conflagrations.”
De Cormenin makes some remarks concerning individual popes which I will notice. In the sixth century, he speaks of Pope Saint Gregory I., who reigned from A. D. 590 to A. D. 602 as the one who “discovered the doctrine of purgatory.”
In the seventh century, he says of Boniface IV., who was pope from A. D. 608 to A. D. 614: “The tyrant Phocas offered to Boniface IV. the Pantheon, built by Marius Agrippa, son-in-law of Augustus, thirty years before the Christian era, and consecrated formerly to all the divinities of paganism. The pontiff thankfully accepted the offer of the emperor, and transformed this splendid building into a Christian church, which he solemnly dedicated to the virgin under the name of our lady of the Rotunda.”
In the eighth century, he says of the reign of Zachary, or Zacharias, as some call him: “We now enter upon the most remarkable period of papal grandeur. History will show us the bishops of Rome abandoning the principles of the Bible, trampling under foot the precepts and the morals of Jesus Christ, plunging into all the excesses of depravity, tearing diadems from the foreheads of kings, and crushing the unfortunate people beneath their execrable tyranny.”
Zachary himself wrote to the primate of Gaul: “Has not Rome itself been filled with scandals by its clergy? Has not the chair of St. Peter itself been soiled by pontiffs who were guilty of adultery, incest, murder, and poisoning?” It was this same Zachary who persecuted Virgil, the Scotch priest, calling his theory that the earth was round and inhabited on all its sides, “sacrilegious idolatry.” It was also upon him that Pepin conferred several rich domains of France. By the gift of Pepin, and of Charlemagne, his son, “the pontiffs became possessors of the isle of Corsica, the city of Bari, Reggio, and Mantua, the exarchate of Ravenna, the province of Venice and Istria, and the Duchies of Spoletta and Beneventum.”
In the ninth century, or from A. D. 853 to A. D. 855, the Catholic church was favored with the rule of a female pope, Joan. The deception of her disguise, as well as her own iniquitous course, was discovered in her being delivered of a child during a public procession. Some Catholic writers undertake to deny that there ever was a female pope, but De Cormenin says: “It’s no use to deny it. . . . All that scaffolding of superstition and idolatry on which is placed the chair of St. Peter falls before a female pope!!!”
In the eleventh century, there were three popes ruling at one time: “One at St. Peter’s, the other at St. Mary Majura, and the third at the palace of the Lateran.”
In the same century, or from A. D. 1073 to A. D. 1085, Gregory VII.—Hildebrand—ruled as pope. He had poisoned eight popes while trying to exalt himself to the holy see. Bayle, in speaking of Hildebrand, says: “The popes have been more than once wicked hypocrites, worthy of the rope and fire.” Hildebrand himself, in one of his works, boasts that his “justice resembled rather the cruelty of a tyrant than the severity of a judge.”
As a sample of his manner we will present his anathema against king Henry of Germany: “I prohibit Henry, who, by reason of an unheard-of pride, has elevated himself against us, from governing the kingdoms of Germany and Italy. I free all Christians from the oaths which they have taken to him, and I prohibit all from serving him as king; for he who would oppose our authority deserves to lose his crown, his liberty, and his life. I burthen Henry, then, with anathema and malediction. I devote him to the execration of men, and I deliver up his soul to Satan, in order that the people may know that the sovereign pontiff is the rock upon which the Son of the living God has built his church, and that the gates of hell shall never prevail against it. . . . He addressed a circular to the German and Italian bishops and lords, in which he ordered them, in case Henry should persist in his revolt against the holy see, to choose another king who would govern the empire in accordance with the laws of the church.”
Henry presented himself alone at the outer gate of the fortress, and waited with patience until the pope was ready to have them opened. When he had passed the outward entrance, he laid aside all his royal ornaments, unclothed himself entirely and put on sackcloth. A broom and scissors were then placed in his hands as a sign that he consented to be whipped and shaven. He remained in this position for three days and three nights, with naked feet, during the most extreme severity of the winter, without covering, without any nourishment, shedding torrents of tears, and imploring with many groans the mercy of the pope!”
Hildebrand himself said respecting the position of the pope: “Christians are irrevocably submitted to his orders; they should murder their princes, fathers, and children, if he commands it; no council can be declared universal without the orders of the pope; no book can be received as canonical without his authority; finally, no good nor evil exists but in what he has condemned or approved.”
In the same connection with the above, De Cormenin quotes and indorses the words of Bayle relative to the papacy, as follows: “We cannot consider without astonishment that men, by the assistance of the word of God, a gospel which preaches disdain of grandeur, which exalts humility and poverty, have had the hardihood to aspire to absolute sway over the sovereigns of the earth. But, what surprises us still more is, that the popes have been enabled to maintain this incredible sway during almost a thousand years. This conquest is more admirable than those of the Alexanders and Cæsars; and Gregory VII., who is the principal author of it, ought really to have his place among great conquerors.”
In the eleventh century also, the crusades were commenced, and in these crusades more than one million persons perished. In the fourteenth century, or from A. D. 1318 to A. D. 1335, John XXII. was pope, and it was he that published the celebrated tariff of the Roman chancellors for the absolution of all crimes. De Cormenin says of this tariff: “In fact, the tax exacted by John XXII. became for the popes, his successors, one of the most vast and fruitful financial operations that the avarice and infernal genius of the pontiffs ever invented.”
In the fifteenth century, or in A. D. 1410, John XXIII. commenced his reign as pope. It was under his reign that John Huss was burned. When Gerson, the chancellor of Paris, told Huss he must either bend or break, Huss said: “I prefer the most terrible punishments to the disgrace of being called the defender of popes and kings. Let your infernal proceedings take their course; give John Huss to the flames; but ere a century passes, there will spring from these ashes an avenger who will proclaim anew the truths which I have taught,” and for which you would condemn Christ himself, should he return to earth.”
In A. D. 1492 commenced the reign of Roderic Borgia, under the title of Alexander VII. Of him, De Cormenin says: “We are finally entering upon a period in which the theocracy reached the apogee of its power, and in which, far from concealing its perfidies, corruption, and cruelties, in the dark, it exposes them to the light of day, and even glories in them. . . . The pope who comprehended this new phase of the pontificate, is beyond all contradiction the successor of Innocent VIII., the execrable Roderic Borgia.”
It was in the sixteenth century, while Leo X. was pope, that Martin Luther engaged in the work of the Reformation. Leo X. was the first to proclaim by a bull the doctrine of the immortality of the soul. De Cormenin says that Leo X. “organized on a vast scale the speculation in indulgences.” It was one of the venders of these indulgences—Tetzel—that stirred the spirit of Luther to proclaim loudly against the corruptions of the papacy. De Cormenin says: “On all sides they attacked the colossal statue with the feet of clay; bold men cried out to the people, ‘Draw away from the dominion of the popes those shameless thieves who have made the temple of Christ a cave of robbers.’”
Arcembold, one engaged in the sale of indulgences in Saxony, said: “As our Lord Jesus Christ absolves you by the merits of his passion, I, by his authority, and that of the blessed apostles, St. Peter and St. Paul, and that of our most holy father, absolve you from all ecclesiastical censures under which you may have fallen, from all sins, delinquencies, or excesses, which you may have committed, or shall commit hereafter, how great soever they may be, and I make you a partaker in all the spiritual merits acquired by the church militant or its members.” Leo X. printed documents announcing that, “for money, one could purchase pardon for any crime, even parricide.”
In the sixteenth century, while Paul III. was pope, the society of the Jesuits was founded by Ignatius Loyola. Of this society, De Cormenin says: “Whilst the Reformation was making great strides under the burning inspiration of Luther and Calvin, and was threatening to crush the papacy, a society of fanatical devotees were sharpening their daggers in the dark, and were preparing to exterminate the Protestants.” Of the Jesuits, I may have more to say hereafter. J. N. LOUGHBOROUGH.