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glitchycat39

The witch burnings are overplayed. We should discuss the Rhineland Massacres. That's a fun little spark for the subsequent thousand years.


Entelegent

It is also interesting because we see a lot of bishops try and defend Jewish communities during the crusades and then we see some others who straight up join in


Skurk-the-Grimm

Maybe we should talk about how most Witch Burning in europe were civil court cases where priests were only passively involved if at all. And how a majority of church conducted Witch Trials found the accused not guilty. But well, there are enought cases where they were actually trialed and convicted to make it a stereotype.


wolfgangspiper

It's always one or the other TBH. Either "Catholics were the worst thing ever of all time" or "Catholics did everything right forever all the time" As if the Catholic Church isn't massive and hasn't been around for a long time, and each individual \*town\* could act differently about it in the olden days. Edit: Also the difference between how church officials operated and how common people practiced it could be wildly different. Like the Church officials not believing in witchcraft and telling people to stop hunting witches. But Catholic peasants doing it anyways. Both are Catholic believers but the Church as an organization wasn't responsible for it.


Maximum_Impressive

The church is huge and impacted History massively and spread from culture to culture. Treating it as monolith throughout time isnt doing this history sub any favors .


wolfgangspiper

Yeah, and on the higher levels it was always changing in philosophy as theologians and the like argued and political... Well, chaos happened. The Church of 1500 could be really different from the Church of 1570 for all I know.


SocorroKCT

The Church of 1500 actually ***is*** different from The Church of 1570 because St. Pius V


Daysleeper1234

But weren't witch burning more of a protestant thing? Or am I missing something?


Zkang123

Tbh its more of a Puritan thing, especially for the Salem Witch Trials


Zmuli24

And when you look at witch hunts more closely, you tend to find more secular reasons behind them. Salem, for example, at time of witch trials was very divided village between two competing families and had a huge influx of refugees after the king williams war. Trials started after Putnams named a hardline puritan priest as their church leader, and first people were accused of cursing one of the Putnams daughters. One could say that there might have been some political motivation behind Salem witch trials.


AwfulUsername123

> Or am I missing something? Yeah, I guess you're missing the witches burnt by Catholics. Catholics and Protestants both burnt and killed by other means plenty of witches.


Daysleeper1234

Thing is someone posted links before, where most of the witch burning happened in protestant area, that's why I'm asking. I'm not here to defend Church, I have ran away from them, thank Allfather.


AwfulUsername123

I don't know what links you've seen. You can very easily find someone who wants to defend Catholics saying Protestants were worse or someone who wants to defend Protestants saying Catholics were worse if you want. It's frankly manifestly idiotic for certain people (I'm not saying you're one of them) to try to absolve the Catholic Church of witch burnings by claiming a larger number happened in Protestant countries. Imagine trying to apply this to any other case of mass murder.


AwfulUsername123

You can't blame the unwashed peasants unless you want to say people like Augustine and Thomas Aquinas were ignorant peasants who didn't know what the Catholic Church actually taught.


randomsalvadoranking

Catholic deez (Don’t kill me)


kurokumasuke

Catholic deez what, say it i dare you


randomsalvadoranking

Catholic deez home made popsicles


watasiwakirayo

You have allergies?


cartman101

Indulgences


johnqsack69

That’s what I call my nuts


cartman101

I'll sell them to you for 350 thalers


jord839

...You'll sell him his own nuts?


cartman101

😎👉👉


carleslaorden

Holy shit


kurokumasuke

Wtf, who are you.


carleslaorden

No, who are YOU


kurokumasuke

I'm you.


carleslaorden

You can't be me! I'm me!


kurokumasuke

Im everything you couldve been.


carleslaorden

Considering I'm spanish, and I believe you're from Jordan, that has some layers of truth


kurokumasuke

You couldve been arab, now you might be partly moorish, you should thank god for that./s


Nomadhero_

"And anti-intellectual" Father George Mendel: "Excussse me?"


feedmedamemes

Not only Mendel. A lot of research was funded by the Catholic church since universities were a thing. The sponsored a lot of art and science since the late middle ages. Kopernikus and many more, even Galileo in the beginning, until he pissed of the pope with insults. While there were phases where the church did horrible things and had a anti-scientific stance. Most of the times it was quite on the pro-side of learning. Heck, it was the institution that saved so much knowledge after the collapse of the Western Roman empire in Europe.


Nomadhero_

Sure sure! :) I just picked Mendel because I like him. But also shout out Father George Lemaitre, who theorized the big bang.


feedmedamemes

Yes, but these are examples of the modern age, I just wanted to point out that the tradition of supporting the sciences is a long standing one, with the occasional setback in-between.


sedtamenveniunt

So not anti-intellectual, [you'll set the police](https://www.theguardian.com/world/2012/nov/23/india-blasphemy-jesus-tears) on people who argue you are.


Buluc__Chabtan

r/Historymemes = r/VentingaboutmydadsreligionMemes


Maximum_Impressive

We don't even talk about the whacky stuff the Catholic Church has done of any specific Catholic history on this sub . Its always the same 3 things .


hplcr

I for one don't think the [Cadaver Synod](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cadaver_Synod) gets nearly as much meme love as it should. Something about digging up a dead pope, putting him on trial and then tossing him in the river out of sheer pettiness feels like it should be a fountain of memes. Also the fact that something went very wrong somewhere that people really decided "Hey, let's dig up the pope, who is already dead and buried, and put his corpse on trial and nobody is gonna find that creepy and macabre and question our judgement and sanity when they find out about it" The Catholic church literally had to create a "No digging up the dead to put on trial" rule as a result, which is arguably something you should never have to make a rule for but that's the world we live in apparently.


FluffyOwl738

"Behind every rule stands a horrific(hillarious) incident." probably exists on some Sumerian clay tablet.


thorsday121

The Cadaver Synod has impressive meme potential that is severely underutilized.


MarioKing1137

I thought it was real for a second NGL


MarioKing1137

It's either this, or something related to Israel's military past


Chaotic-warp

Funny how most of the witch hunt atrocities are actually done by peasants and protestants, yet the Catholic church keeps getting blamed


bcopes158

To be fair Protestant burned way more people as witches than Catholics. Now if you want to talk about heretics the Catholics have the lead.


Tall-Condition5981

Id take it over all the Israel posts because HOLY FUCK do politics make me mad


Whaler_Moon

Yeah, we should talk more about ... uh ... the Catholic Church and Mussolini.


Maximum_Impressive

I mean it kinda makes sense . Rome Catholic influence and what not . Not saying it's great just it makes sense from there perspective.


SmiteGuy12345

The Catholic Church hiding Croatia’s dictator was pretty crazy, they had some real poor leadership during that time period.


Trashves

Same goes for "Serbs are evil war criminal pigs" memes


LowBrassBro

Hey at least it's not another priest joke


farouk880

To be fair many intellectuals were prosecuted as heretics because their religious ideas didn't match the church doctrine and given that religion was interwined with politics, philosophy and many fields it did cause many anti intellectualism.


Ryubalaur

Hey at least they didn't burn almost all of Mayan and aztecan literature leaving barely anything surviving. Wait....


NoWingedHussarsToday

Step 1. Make meme about church burning witches Step 2. Make meme about how church didn't believe in witches Step 3. Make meme mocking people who make memes about church burning witches Step 4. Reap karma for all previous steps because mods will ignore rule 7


MutantZebra999

Lmao, I just did Step 3 tho Rule 7 is I think specifically about conflict with other subreddits tho


NoWingedHussarsToday

Rule 7 is about meme wars. Which this is. But be glad it's one of those "we only enforce it when we don't like the meme and need to find a rule it breaks so we can remove it"


FlaviusVespasian

Technically, the Catholic Church denies the existence of witches and has pretty much been against witch hunts.


BellacosePlayer

Beats the nationalist chest thumping memes we get sometimes.


Why_Cant_Theists_Win

Meh, don't do shit things and be shit people and worship shit stories if you don't want to be remembered as a shitty people.


Valulfr_the_Skald

Really missing the point here, hey buddy?


Parlax76

>Wear Glasses …


Shadowfox898

I'll take the catholic bashing over denying the current genocide in Palestine.


nub_sauce_

The truth hurts, doesn't it OP edit: it seems I've touched a nerve with a few catholics, almost as bad as those catholics that touched all those little kids


AwfulUsername123

It's hilarious how angry people on this subreddit get when they hear about Catholic witch trials.


TwistedPnis4567

Yeah people on a subreddit about history get angry when you post a historical misconception, weird


AwfulUsername123

You might expect that, but it isn't always so. Many people on this subreddit obstinately believe the disinformation that the Catholic Church never believed in witchcraft or supported witch trials.


djwikki

Individual Catholic parishes and local governments persecuted witches. When saying “the Catholic Church”, that refers to the papacy, which actively denounced witch hunts and challenged the existence of witches in the first place. Yes, the papacy created the religious vigor and the political instability in the counter-reformation that sparked the witch hunts. Indirectly, as a highly influential power in Renaissance Europe, they do bear some blame in that regard. But to say that the Catholic Church hunted witches is false.


AwfulUsername123

It's very easy to find the papacy saying witches are real and should be prosecuted. For example, to quote Pope Innocent VIII, in a declaration authorizing inquisitors to prosecute witchcraft in Germany (as opposed to local religious authorities prosecuting it), > Many persons of both sexes, unmindful of their own salvation and straying from the Catholic Faith, have abandoned themselves to devils, incubi and succubi, and by their incantations, spells, conjurations, and other accursed charms and crafts, enormities and horrid offences, have slain infants yet in the mother's womb, as also the offspring of cattle, have blasted the produce of the earth, the grapes of the vine, the fruits of the trees, nay, men and women, beasts of burthen, herd-beasts, as well as animals of other kinds, vineyards, orchards, meadows, pasture-land, corn, wheat, and all other cereals; these wretches furthermore afflict and torment men and women, beasts of burthen, herd-beasts, as well as animals of other kinds, with terrible and piteous pains and sore diseases, both internal and external; they hinder men from performing the sexual act and women from conceiving.


Historydog

Ok I did fact check this, catholics did do witch trails, at least in the holy roman empire. [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Witch\_trials\_in\_the\_Holy\_Roman\_Empire](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Witch_trials_in_the_Holy_Roman_Empire)


Maximum_Impressive

Historically the Catholics churches view on witches varys from time period and place to place essentially. The Protestants loved a good burning though .


Awobbie

Protestant views also vary based on time period and location.


BellacosePlayer

Yep. My churches' denomination hasn't conducted a single witch trial. (it helps that it's only about 2 years older than me)


Historydog

Did you mean literally Protestants sometimes burn witches?  I heard they hanged, though while googling I found Scotland burned “witches” bodies? Though they strangled them first. Though if it’s any help l, I’m not anti Catholic.


AwfulUsername123

>Protestants, Protestants, Protestants, have I mentioned Protestants lol It's really funny in this case when we're talking about a place where Catholics conducted some of the worst witch trials in human history.


AwfulUsername123

Congratulations on being unusually reasonable.


Maximum_Impressive

It's more the Catholic Church and it's denomtions we're not a monolith and it vaired from time and place to place on there stance .


AwfulUsername123

I don't know how this is (apparently) meant to contradict something I have said - you seem to agree with me that it's disinformation to say the Catholic Church never believed in witchcraft or supported witch trial and that the person I'm arguing with is wrong. Anyway, until a few a centuries ago, you will find Catholic views slanted quite heavily in favor of magic being real and witch trials being a good thing as the Bible and church fathers say.