In Exodus 22:18, God orders the death of witches, sorceresses and anyone who practices magic. Sadly enough, this verse was justification for the Inquisition. The Index Librorum Prohibitorum was a list of publications prohibited by the Catholic church. It included amongst others, the books writtem by the astronomer Johannes Kepler and any versions of the Bible that were not written in Latin. The list was finally discarded in 1966. It was only in 1973 that the church allowed the bible to be translated into native languages. Now, we have many different translations in English alone :-) In 1231, Pope Gregory IX dispatched the Inquisitors of Heretical Depravity to exterminate the wherever it may be found. By 1252, Pope Innocent IV authorized the use of torture to encourage extravagant and satisfactory confessions and valuable denouncements of others from the accused. During the inquisition which finally ended around 1860, some 20,000 people were burned at the stake, some were boiled in oil, thrown into dungeons and all were put thru excruciating torture for their heretical beliefs. Keep in mind that the concept of heresy is a thought crime. The Vatican files on the Inquisition were released to the public in 1994. The Spanish Inquisition: The Original Faith-based Initiative The Spanish Inquisition: An expression of Christian doctrine of brotherly love. Until recently, Christians could simply burn or silence anybody who asked any inconvenient questions Any religion that demands earthly vengeance and retribution for any reason is not a religion at all, but a mental illness and should be treated as such. Here are some wonderful devices used to correct the thinking of the heathen, heretics, protestants, jews, muslims, pagans and atheists.. Had they known about electricity, we would have seen this. Can you just feel the love from Christianity? Executing heretics was necessary because their thoughts were considered dangerous to the church. They were killed and tortured for thought crimes. If you think that the Inquisition is over, you would be wrong. The Inquisition lives on in Massachusetts in tthe state's Blasphemy law. You can be incarcerated for denying the existence of something that clearly does not exist. Any religion that demands earthly vengeance and retribution for any reason is not a religion at all, but a mental illness and should be treated as such.

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