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Crusades Sword Mission and witch-burning - This church is unacceptable


Increasingly, we as Christians in Europe is filled with allegations. Christian is to be like running the gauntlet of the accusations. Very often one is for questions however that many here are very ignorant of the parrot - I "chatter" in the the word to forgive, but it is the only appropriate - which prompt others to them. What is questioned, because Christians must be bad, so you have yourself a better excuse why you do not know what to believe.

common to three allegations is an article on the side http://www.katholisches.info interesting background information:
With a cool head on hot iron. Crusades, sword mission and witch burning

An excerpt from the article:

Talk to people, although they "somehow" believe in God (or something "higher"), the Church, however, turned their back or to return it are, then - in addition to the tax savings - often the past of the Church of crucial, often summarized in three points: 1 Crusades, 2nd Sword Mission, 3 Witch burning. Often these phenomena are only the word but not known by the term. It does not matter, because the word is powerful enough to stifle any further discussion. The hate-Triassic, which can become any good and faithful Catholics in sackcloth and ashes go to church, always ready to apologize for the dark past, is it usually swallowed without question, both by critics and church friend from church. Crusades, sword Mission, witch-burning - that's just the dark side of church history. That everything was not quite as dark as you think shows like the movies now and then about Hildegard of Bingen. But three weeks after the theatrical release is forgotten. What gets caught? Crusades, sword Mission, witch burning. So it seems appropriate to sure to take a closer look.

first Crusades

The term "crusade" finds in recent years more frequently used when of "crusades for freedom" is mentioned, or political campaigns by the term "crusade" unusual in its vehemence and sharpness are accurately described should. The use is partly affirmative, others critical to mockingly, in any case, they should remember the supposed understanding of the historical crusaders and triggering the Emotions: Who wants to lead a crusade, on the assumption he was in possession of absolute truth, violent and ruthlessly to enforce his ideas, and area that they can not convince its own initiative. Paradigm is the medieval Roman church of 11 to 13 Century in this sense, the war led just took those seven Crusades, which were received as such in the story. The cause of the crusades is in the power vacuum of the Roman Empire to see that since 5 Century had led to the Pope as the only constant urge institution of the West more and more in the temporal requirement (in the Eastern Church it was, accordingly, no Crusades).

case was never about the Crusades Imperialism, colonialism and forced missionary, but survival of the Christians in the south-east Europe, Turkey and the Middle East and the safety of the pilgrims to Jerusalem. A denial of the crusade would be a failure to assistance to the emergency of the Christian brother country equaled. The Crusades are the cause so the character of a "humanitarian intervention".

The Christian doctrine recognizes a natural right to self-defense and self defense. This is not a perversion of Christ's message of peace, but their practical implementation. Jesus' invitation to radical violence in the Sermon on the Mount (Mt 5, 38 et seq.) Refers not on concrete actions, but to the attitude of the people who praeparatio cordis (attitude of the heart), as he called St. Augustine. The attitude of the Christians he says: War is an evil that must be resorted to only after exhausting all peaceful means. The condition is a war always the misconduct of others, because "only the injustice of the other party to the wise just wars compels" (Augustine). This evil comes in an eschatological sense benefits the unjust enemy because he may be so in return, abandoned by his order. This forced the reverse orientation to release war and again to God and thus ultimately contributes by the commandment to love our enemies bill. Could you provide the unjust, he went away in the mistaken belief that its injustices would be worth more and more of God, his last sentence he can not escape, however.

mixed case of the Crusades, Christian pilgrimage tradition, this early medieval bellum iustum-topos to an understanding of "armed pilgrimage" for the free access to holy sites of Christianity, which was then under Islamic rule, in particular to protect way to the Holy Land, resorted to military force as a means of enforcement.

It was not a mission or conquest, but for counsel for the Christian minority in the Holy Land and the safety of pilgrims to Jerusalem, which was given not by the political circumstances of that time. It is important to note that even Charlemagne in the 9th century had closed with Harun Al Rashid, the caliph of Baghdad, an agreement to protect the Christian pilgrims. Which in the 10th and 11 Cent more border attacks on pilgrims along the route to the Holy Land and there were even so plain and simple injuries before, "international law" contracts.

In the 10th Century it was in the Holy Land to violent clashes between Christians and Muslims. 966 occurred after the reoccupation of parts of Syria by the Byzantines to harassment of Muslims on Christians in Jerusalem. 969 penetrated the Fatimids, Berbers from Morocco, in Egypt, Syria and Palestine. During the conquest of Jerusalem by the Fatimid caliph Ibn Moy (979) Church of the Resurrection was set on fire, its dome collapsed, the patriarch was killed in the blaze. Under the Fatimid caliph Abu Ali al-Mansur al-Hakim (996-1021), Christians came under increasing pressure: public processions were banned, forcing Christians to accept Islam and confiscated about 30,000 churches, many of them looted and destroyed, including Church of the Resurrection. 1056 300 Christians were expelled from Jerusalem and forbade European pilgrims to enter the Holy Sepulcher. When in 1065 the Archbishop of Mainz and the bishops of Utrecht, Bamberg and Regensburg set out on a pilgrimage to the Holy Land, this was only possible with an armed escort. The pilgrimage routes were no longer safe, attacks on peaceful pilgrims on the agenda.

began the Crusades - as is often said - with the infamous "Deus lo volt" Urban II's speech at the Synod of Clermont (1095). Is that true? No, it's not true. Apart from the long history - the Crusades, it was only after the occupation of the Byzantine Empire by the Seljuk Turks, which was followed by the cry of East Rome.

The Seljuks, a steppe people from the territory of present-day Turkmenistan, ancestors of the Turks broke out, killing, looting and ravage in upon the East. Although they were Muslims themselves, they fell early in 1055 in Persia, and rushed at the end of that year, the Caliph of Baghdad. In 1071 they defeated the Byzantines and took Emperor Romanus IV caught. 1076, they conquered Syria, 1077 Jerusalem.

Urban's speech was a response to this call for help from Byzantium. He called not arbitrarily on a crusade to evangelize about the Muslims or to conquer their areas, but asked what we now call indeed a "humanitarian intervention".

Run

this intervention should a knight army. The Crusaders were not peaceful people who had the church with promises of salvation only to the war must seduce, but "ruffians" who thought anyway, to get their share of salvation only in combat. It was also today by historians for their reasons not fully explained enthusiasm of French, Flemish and Norman knights, who surprised even Urban. It was they, the "Deus lo volt!" Called and Urban took it in astonishment. The Pope terminated the First Crusade at 15 August 1096, the Knights were not to stop and went in April.

On the way to Byzantium came in many German cities to pogroms against Jews. Crucial here were the Crusaders, not the church. The relevant competent bishops tried in vain to restrain the Knights. Only in Cologne was the solution: the Jews were hidden by friendly Christians. This rescue operation was organized by the church, but not the pogrom! That was the idea of individual knights who acted completely disorganized. This lack of organization runs through the entire history of crusade and led known to many military disasters.

Even with contemporary theologians, there was criticism because of the attacks in the Crusades. Even the Pope, in his secular role as guarantor of the safety of Christians in the diaspora, has criticized excessive violence, especially if it was not about this security, but others, such as economic interests. The Fourth Crusade ended in 1204 with the conquest and sacking of Constantinople, then the largest Christian city in the world of crusaders, so the water transport through the fleet of Venice "paid", the Pope, who in the face of the atrocities of the Crusaders about aware that it was a church with the Orthodox Union was practically impossible, this action strongly condemned what remained virtually without effect.

have the Crusades - in spite of their humanitarian intentions - has produced a lot of brutal violence that strain the relationship between the Occident and the Orient to this day considerably. But they also generated the Knights (Knights, Templars, German knight), of which perform the remaining Knights still important humanitarian and social services. In the early 13 Century mingled also a crusader without weapons in the army of the pilgrims: Francis of Assisi, 1219 in Egypt with the Sultan said, and left a deep impression. In this sense, intercultural dialogue is to continue today.

second Sword Mission

mission is to try to convince others of the value of their own conviction. As people, represented the beliefs emanate, the fact that these are true, mission is always in their eyes spreading the truth. Mission is not limited to religions, but is also found in the tests, people on certain beliefs, political views, gain (specifically, political parties, citizens' groups) to etc.. The right to communicate one's own conviction Third, hat wohl jeder, der überhaupt von etwas überzeugt ist.

Die Kirche ist apostolisch, also missionarisch1, d. h. sie ist darauf ausgerichtet, die Botschaft ihres Gründers, Jesus Christus, allen Menschen zu verkünden. Den Auftrag zur Mission erhält sie dabei von Christus selbst: „Da trat Jesus auf sie zu und sagte zu ihnen: Mir ist alle Macht gegeben im Himmel und auf der Erde. Darum geht zu allen Völkern und macht alle Menschen zu meinen Jüngern; tauft sie auf den Namen des Vaters und des Sohnes und des Heiligen Geistes, und lehrt sie, alles zu befolgen, was ich euch geboten habe. Seid gewiß: Ich bin bei euch alle Tage bis zum Ende der Welt.“ (Mt 28, 18-20).

be convinced of it and speak of a thing does not automatically meet the opposite of intolerance, even when one of the absolute (that is, universal) validity of one's own position is on show. On the contrary, who has a unique position from which he is convinced she is independent of time and space, culture and situation, can often better understand that the other has a position, as it considers valuable and important.

It all depends on how the conviction with which it claims to tell the others some truth that can be useful and helpful for this, be addressed to that other. This is the boundary of missionary activity is visible in tolerance, where the other is the offer for consideration or adoption of conviction explicitly rejects. must be accompanied

That mission with no coercion or even violence, Christ makes clear in his instructions for the mission "(Mt 10, 5-15). At least for Christianity is not that mission is intolerant, because the Great Commission is subject to conditions (peacefulness of faith disclosure, voluntariness of belief).

The adoption of the Christian faith can only be accomplished voluntarily, are enforced only the formal membership of the denomination, the Church. Since this is theologically worthless to the extent and the inner attitude of faith is lacking, have theologians in reliance on the Gospels always opposed violence and forced baptisms mission. Jesus calls for a mission of love and conviction, their termination condition refers to the free will of the missionary. Thus the day also sees the church.

The church has undergone in the past against this principle of Jesus forced baptisms and violence Mission! Is often claimed. True but only in part. In the first three centuries of its history there have been no forced baptisms and not force mission. The people decided voluntarily and often risked their lives to follow Christ. At the core of their argument, the church is therefore not biased by force and violence. Only after the turn of Constantine in the early 4th Century, when Christianity became the state religion of the disintegrating Roman Empire, it is related in this capacity constraint means to Christianize pagans. To the extent that by the church took over a state-supporting role (and the clergy acted as a secular ruler), forced baptisms and they used violence as a mission of power.

of principle, coercive proselytizing, which were ruled by secular leaders, representatives of the church seen very critically. Two important examples are the forced baptisms, Charles the Great had to make the Saxons (9th century), and the force mission in Latin America on behalf of the English Crown (16th century). In both cases, there were secular rulers, the mission is used as the means of power politics. The criticism of this suggestion came from church circles, court chaplain and religious people who opposed him with biblical, theological and legal arguments. had subjected

When Charlemagne around 800 the Saxons, he issued in the Capitulatio de partibus Saxoniae provisions on the death penalty for those who did not want to be baptized. The theological legitimacy of the alternative "Baptism or death," his court theologians Alcuin contradicted decided.

as the "Catholic Kings" by papal mandate America conquered and the indigenous population to Christianity by the Conquistadores force was (Mission was the condition of the Papal Donation of 1493), this was met with the missionaries on massive opposition for the especially the Dominican Antonio Montesinos and Bartolomé de Las Casas want to provide advocacy and a Christian life as a positive example to the violent mission policy that was in the English colonies on the agenda.

Often claims, aid workers were present and in future the better "missionaries", as there is no spiritual but a material hardship applies alleviate. It must be said that the "real" missionaries help in our time well and materially. Only they have discovered time and again that the plight of the people is not only a physical but a spiritual one.

addition, the causes of material need to be addressed. The plight of many people in the so-called "third world" can sustainably reduce successful only when the forces to help themselves in these people are mobilized. For this it is often necessary that change the principles of economic and social order and individual lifestyles. For this, but also for those the church has to make an offer outstanding examples in the field of AIDS prevention and economic development.

first If the Pope as head of the church of the humanization of sexuality "prompts and recalled that the fight against AIDS by technical means (condoms) to not win, then he calls for the Church in the light of their personal image of man and understanding of partnership sexuality as an integral connection between sex and love to the individual lifestyle resolve of the people and in doing so, the causes of the AIDS pandemic, rather than just their symptoms.

second With the social market economy was in Germany, the Catholic social doctrine been highly successful in political practice. Its principles are the basis of this positive experience with the "economic miracle" of the postwar period by many other countries would be appreciated, especially in a time of crisis in which the purely material point of view, the people in the context of the socio-economic structure estimated generally to be too narrow . In many cases, the newfound Catholic faith contributes significantly to the stabilization of these principles.

Especially the church commitment in AIDS prevention is but one example, it is then often continued as church abusing the misery of the people for their missionary purposes. But to insinuate that the Church would be abusing the misery of people to mission purposes, is simply absurd. If it were up to AIDS prevention at Mission, the church handles unlikely to "inconvenient truths" as the need for chastity (abstinence outside, fidelity within marriage) back to the people today do not hear most. Then they would distribute free condoms with the zeitgeist.

general, there is always the Church the truth of the Bible and church history sound doctrine and to the welfare of the people because they know that this long-term desired by God "strategy" is to tie people to the church.

third Witch burning

is often heard, the church had burned in the Middle Ages, millions of European women as witches. It is the merit of the Berlin Protestant Richard Schroeder, shown to have put that in this statement four errors:

1. was not the focus of witch hunts in Europe, but is in Africa today: "The intense witch-hunting, "Schroeder wrote in" abolition of religion? Scientific fanaticism and its consequences "," took place in 2001 ", in the" eastern Congo. There she is anything but "Christian" reasons. Most were
2. witch hunts in Europe it is not in the Middle Ages, but in the early modern period, the last witch was burned in Germany 1775th
3. The victims were mostly women only in Germany, or the ratio was at least offset, in part, the men in the majority, in Iceland, 90%, in Estonia 60% of the victims men.
4. It was not "8 or 9 million Victims, "as the" Nazi propaganda "suspected, but" ca 50,000 ". 50,000 victims - in 350 years of European witch hunting (1430-1780). The persecution of Christians alone in 2008 led to more than twice as many victims.

interesting is how the witch craze - in Europe! - Came to an end. Schroeder: "The intelligence, they say. That's not true. Namely, he came in the 17th Century, largely ceased. "For there was massive resistance. "The opponents were theologians and jurists, who regarded themselves as Christians."

One of them was Friedrich von Spee. 1631 published his masterpiece, the Cautio criminalis ("legal concerns about the witch trials), only a few weeks is out of print after publication. In this book he exposes the witch trials as a farce and the enforcement of judgments as murder. Major criticism is the use of torture, which was then used to find the truth. Spee stops torture even for morally reprehensible ("No German nobleman would be able to tolerate that one mangled his hunting dog so. Who is it there to watch with that a man is torn apart so many times?"), But first for legally disabled because them in legal practice for faulty evidence lead.

Torture is also bad for the person who tortures and for those who order the torture - for the judges. Debt falls at Spee after the Christian sin theory and the eschatological "retribution principle" to Mt 25, 31-46 on the offender back to the expectations of the hell in which he will know that torture in his own body, which he expected in his lifetime other. "If I wanted to sin and had made up my mind to definitely go to hell, so I instead of the judges to choose but not so cruel, but a little more enjoyable way.", He puts a bit against the jurisdiction. A clear warning that caught then. Here and now, where torture is coming back into fashion, catching the thought no longer the responsibility before God. But at least this is certainly not the fault of the church.

Further Reading

to "crusades":

Michael Hesemann (2007): The dark men. Myths, Lies, and legends of the Church's history. Augsburg.

Hans Eberhard Mayer (2005): History of the Crusades. Stuttgart.

Tamcke Martin (2008): Christians in the Islamic world. Munich.

Thomas E. Woods (2006): Great moments instead of dark Middle Ages. The Catholic Church and the development of Western civilization. Aachen.

to "sword Mission:

Bordat Josef (2008): Annexation - Connection - Recognition: Global Relationship Cultures in the early 16th Century. Hamburg.

Gregor von Furstenberg et al. (2006): faith, life giving. Missionary 175 years. Freiburg i. Br

Lutz E. von Padberg (1998): The Christianization of Europe in the Middle Ages. Ditzingen.

Neal Pirolo (2007): Called to Send. Community and world mission. Holzgerlingen.

Hans Waldenfels et al. (2005): The case continues ... Munich.

Wietzke Joachim (ed., 1993): Mission explained. Ecumenical documents from 1972 to 1992. Leipzig.

Klaus Wetzel (2005): Mission history of Germany. Nuremberg.

to "witch burning"

Walter Nigg (1996): Friedrich von Spee. A Jesuit fight against witchcraft. Paderborn.

Richard Schroeder (2009): Elimination of Religion? Scientific fanaticism and its consequences. Freiburg i. Br

patient is a weblog of course, but I invite anyone to look into a what we say. And this is not an attempt to deny something is desperately is obvious, as otherwise one would not open and honest appeal to all and also list the errors.

And of course, Christians have made mistakes. That is to deny no one. Christians are also human beings and just because you're Christian, you are not a better person. Christians make the same mistakes as other people are committing the same crimes, making the same stupid things.

people are like that, have always been so and will also be so. So even non-Christians and especially the history of famous atheists like Hilter, Stalin, Pol Pot, Mao shows to what people are able to have no religion. And what does this tell us? And how to be atheists?