Inquisitive about the Inquisition?

In his 1994 encyclical Tertio millennio adveniente, dealing with the beginning of the third millennium, Pope John Paul said that it was appropriate for the Church to repent of the sins of its officers and its faithful during the last two thousand years: "As the Second Millennium of Christianity draws to a close, the Church should become more fully conscious of the sinfulness of her children, recalling all those times in history when they departed from the spirit of Christ and his Gospel, and...indulged in ways of thinking and acting that were truly forms of counter-witness and scandal" (#33). The chief events he had in mind included the Inquisition, slavery, the Galileo affair, anti-Semitism, and the Nazi Holocaust. He has already dealt with all of these except the Inquisition.

It seems that on Ash Wednesday in the year 2000 the Pope will ask God's pardon for the sins of Catholics in these matters and, presumably, in others as well.

The Church has now called for an examination of conscience, in a spirit of repentance, for the times when methods of intolerance and even of violence were employed in the service of truth.

Symposium

As concerns the Inquisition, the Vatican arranged for a symposium in October 1998, attended by about fifty of the world's experts on the history of the Inquisition. The papers of this symposium will be published soon. The purpose of the symposium was "restructuring as precisely as possible the events, actions, and mindsets of that day, in the light of the historical context of that era."

In 1998 the Vatican Library announced that it will open to scholars all its files on the Inquisition. The Inquisition is considered by many to have been an evil institution of the Church which, for a few hundred years, terrorized, tortured, and put to death a large number of people. Many earlier historians were heavily influenced by partisan passions, especially because of the religious divide between Catholics and Protestants. It was to the interest of the Protestant and liberal parties to paint the Catholic Church in the blackest possible colours.

Today we find less harsh judgments. For example: "On the whole, the institution was a logical product of its time. In those days the Church and state were united in the closest bonds, and heresy was considered a crime against both, to be compared only with high treason and anarchy." [1] Again, "Actually, the Inquisition imposed the death penalty rarely, only in those cases offering no hope at all for a change of belief and practice by the individual. Detailed studies of the court sessions and sentences invalidate earlier beliefs about the frequency of the death penalty." [2] Of course much research has already become available for the study of this institution, but historians are wondering to what extent the new material will either confirm or alter our present judgments.

My own opinion is that the Pope will apologize to the world, and ask God's forgiveness, for the use of force in the service of the Gospel--including torture and the death penalty.

Some Catholics, such as Frank Morris in The Wanderer, Dec. 17, 1998, have suggested that the Church has the right to put persons to death because Ananias and his wife Sapphira were struck down for trying to deceive St. Peter (Acts 5:1-10). But this incident, which is subject to several interpretations, fails on more than one score to parallel what happened in the Inquisition.

Origins

Catholicism was persecuted by the Roman Empire for the first three centuries of the Church's existence, and it took many more centuries for the faith to spread over most of Europe, and for political stability to replace the chaos of the "Barbarian invasions" which caused and followed the collapse of the Roman Empire in Western Europe. The Church was not able to set up such an institution as the Inquisition until Catholicism had been accepted by most of Europe, including the secular powers, since the institution could not have done its work without an organized society and the cooperation of civil leaders.

The Inquisition was begun by Pope Gregory IX in Italy in 1231. It was intended to be a permanent tribunal, or court, to combat heresy. Heresy is a denial of the Catholic faith and, in the predominantly Catholic society of the day, it led to civil disorder. For example, the Cathars were heretics in southern France in the thirteenth century who believed in two gods, a good god who created human souls and an evil god (Satan) who created human bodies. They taught that marriage is evil. Such a doctrine, for European societies, contradicted even the natural moral law, which binds everyone. Its consequences were bound to lead to civil strife.

Thousands of books and articles have been written on the Inquisition. But let us recall that there were three distinct Inquisitions. The medieval one began in 1231. The Spanish Inquisition began in the 1480s to deal with the Jews and Moors in Spain, and in the late 1500s was used in the Netherlands when Protestantism, and unhappiness with Spanish rule, merged into a rebellion against Spanish overlordship. The Roman Inquisition began in 1542 to deal with the heresies of the Protestant Reformation. To give a more precise idea of the Inquisition I will deal here only with the medieval phase.

The medieval Inquisition 

Though the Catholic faith was widespread in Europe by the thirteenth century, there were heretical groups such as the Cathars and the Waldenses. Though the Church had tried for a hundred years to get the bishops and the civil leaders to deal with them, Pope Gregory felt the need for a more centralized organization for this purpose.

In each area where they existed, two inquisitors were appointed, from one of two religious orders, the Dominicans or the Franciscans. Their authority came directly from the Pope, though they were asked to try to work with bishops and princes. They visited their area and summoned to their court those accused of heretical leanings. Once there, these persons were put under oath and asked to answer the charges against them.

The accused did not know who their accusers were, because the latter would not testify without this protection. There was no such thing as a police force; thus they feared reprisals from the family or relatives of the accused. Persons were found guilty if they confessed, or if two witnesses made the same accusations (unless it was thought that the witnesses lied out of hatred).

The "penances" assigned to those found guilty were various. Some were ordered to make a pilgrimage; others were scourged; others again were ordered to wear a special garment with crosses on it; some were sentenced to prison terms; others had their houses destroyed. The heaviest penalty was being handed over to the secular power for burning at the stake.

Women were not imprisoned after 1283. We must remember, of course, that society took it for granted that torture could be used on suspected persons, that being a far different age from ours. Again, heresy was a form of treason, to be punishable even by death.

The medieval Inquisition flourished from 1250 to 1300, after which its activity was curtailed.

An example

To give a more precise account of the medieval Inquisition's activities I'll present information from a recent book: James B. Given, Inquisition and Medieval Society (Cornell Univ. Press, 1997). It deals with the Inquisition from 1275 to 1325 in Languedoc, an area in southern France whose chief cities were Toulouse, Albi, Foix, Narbonne, Pamiers, Beziers, and Carcassonne. The two chief heresies with which it was concerned were Catharism and Walden-sianism.

Besides believing in two gods, as has been mentioned, the Cathars believed that Jesus was a messenger from God, sent to tell the truth of Catharism, but he was not God, and did not really become a human being or die on the Cross. Their central act of religion was a baptism by the Holy Spirit, conferred by the laying-on of hands. The souls of those who received it were cleansed of sin and, at death, were not reincarnated but went to heaven, provided they had not committed a serious sin, which would cancel out the baptism. The Cathars had their own bishops, and were widespread in Languedoc.

The Waldenses were started in Lyon, France, in the 1170s by a man called Valdes. They wanted to preach without episcopal permission and were led into several heresies by their basic contention that only what was found in Scripture should be believed.

The first Languedoc inquisitors were appointed in 1233. The number of inquisitors altogether was not large, and their staffs (secretaries, etc.) were fairly small. They did not use torture very often but did put suspects in prison. There were two kinds of imprisonment. In the normal regime, prison life was not especially hard; prisoners were required to stay within the prison walls but could move about within them freely. In the strict regime there was solitary confinement, sometimes with shackles. Imprisonment usually produced results.

An inquisitorial register in Pamiers recorded that from 1318 to 1325 there were 87 cases dealt with and that it averaged about a year to settle a case. In 55 of the cases the person was kept in prison for a length of time averaging about half a year. Being in prison was particularly hard because prisoners had to pay their own expenses.

The register of the Toulouse Inquisition from 1308 to 1324 lists the sentences pronounced in the 907 cases with which it dealt. Seventeen were required to make a pilgrimage, 136 to wear crosses, one to serve a 1-year prison term, 276 to be perpetually imprisoned in the normal regime (eight of these also were to have their houses destroyed), 31 to be perpetually imprisoned in the strict regime, 41 to be burned alive, and one to go on a crusade. Some prisoners had died before sentence was passed; of 17 of these it was said that they would have been sentenced to prison if they had lived, and of three it was said that they would have been sentenced to be burned alive if they had lived. Forty were condemned in absentia. For one, judgment was reserved. The bodies of 66 were to be exhumed and burned (and the houses of 14 of these were to be destroyed). The bodies of three others were to be exhumed but not burned. The sentences of those who were being retried were commuted as follows: 139 were released from prison b ut were required to wear Crosses, and 135 were no longer required to wear crosses.

Those who were sentenced to death were the ones who refused to recant their errors; who maintained their innocence even though they had been proven guilty; or who had relapsed, that is, had become heretical again after they had renounced heresy. Those whose houses were destroyed were the ones who had received the baptism of the Holy Spirit.

The number of prisoners in the Inquisition prison at Toulouse numbered between 100 and 200 from 1250 to 1320, and was 69 in 1322; at Carcassonne in 1312 it was 162.

Judgments

Let us close with two opinions of the Inquisition held by scholars. R. C. Finucane wrote: "Historical Judgments on the medieval Inquisition have varied from absolute condemnation to qualified approval of at least some of its characteristics. Only a small portion of those who appeared before the Inquisition were sent to their deaths, and in this respect it was more lenient than violent mobs or contemporary criminal courts; yet, even in the thirteenth century, some, such as lawyers who cautioned against the unrestricted use of torture, doubted whether this ecclesiastical tribunal ... served the interests of Christendom." [3]

Y. Dossat, writing concerning all the subdivisions of the Inquisition, has concluded: "Any objective evaluation of this institution must properly place it in its own intellectual, religious, and sociological milieu. Political and social factors contemporary with the Inquisition favored its growth and development in view of the threat to both political and religious unity posed by doctrinal dissidence. But ... the excesses attendant upon its procedures, especially in southern France and in Spain, make the Inquisition, as it evolved in practice, indefensible." [4]

Fr. Leonard Kennedy is a contributing editor of Catholic Insight and a priest of the Congregation of St. Basil.

Endnotes:

(1.) Compton's Encyclopedia (1982) XII, 191.

(2.) Collier's Encyclopedia (1994) XIII, 39.

(3.) The Encyclopedia of Religion (1987) VII, under "Inquisition".

(4.) New Catholic Encyclopedia (1967) VII, under "Inquisition".

Commentary 1

Pursuing wayward Catholics

From a sermon on Pastors by Saint Augustine, Bishop of Hippo (354-430 AD)

The straying sheep you have not recalled; the lost sheep you have not sought. In one way or another, we go on living between the hands of robbers and the teeth of raging wolves, and in light of these present dangers we ask your prayers. The sheep moreover are insolent. The shepherd seeks out the straying sheep, but because they have wandered away and are lost they say that they are not ours. "Why do you want us? Why do you seek us?" they ask, as if their straying and being lost were not the very reason for our wanting them and seeking them out. "If I am straying," he says, "if I am lost, why do you want me?" You are straying, that is why I wish to recall you. You have been lost, I wish to find you. "But I wish to stray," he says; "I wish to be lost."

So you wish to stray and be lost? How much better that I do not also wish this. Certainly, I dare say, I am unwelcome. But I listen to the Apostle who says: Preach the word; insist upon it, welcome and unwelcome. Welcome to whom? Unwelcome to whom? By all means welcome to those who desire it; unwelcome to those who do not. However unwelcome, I dare to say: "You wish to stray, you wish to be lost; but I do not want this." For the one whom I fear does not wish this. And should. I wish it, consider his words of reproach: The straying sheep you have not recalled; the lost sheep you have not sought. Shall I fear you rather than him? Remember, we must all present ourselves before the judgment seat of Christ.

I shall recall the straying; I shall seek the lost. Whether they wish it or not, I shall do it. And should the brambles of the forests tear at me when I seek them, I shall force myself through all straits; I shall pull down all hedges. So far as the God whom I fear grants me the strength, I shall search everywhere. I shall recall the straying; I shall seek after those on the verge of being lost. If you do not want me to suffer, do not stray, do not become lost. It is not enough that I lament your straying and loss. No, I fear that in neglecting you, I shall also kill what is strong. Consider the passage that follows; And what was strong you have destroyed. Should I neglect the straying and lost, the strong one will also take delight in straying and in being lost.

Sermon 46, 14-15, CCL 41,541-542, Office of readings, Monday of the 25th, week in ordinary time.

Commentary 2

History and apologies

Editor

The book When a Pope asks forgiveness: The Mea Culpa's of John Paul II by Luigi Accattoli (Boston, Daughters of St. Paul, 1998, PP. 257, $25.50 Can.) mentions in its section on "The Inquisition," that the Holy Father has spoken about the Inquisition on three occasions, each time with more persistence and increased clarity.

The first mention came during a visit to Spain in 1982. It was only an aside in a speech addressed to academics about combining freedom of research and commitment to the Church. The Pope noted that "in certain moments such as those of the Inquisition there were tensions, errors, and excesses, facts which the Church today can consider in the objective light of history."

Brief as it was, this reference marked the first time a modern Pope had spoken unfavourably about the Inquisition in public. As Accattoli put it, it broke "a longstanding taboo." Remember that as late as 1908--when Pope Saint Pius X changed it to the "Congregation of the Holy Office"--the present Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith (a Vatican II name change) was known as "The Sacred Congregation of the Roman and Universal Inquisition."

In Latin, inquisition simply means enquiry, investigation. Under this title, the Congregation became an ecclesiastical tribunal for the suppression. of heresy in the 13th century. Suppressing heresy was looked upon not only as a good thing religiously but also as necessary for the social cohesion of society. What are the origins of this notion?

Its ultimate origins may be found in the New Testament and the admonishment to rebuke brethren going astray and, if necessary, to banish them. Three centuries later St. Augustine (354-430) tried to set forth the dilemma of needing to rebuke those going astray (see Commentary 1).

Development

The development of the Inquisition is sketched briefly in The Oxford Dictionary of the Christian Church. In early times the usual punishment for heresy was excommunication. Physical penalties were generally disapproved of by the Church Fathers, though, after Christianity had become the official religion of the empire, secular princes tended to treat heretics as traitors for whom confiscation of property and. even the death penalty were seen as suitable measures.

The Church on the whole, states the Dictionary, kept to her original attitude as late as the 12th century when St. Bernard laid down the principle 'Fides suadenda, non imponenda' (persuasion, not imposition). But some, perhaps most heresies, such as the Cathars of the late 12th and early 13th century, threatened not only religious orthodoxy but basic institutions of society. Cathars saw marriage as the work of Satan. In order to halt their rapid spread, the Church sought the help of the political powers.

When in 1232 Emperor Frederick II issued an edict entrusting the pursuit of heretics to state officials, Pope Gregory IX, fearing Frederick's political ambitions, stepped in and reserved this task for the Church. It set up an official tribunal of investigation called The Inquisition.

The appointment of Papal Inquisitors was made not from among bishops (who might have a conflict of interest) but from among the mendicant orders, known for their theological knowledge and their absence of worldly motives. Despite these good intentions, the Papacy was wading into very polluted waters indeed. In 1252, instead of recognizing the danger signals, Pope Innocent IV felt he had to back the process involving both state and Church even further and so he allowed the use of torture (Bull Ad extirpanda).

Pope John Paul II 

In 1988, six years after his initial mention of the Inquisition's "errors and excesses," the Pope focused more closely on the nature of the problem. In an address to the parliamentarians of the European Assembly in Strasbourg (October 6, 1988), after affirming the Church's recognition of the dignity of every person, especially his conscience as a place of responsible freedom, the Pope stated:

"It is true that there has been a lot of drifting away, and Christians know that they have played a part in it." In other words, the Inquisition violated the individual conscience.

Finally, in a memorandum to the Consistory of Cardinals in 1994, Pope John Paul II broached the idea of apologizing in preparation for the Great Jubilee:

How can we remain silent in the face of so many forms of violence perpetrated in the name of the faith? Religious wars, the courts of the Inquisition, and other forms of violation of the rights of individuals.... It is significant that the coercive methods, injurious to human rights, were later employed by the totalitarian ideologies of the twentieth century and are now being used by the Islamic fundamentalists. From those kinds of coercive methods came the crimes of Hitler's Nazism and Marxist Stalinism. A correct reaction to all of this is the Declaration of the Rights of Man and, in the Church, the Declaration on Religious Liberty issued by Vatican Council II. It is also necessary, in the light of what the Vatican Council has said, that the Church, on her own initiative, should look again at the dark aspects of her own history.

This text touches the heart of the issue. Instead of just speaking about "excesses"--which may or may not have been the case in the context of the customs of their own day--the Holy Father concentrated on the use of violence in the name and service of the Faith, something Jesus had specifically rejected.