Phillip, we know that on the sixth day God finished the work of Creation with the creation of our first parents. Since that time we are in the seventh day when God rested. If Adam’s creation was in 3997 BC, as was revealed to Sr. Emmerich, then it was early in the morning of the "4^th hour" or 4^th millennium that God the Son came to redeem the world by His grace and His rule, so that it could become all that God intended for it to be. He did not change the nature of creation; but repaired the damage man’s free will had done to creation, washing and reanimating it with supernatural Life. He came to announce the establishment of His Kingdom, which His elect had awaited and prepared for. At Christ’s first advent He offered His Life to all, because they had lost it through Adam’s sin. Two thousand years later he came in a Just Judgement of the nations on the "Day of the Lord" to destroy wickedness and establish justice and peace. And He will come, in the final, Universal Judgement, to reveal all things hidden, ending all speculation, all deliberation. Then all mercy and forbearance, all patience, all longing and desire will pass away, along with Time itself, and eternal Glory will Reign forever. Woe to those who do not recognize the time of His coming in their age.
          "He comes then in every age, Father? His coming lasts until His coming again?"
          Yes, that is exactly right, Phillip, now that you put it that way. When He came on Christmas day the true people of God were those born of the Faith of Abraham, whether they were descendants of Jacob or not. These same people entered into the eternal and real Ark of the Covenant at Jesus’ death through the wound in His right side, where the spear had pierced His Sacred Heart. In the Love of this Heart is carried all people who would ever be saved.
          At Christ’s first advent all were invited to enter this Ark of the Church, but some refused, including many of those descended from Jacob or who pretended to be so descended. These sensually minded ones supposed that salvation came from the loins, by a fleshly right of inheritance, regardless of their spiritual state. Those elitists who presumed this forgot that God chose Israel as an instrument to save all men who willed to serve God in truth and spirit, not just in the repetition of words, ritual, sacrifices and genealogical pedigrees.
          St. Paul took great pains to convince those who were descendants of Israel that it was not the flesh of their ancestors to whom the Promise had been made and a covenant established, but to those who were spiritual children of Abraham, who was justified by his faith.
          "Wasn’t it true, Father, that those of other nations not descended from Jacob could be adopted by Israel, even from Moses’ time, if they converted to the worship of the true God?"
          Yes, a good point to prove that salvation was not just a matter of blood or heredity but was a matter of spirit.
          "Who were the chief enemies of Christ in His time, Father?"
          Those would seem to be Herod and the other descendants of Esau (Edomites) who misleadingly for later generations were even then called Jews only because they had come to occupy and reside in the land of Juda. These Edomites, traditionally, were the enemies of Israel, hating Israel because Israel's descendants had, through the justice and

Faith of Jacob, acquired the Blessing of his father, Isaac, by God’s will, although, by the flesh, by the custom of primogeniture, Esau "should" have received it. This, of course, is another sign that God does not save by mere birthright, but by the possession of a right spirit.
          "Cain was the elder brother of Abel, Father, yet his sacrifice was not accepted. God seemed to repeat this lesson in history with Esau and Jacob."
          Yes. For by the order of primogeniture alone, all Israel was the first nation invited into the Promised Land of Heaven upon earth, the true Ark, the Catholic Church, instituted by the Messiah, the Son of God. Yet most of these went the way of their flesh, which is not the way of God and misinterpreted God's universal Love, blinding themselves to His own Son.
          "But, Father, how did an Edomite, like Herod, rule over the people of Israel?"
          It is said that Edomites occupied Judea after the true descendants of Juda had been taken into the captivity at Babylon. They assumed political power in Judea, and because they lived in Judea, they called themselves Jews. In that position certain evil ones among them could hide their malice and treachery behind the name of Juda, the prophesied ancestor of the Messiah. It was these evil elitists, chiefly, who wrestled with Caesar for the political autonomy and control of Israel, which resulted -- as they may well have foreseen and planned -- in the destruction of Jerusalem in 70 AD and the dispersion and complete dissolution of the actual race of Israel.
          The religion of Israel may also have contracted certain heresies and impurities of various sorts during the Babylonian captivity which the Scribes and Pharisees later promulgated. Phillip, there is a thread of evil knowledge and deeds in history, just as there was the thread of good knowledge and good deeds as passed on through the Patriarchs. A rather clear outline of this evil thread that I will follow now is found in this book by Stephen Mahowald, entitled She Shall Crush Thy Head. Evil "knowledge" is called occult (hidden or secret) gnosticism (knowledge). Adam and Eve were tempted by gnosticism, namely the secret knowledge that God did not want them to know -- the knowledge of good and evil. All they had to do was perform the secret ritual of sinful disobedience. When they did this lustful sensuality poured into them as a result. Thus the Serpent himself sowed the seeds of all diabolical religions or mystery religions and their wicked rituals and customs. The Pharisees claim that a higher more complete secret knowledge and law was revealed to seventy elders (called the Sanhedrin in later times) at the foot of Mount Sinai, while Moses was being given the written Law by the same God. A likely story; no doubt invented to upstage and counter God's revelation. This kabal or "body of teachings" was thenceforth passed on by oral tradition until it was set down in the Babylonian Talmud, which was passed on through the secret initiation of gnosticism to all succeeding generations.
          Upon examination this Kabala is seen to contradict the Ten Commandments on all counts. And it was, a little too conveniently, said to take precedence over the publicly proclaimed, written Law of Moses. The Talmud (the written version of the Kabala) contains hideously immoral doctrine in places.
          The Kabala could have been simply a collection of diabolical lore from these same Israelites who demanded a golden calf to worship and who were most likely also those who had been contaminated in Egypt by its pagan religion. These evil ones may also have broken God's command to the people of God not to intermarry with other races

and peoples, like the Egyptians who had descended from Ham. Some of these seventy ancient paganists may also have been descendants of Esau pretending to be converts or descendants of Israel. They may have been under secret orders to infiltrate the people of God and try to lead them away from true religion by sowing the seeds of error and tempting them with those sins which the diabolical arts and rituals cultivated.
          The high court of Israel at the time of Christ was composed of the "spiritual" descendants of these seventy ancients, plus the High Priest, who represented the Spirit of God. The Scribes and Pharisees, some of whom harbored paganism within Israel, were a sect born in the time of the Babylonian Captivity. These Kabalists and elitists laid Talmudic prescriptions on the common people that they were exempt from. These were the enemies of the Son of God. He condemned them:

          "But woe to you scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites; because you shut the kingdom of heaven against men, for you yourselves do not enter in; and those that are going in, you suffer not to enter." (Matthew 15:7-9) "Woe to you scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites; because you go round about the sea and land to make one proselyte; and when he is made, you make him the child of hell twofold more than yourselves … You serpents, generation of vipers, how will you flee from the judgment of hell?" (Matthew 23: 15, 33) "You are of your father the devil, and the desires of your father you will do. He was a murderer from the beginning, and he stood not in the truth; because the truth is not in him. When he speaketh a lie, he speaketh of his own: for he is a liar, and the father thereof." (John 8:44)

          Manichaeanism and most other heresies have roots in Gnosticism or Luciferianism. Therefore, it is no surprise to find such secret societies behind the Protestant Reformation. We note, Phillip, that the Church excommunicates those who join secret societies, because God does not do His work in the dark. The devil does because the common morality and good sense of mankind condemns evil and legislates against it, thus affirming the law of God.
          The secret knowledge passed on through Cain, Ham, Nemrod and perhaps King Solomon was a Lie. Perhaps its essence was the Serpent's lie to Eve, "you shall become as God." I see it expressed as, "You can have your cake and eat it too." That is, you can have the pleasure of doing wicked sensuous things and you can have the suspension of prosecution for the same, as well as immortality, just as gods get away with -- if you will have "faith" in Lucifer and believe in what he tells you to be true (his lies) through his chosen priesthood. Personal initiation into this covenant with Lucifer is a parody of Baptism. Other "sacred" acts eventually follow initiation such as the real or symbolic murder of an innocent victim and the eating of his flesh and drinking of his blood. This so-called Black Mass blasphemously parodies the true Mass of Christ's Church.
          It would probably be true to say that Judaism had been infiltrated by its enemies and corrupted in a certain degree by the time Jesus arrived. Many of the common people must have been aware of this, therefore, they flocked to Jesus, who preached the pure doctrine, while others were led astray by the false shepherds.
          "Just as it happened in the Catholic Church in the 20^th century, Father?"
          Very much so, Phillip. And again, Jesus came when His people were being led by false shepherds – wolves in sheep’s clothing. Let us read an example from Scripture of the characteristic work of those I choose to call frauds. Their spiritual children appear throughout history, Son.

         Matthew 15:1-9 "Then came to him from Jerusalem Scribes and Pharisees, saying: Why do thy disciples transgress the tradition of the ancients? For they wash not their hands when they eat bread. But He answering said to them: Why do you also transgress the commandment of God for your tradition? For God said: Honour thy father and mother: and he that shall curse father or mother, let him die the death. But you say: Whosoever shall say to his father or mother, The gift whatsoever proceedeth from Me, shall profit thee. And he shall not honour his father or his mother: and you have made void the commandment of God for your tradition. Ye hypocrites, well hath Isaias prophesied of you, saying: This people honoureth me with their lips: but their heart is far from me. And in vain do they worship me, teaching doctrines and commandments of men.

          These frauds feared that the sway of Jesus over the people would be the ruin of their dominion over Israel. Imagine, Phillip, the effect of the stupendous public miracles of Jesus – true miracles being God’s signature written on the wall of the temple of God’s People. Who could deny it but the devil and his children.           The generic integrity and identity of Israel, signified by the physical temple in Jerusalem, disappeared in 70 AD when both that temple was destroyed and the people of Israel were widely dispersed.
          "Do you mean, Father, that the generic identity of Israel continued to disperse as the people intermingled and intermarried with other peoples throughout the world?"
          Exactly, Son."
          "Then there are more left in the world who can trace their ancestry to Jacob by a pure genealogical line of ancestors?"
          That is correct. God saw fit that the seed He had planted should die, so that which it was made to become should spring up, that is, the true descendants of Jesus Christ in the order of the true Faith. The dispersion of Israel in 70 AD totally obliterated the instrument of the flesh, in order that the Temple of God Himself, Jesus Christ, would have no earthly veil or obstacle hiding Him. To signify this, at the moment Jesus died, the great veil in the Temple concealing the Holy of Holies split asunder. The false Jews or Edomites and their followers in Israel pretended to patch this veil by maligning and covering up the divinity of Jesus.
          "Father, is that why they bribed the guards of Jesus' tomb not to tell of His Resurrection?"
          Yes, and since then the Frauds and their fellow travelers have milked their false Jewish credentials to the limit, crying out in hypocrisy that they are God’s people still awaiting the Messiah. How could He have come, they say, when we see all this evil in the world -- which they themselves have inspired and instigated by their diabolical perfidy.
          Above all, the Herodians’ diabolically guided purpose, Phillip, was to discredit and misrepresent Christ, casting him in a bad light as a blasphemous imposter -– when it was they who were the only imposters and blasphemers. Jesus boldly rebuked them to their faces for a witness to His people, pointing out the wolf in sheep's clothing prowling in their midst. Jesus said in Luke 12:1, "Beware of the leaven of the Pharisees, which is hypocrisy." Beware of this hypocrisy, Phillip. It is the sign of evil, the odor of evil. Let me read from God’s Word about hypocrisy:

          "Then was offered to him one possessed with a devil, blind an dumb; and he healed him, so that he spoke and saw. And all the multitudes were amazed, and said: Is not this the son of David! But the Pharisees hearing it, said:

61

This man casteth not out devils but by Beelzebub the prince of the devils. And Jesus knowing their thoughts, said to them: Every kingdom divided against itself shall be made desolate: and every city or house divided against itself shall not stand. And if Satan cast out Satan, he is divided against himself: how then shall his kingdom stand? And if I by Beelzebub cast out devils, by whom do your children cast them out? Therefore they shall be your judges. But if I by the Spirit of God cast out devils, then is the kingdom of God come upon you. (Matthew 13:22-28)
          Therefore I say to you: Every sin and blasphemy shall be forgive men, but the blasphemy of the Spirit shall not be forgiven. And whosoever shall speak a word against the Son of man, it shall be forgiven him: but he that shall speak against the Holy Ghost, it shall not be forgiven him, neither in this world, nor in the world to come. (vs. 31-32)
          O generation of vipers, how can you speak good things, whereas you are evil? For out of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaketh. A good man out of a good treasure bringeth forth good things: and an evil man out of an evil treasure bringeth forth evil things. But I say unto you, that every idle word that men shall speak, they shall render an account for it in the day of judgment. For by thy words thou shalt be justified, and by thy words thou shalt be condemned." (vs. 34-37)

          Jesus’ death conveyed to us this message: It is better to give up the body to death than to save it and lose one’s soul and eternal life. Some things are passing and some are forever. Jesus crowned and magnified the lesson of spiritual ascendancy over the flesh by teaching that the vehicle or instrument of our mortal bodies and our earthly existence should be totally subject to the Word of God.

          "Therefore fear them not. For nothing is covered that shall not be revealed: nor hid, that shall not be known. That which I tell you in the dark, speak ye in the light: and that which you hear in the ear, preach ye upon the housetops. And fear ye not them that kill the body, and are not able to kill the soul: but rather fear him that can destroy both soul and body in hell. (Matthew 11:26-28)
          Everyone therefore that shall confess me before men, I will also confess Him before men, I will also confess him before my Father who is in heaven. But he that shall deny me, before men, I will also deny him before my father who is in heaven. Do not think that I came to send peace upon earth: I came not to send peace, but the sword. For I came to set a man at variance against his father, and the daughter against her mother, and the daughter in law against her mother in law. And a man’s enemies shall be they of his own household. He that loveth father or mother more than me, is not worthy of me; and he that loveth son or daughter more than me, is not worthy of me. And he that taketh not up his cross, and followeth me, is not worthy of me. He that findeth his life, shall lose it: and he that shall lose his life for me, shall find it. He that receiveth you, receiveth me: and he that receiveth me, receiveth him that sent me. He that receiveth a prophet in the name of a prophet, shall receive the reward of a prophet: and he that receiveth a just man in the name of a just man, shall receive the reward of a just man. And whosoever shall give to drink to one of these little ones a cup of cold water only in the name of a disciple, amen I say to you, he shall not lose his reward." (vs. 32-42)

          "Father, why did God allow the enemy to enter His church before His first and His second comings?"
          Think of it this way, Phillip. Jesus Christ is the Groom; the congregation or Church of His people is His Bride, His Mystical Body, of which He is the Head. And

then, … there is, lurking in the shadows of history, the Harlot, who hates the spouse of Christ out of envy.
          A harlot tempts men to violate their marriage vows by tempting them to pay homage to the will of their flesh and its pleasures at the expense of breaking his marital promises. The legacy of the harlot’s victims is disease and death. Who is the Harlot in history? Let us follow her trail – a trail of treachery, violence, lies, of blood, sweat and tears.
          After the death of Christ it is said that Edomite conspirators, led by a man they called "Hiram," conscripted Herod Agrippa III, the great grandson of the murderous Herod the Great, as the leader of their secret society, the aim of which was to destroy Christianity by treachery, infiltration, misrepresentation of its doctrines, instigation of heresies, murder and sorcery. They swore to each other by a bloody oath, under pain of assassination, absolute secrecy and fidelity to the cause.           They often styled themselves Jewish Christians or Christian Jews, neither of which they were, in order to become as leaven in the new Church, seeking disciples and victims of their lies. One of these held that every Christian must be circumcised in the flesh according to the custom of Israel. But St. Paul preached mightily against them. And Jesus said of them, 'You call yourselves sons of Abraham, but you are sons of Satan, going about the world making proselytites two fold more the children of hell than yourselves.’
          It is said that the false "Jews," pretending to be pious adherents of Judaism whenever it suited their public relations’ purpose practiced usury and sacrificed (murdered) Christian babies in parodies of the Masses during the first millennium. Black masses are still held by satanists the world over. To excuse and authorize their criminal acts, they added to that collection of non-canonical Jewish literature called the Talmud their own corrupt doctrines and then hid these versions from all who were not initiated into their secret society of diabolical worship.
          In the first centuries they were behind the scenes inciting and coercing the Roman Emperors to annihilate the Christian sect in wave after wave of persecution. Here we clearly see the wrathful face of Satan on an historical scale. By loaning large sums of money to the Emperors for war, they wielded a silent but real political control through indebtedness. In later centuries their diabolical brotherhood also used this device of usury to effect events on an historical scale. There is a connection between Nemrod and his usurious Babylonian priesthood, these "Jewish" frauds and the Yiddish Banksters of the later centuries. These are all the spiritual sons of Satan. It is a definite spiritual brotherhood that will exist from the beginning to the end of the world. Their spirit is always anti-Christ and anti-Catholic.
          In addition to their usurious money power, they added in these first centuries false accusations and misrepresentations of Christians in order to give a plausible cause for 300 years of laws and edicts calling for the extermination of Christians, whose beliefs, supposedly, threatened civil order and the commonwealth.
          Using this same ploy, they had asked Jesus whether tribute should be given to Caesar or not. They intended to trap Him if he said "yes" with the accusation of abandoning the cause of Israel’s independence, which they secretly promoted through the Zealots, to the point of compelling Rome to crush them and all Israel. But if Jesus said "no", they would report Him to Rome as an instigator of civil unrest advising tax evasion.

          By such hypocrisy or pretense of virtue the Frauds have hounded God’s people from the time of Adam. Their rage comes from the jealous, murderous lust of Satan, who first wanted to destroy the human race through the temptation to sin of Adam and Eve. He wanted them to destroy the ancestors of the Saviour by whose power his (Satan’s) head would be crushed, which became in time the nation of Israel. But when he failed to destroy the mission of the Church of Israel and its child, Jesus, who was born and crucified and taken up to Heaven, he (Satan) chased the Woman (the Church) and her children down through the ages.

Apocalypse 12:1-6 "And a great sign appeared in heaven: A woman clothed with the sun, and the moon under her feet, and on her head a crown of twelve stars: And being with child, she cried travailing in birth, and was in pain to be delivered. And there was seen another sign in heaven: and behold a great red dragon, having seven heads, and ten horns: and on his heads seven diadems: And his tail drew the third part of the stars of heaven, and cast them to the earth: and the dragon stood before the woman who was ready to be delivered; that, when she should be delivered, he might devour her son. And she brought forth a man-child, Who was to rule all nations with an iron rod: and her son was taken up to God, and to his throne. And the woman fled into the wilderness, where she had a place prepared by God, that there they should feed her a thousand two hundred sixty days."

          "Father, I am a little confused. What or who is the Harlot of which you spoke? Is it a race of people?"
          The Harlot is how Satan appears in history after Christ. He appears as a Harlot who attempts to seduce Christians who are spiritually married or united to God in His Church, the "Bride of Christ". How does Satan materially appear in history but in those who act in His spirit. And this evil spirit of his is enough to infect the whole world – so great and powerful is the nature of this fallen angel. Cain and Esau were prototypes of the prostitutes of Satan (regardless of whether they were personally saved or not), as were certain diabolical sects of the descendants of Esau who pretended to be Jews in order to rule Israel for Satan. These I have called Frauds. But they went on to perpetuate their kind throughout history in the form of secret societies, such as I will identify. These are the Harlot, or by another title, the head of the Serpent. The Serpent's body were those in history that, in some degree of ignorance, followed and served the head. This spiritual brotherhood of evil arose all over the world, out of every nation and race, in all those who imbibed the spirit of Satan.
          Most all of the heresies of the Church were probably instigated through the mediation of the secret societies of the false Jews or Frauds, who were possessed by Satan. Their "religion" is satanic, far from the traditional Judaism they may hide behind.
          It is said that the anti-christ sect formed by Hiram under Herod Agrippa III first called themselves "The Force" because in their enemy, the Church of Christ, surrounded by Saints and miracles was seen as a "Mysterious Force." So they would be the opposing "Force." They even made a movie called "Star Wars" in the latter times to glorify the Force as good.
          In later centuries this secret, diabolical society was exposed to public scrutiny to some extent, and they chose to change their name to Freemasons, passing themselves off as a benevolent guild or brotherhood of artisans. They love to parade before the people as illustrious persons and generous benefactors, while in fact, at the heart of their society,

the devil uses them to work against Christ. They attract many unwitting devotees, but their rituals and oaths are full of ancient pagan and diabolical imagery. These antichristian conspirators in every age, I call, the Force of Antichrist. They lead and coordinate all evil forces and sects, as well as all sinners and all systematic evil. They tempt mankind just as Eve was tempted by Satan through the instrumentality of the Serpent, whose spiritual principle is self will born of pride. They are the Church of Antichrist, the Harlot wedded to the Red Dragon. Their mode of operation is always to mimic and mock truth and goodness by the manipulation of those words and appearances, etc. that represent them.
          "Surely, Father, if they never told the truth, all would know them to be liars."
          If I tell you a story that is 99% true, but deceive you intentionally in the critical 1% that I wish to deceive you about at present, have I used that 99% truth to my advantage by making a lie appear to be the truth?           "I see what you mean, Father."
          I would be manipulating or using truths for the purpose of recommending a concealed lie. The Truth, Son, is always known by its integrity, its wholeness, which involves completeness, 100%. The truth is the Indivisible Light, not divided against itself, not equivocal but wholly and perfectly univocal, having but One Voice.
          Phillip, almost every pope of the infant Christian Church, starting with St. Peter, was martyred for the first 300 years, a parallel to the slaughter of the infants at Bethlehem. Shortly after the deliverance of Christians by Constantine’s conversion, barbarian hordes, one after another, descended on the Roman Empire, until they conquered all. But the Church through her monasteries conquered these people for Christ and civilized them in time. The civilizing and conquering power of Christianity is unparalleled throughout all history. It is a miracle of God’s grace. But you will see that Satan will always struggle with Christ for the conquest of the world.
          It is an error to say that Christ wishes us to quit the world and let Satan take it over for evil. No, we are to quit the evil ways of the world, in order to build the Kingdom of God on earth, first within ourselves and then in the world around us. This warfare is both spiritual and temporal, mystical and political. Christ will not conquer the world for us as we sit in our armchairs and watch television. I used to tell people that before the end.
          I told you how Satan used a certain element of the Semetic race, Edomites, to do his work, because they had, as a people, cultivated an historical hatred for Israel, God’s people. Now we see another people emerge who were fitted for Satan by their past diabolical worship. In 700 AD the Kazars, by their own account descended from Japeth, the father of the Caucasian or white race through his grandsons, Gog and Magog, were forced to abandon paganism and choose between Christianity, Judaism, or Islam. They chose Judaism. Soon Christian Europe was dotted with their ghettos, and the extortion they had formerly practiced on travelers over the trade routes of lower Russia, their ancestral homeland, they now exacted through usurious moneylending throughout Europe. They began to build over the centuries a powerful international banking power.
          "Why were they international, Father?"
          They were ostracized as nonchristians and usurers, so they became a separate nation whose members were scattered among all the nations, in which they lived as parasites, feeding off the labor and wealth of others through usury. Since they had no

inherent national loyalties, they became internationalist in character. Though there were pious adherents of Judaism among this race of non-Jews, Satan, as among the Edomites, raised up his own servants among them who joined the Force. They used Judaism as a shield and cloak for their diabolical hatred of Christianity and the subversive political and religious activities they engaged in to undermine the people of God. Remember, Satan wanted to enslave the world to evil so that he would be worshipped. Finally, in the 16^th century the great anti-Christian offensive was ready. While they tore Europe apart from within by the Protestant Revolt, they incited Mohammedan zealots to attack Europe from Asia Minor.
          "What was Mohammedanism, Father?"
          It was a Christian heresy which denied the Incarnation but adopted most of the other doctrines. By promising its converts freedom from slavery and debt and a sure place in paradise, it was in continual acquisition of new adherents over the centuries.           "It seems like creating slaves and debtors would be a ready means of providing converts, Father."
          Good insight, Phillip. Perhaps this is another reason why we always find the Frauds instigating wars, for they create public debt, which soon becomes private debt, and also slavery among the conquered. Militant Islam is very anti-Christian. Those who die in battle for its cause are guaranteed heaven. Military service might have been required of many male converts as a price of admission. Thus, Islam took the Holy Land and threw huge armies at Christianity through the Balkans and Spain.
          "Why were they particularly anti-christian, Father?"
          Since they denied the Incarnation of Christ, God become man, Christians were seen as idolaters, blasphemers, and corrupters of true religion. So the heretics of Islam attacked the Church from without and the Protestants attacked it from within.
          The unity of Christendom was seduced by the Protestant Revolt. A Protestant Harlot has since pretended to be the Church or part of the Church. Christian civilization was penetrated and split apart by the hideous errors of Calvin, Luther and others. A massive excommunication or divorce of these heretics finally took place. Christ in every age purifies His Church by casting out the unbelievers hidden within. It has been said that 11 million souls apostacized, abandoning the integrity of the Faith, to be led into Hell by the so-called Reformers. At this Revolt we must look more closely, Son, for with this Protestant Revolt began a series of religious, political and social events that, by a chain of cause and effect, led directly to the Great Chastisement. The world would never be the same again. This Protestant Revolt was analogous to the "harlotry" of Israel, for which reason it was cut off or excommunicated from the people of God for its errors.
          "Did the protestors of the 16^th Century worship other gods then, Father?"
          Let us say that they redefined their relationship with God. In doing that they redefined His Church for Him and the nature and identity of God Himself. Thus they created an idol by their own ideas. Under the pretense of remaining Christians, they invented a new christ and a new church of this false christ. But this church could be none other than an extension of anti-christ, which takes many forms.
          First of all, Phillip, to understand the Protestant Reformation as an event in history, it must be noted that it was universally acknowledged by nearly all sincere Catholics, at least by the 16^th Century, that there were many abuses and evils in the Catholic Church that needed to be ended. This was accomplished by the Council of Trent

in 1545-1563. But the anti-Catholic party took advantage of these abuses as convenient excuses to launch an attack against the Church itself and its Holy Doctrine, received from Christ Himself.
          Calvin articulated the formally heretical doctrines of Protestantism such as fatalistic predestination, which attacked in turn the basic doctrine of free will upon which depends the moral responsibility of man for procuring, through the merits of Christ, his own salvation. But the more useful and widespread definition of the heresy of Protestantism was its rejection of the central, divine, universal authority of one Church extending from Christ to the present. This spirit of rebellion seemed to ruin the unity of Christendom. Actually, it cut what was not Christian or Catholic out of the Church. One could say that Divine Providence was the surgeon from this point of view.
          "Who was orchestrating this revolt, Father?"           Satan's followers, the antichristian usurers, who worshipped Mammon. Besides separating whole regions of Catholics from their spiritual Mother in Rome, the great social effect of the Revolution was the wholesale introduction of interest banking in these regions. This usury radically altered the course of history.
          In the Catholic world the common man was protected from the ravages introduced by interest banking, which can be used to great advantage by men of wealth over the peasants, consumers and wage earners. These criminally rich can fluctuate prices and payments for labor until all competitors are at their mercy.
          Let me read the great historian, Hillaire Belloc in his description of this usurious power from his book, The Great Heresies:

          "To take one example: in the Protestant culture (save where it was remote and simple) the free peasant, protected by ancient customs, declined. He died out because the old customs which supported him against the rich were broken up. Rich men acquired the land; great masses of men formerly owning farms became destitute. The modern proletariat began and the seeds of what we today call Capitalism were sown. We can see now what an evil that was, but at the time it meant that the land was better cultivated. New and more scientific methods were more easily applied by the rich landowners of the new Protestant culture than by the Catholic traditional peasantry; and, competition being unchecked, the former triumphed.
          Again, inquiry tended to be freer in the Protestant culture than in the Catholic, because there was no one united authority of doctrine; and though in the long run this was bound to lead to the break-up of philosophy and of all sound thinking, the first effects were stimulating and vitalizing.
          But the great, the chief, example of what was happening through the break-up of the old Catholic European unity, was the rise of banking.
          Usury was practiced everywhere, but in the Catholic culture it was restricted by law and practiced with difficulty. In the protestant culture it became a matter of course. The Protestant merchants of Holland led the way in the beginnings of modern banking; England followed suit; and that is why the still comparatively small Protestant nations began to acquire formidable economic strength. Their mobile capital and credit kept on increasing compared with their total wealth. The mercantile spirit flourished vigorously among the Dutch and English, and the universal admission of competition continued to favor the growth of the Protestant side of Europe."

          So England, Holland and Prussia in northern Germany gained great economic and military strength and began to dominate and colonize the world. Religion everywhere declined, but …

"…The decline of men's adherence to the old doctrines of Christendom did not weaken Protestant society. The whole tone of mind in that society called every man free to judge for himself, and the one thing it repudiated and would not have was the authority of a common religion.
          A common religion is of the nature of the Catholic culture, and so the growing decline of belief worked havoc there. It destroyed the moral authority of the Catholic governments, which were closely associated with religion, and it either cast a sort of paralysis over thought and action, as happened in Spain, or, as happened in France, violently divided men into two camps, clerical and anti-clerical.
          Still, though we can see what was at work in the eighteenth century, the men of the time did not. England through her sea power had got a stranglehold on India; Prussia had established herself as a strong power; but no one foresaw that England and Prussia would overshadow Christendom. India was going to produce wealth and power for those who should exploit her and, with her as a base, establish their banking power and commerce throughout the East. Prussia was going to absorb the Germans and overthrow Europe.
          …Very few foresaw what the new republic in North America was going to mean for the future; its vast and rapid expansion in numbers and wealth immensely strengthened the position of the Protestant culture in the world. It was much later that a certain proportion of Catholic immigrants somewhat modified this position, but even so, the United States remained during their astonishing increase an essentially Protestant society."

          So an anti-Catholic spirit gained ascendancy and power in the world in the wake of the Protestant Revolt, laying the groundwork for the evils of the modern age of atheism, the age of antichrist -- the French Revolution and the Communist Revolution being its signal events.
          Belloc noted that later the "auto-toxic conditions of the Protestant culture" caused its "breakdown," which was "the result of that very spirit of skeptical inquiry upon which Protestantism had always been based."

          "…(Protestantism) had begun by saying, 'I deny the authority of the Church: every man must examine the credibility of every doctrine for himself.' But it had taken as a prop (illogically enough) the Catholic doctrine of Scriptural inspiration. That great mass of Jewish folklore, poetry and traditional popular history and proverbial wisdom which we call the Old Testament, that body of records of the Early Church which we call the New Testament, the Catholic Church had declared to be divinely inspired. Protestantism (as we all know) turned this very doctrine of the Church against the Church herself, and appealed to the Bible against Catholic authority.
          Hence the Bible -- Old and New Testaments combined -- became an object of worship in itself throughout the Protestant culture. There was a great deal of doubt and even paganism floating about before the end of the nineteenth century in the nations of Protestant culture; but the mass of their populations, in Germany as in England and Scandinavia, certainly in the United States, anchored themselves to the literal interpretation of the Bible.
          Now historical research, research in physical science and research in textual criticism, shook this attitude. The Protestant culture began to go to the other extreme; from having worshipped the very text of the Bible as something immutable and the clear voice of God, it fell to doubting almost everything that the Bible contained."

          Belloc noted also that the usurious society destroyed the wealth and strength of the common man, who is the basis of good government of any kind but especially of the self-government of say, a democratic republic like the United States.

          "There was also another example of the spirit of Protestantism destroying its own foundations, but in a different field -- that of social economics.
          Protestantism had produced free competition permitting usury and destroying the old safeguards of the small man's property -- the guild and the village association.
          In most places where it was powerful (and especially in England) Protestantism had destroyed the peasantry altogether. It had produced modern industrialism in its capitalistic form; it had produced modern banking, which at last became the master of the community; but not much more than a lifetime's experience of industrial capitalism and of the bankers' usurious power was enough to show that neither the one nor the other could continue. They had bred vast social evils which went from bad to worse, until men, without consciously appreciating the ultimate cause of those evils (which cause is, of course, spiritual and religious) at any rate found the evils unendurable.
          But the later wealth and political power of the protestant culture had been based upon these very institutions, now challenged.
          Industrial capitalism and the usurious banking power were the very strength of nineteenth-century Protestant civilization. They had especially triumphed in Victorian England. They are, at the moment in which I write these words, still on the surface all-powerful -- but we every one of us know that their hour has struck. They have rotted from within; and with them the Protestant hegemony which they so powerfully supported in the generations immediately before our own."

          "Father, what spiritual illness among the people do you believe was fertile ground for the success of the Revolution of Protest in the Christian world in the 16^th Century."
          I would not hesitate in pointing to the relative surge of pride, worldliness and sensuality that followed the exaltation of humanity in the preceding Renaissance period. In themselves the achievements of science and art were good. But in conceiving pride in them, they produced a humanistic independence and an anti-religious spirit of skepticism in all that could not be proved by logic or demonstrated empirically. So, the mysteries of Divine Revelation, especially the mystery of the One, Holy Catholic Church, which is the Mystical Body of Christ, Christ present in the world, became the object of skepticism before the pride of human reason. We call the error Rationalism. Science triumphs in what we can know through reason and its tools, the senses and imagination. But revealed religion triumphs in believing and reasoning upon what we cannot see or know completely, which we call a mystery. The loss of reverence for the mysteries of religion is the same as a loss of respect for God, who is infinitely Mysterious to man's finite mind. So it was, this rationalistic skepticism led to revolt against authority in the 16^th century and later on to atheism, which is the spirit of antichrist in the 19^th and 20^th centuries.
          The average Protestant of my time, Phillip, had inherited many errors, had never known the truths of the true Church and was fully a victim of what his ancestral heresy had produced -- the anti-Christian age. But the latter day Protestant blue bloods who were heretics in principle, not just heredity, ironically cursed the antichrist evils their spiritual forefather's errors had brought into existence. Until the bitter end, they never realized in all truth and humility that they imbibed the very spiritual seeds of that anti-Christian wave that swamped the world.

          We see the earliest seeds of the Protestant error, Phillip, sewn back in the time of St. Paul by the "Jews" he preached against. The principle false doctrine that Paul and the other Apostles condemned was salvation by faith without works! This is the devil’s essential lie: just believe you are saved and you are. You are excused, saved and even deified by your willful boldness, just as Lucifer pretended in his rebellion against God. Did Satan not say to Eve, to his pagan priests and priestesses and their followers and to every heretic that ever broke from the Church: believe what you will to believe, and you will save yourself and all your followers, for then my spirit will be with you forever
          "Forever in Hell, Father."
          Yes, but that he never tells his followers. He pretends to be their saviour, their christ. God’s Church is defined in explicit, unchanged doctrine. But the only continuity among all those who have redefined God’s Word for their own sake throughout history is this principle that self will rules all else. And that is, precisely, Satan’s creed. Therefore, it is his spirit that is behind all religions and churches but the One, Holy, Catholic, Apostolic Church of Jesus Christ, however much some of the members of those sects are in ignorance of what they are a party to.
          For fifteen hundred years Satan tried to conquer the Church by sowing various errors of doctrine. He failed. His new approach in the 16^th century was to preach the smorgasbord heresy of believing what you will among the doctrines of the Church, but do not worry about acting on these beliefs, for your works cannot save you. Even your faith is not a definite work of believing one true, divine set of doctrines. Faith is a private, subjective feeling and notion -- that is enough to save you.
          "But this is sheer pride, Father, not a work of Faith, not a Gift of Faith from one, unequivocal God speaking the same Truth to all men."
          The Calvinists loved to say only the work of Christ can save you, not your works. How clever, to sever a man’s acts from his beliefs, taking all responsibility away from man for cooperating in his salvation, except the mere assertion of belief. I agree, Phillip. This is sheer mockery of the true Faith.
          "So, you are simply saying, Father, that sincerity requires that our works match our beliefs."
          Yes, and those works of ours, by God’s Grace, are united with Christ’s works in us. He saved us through His sacrifice united with our works of Faith.
          "So, if I worship God as He directs on Sunday and I help the poor man obtain food and shelter, I have not gained merit before God towards eternal life unless those works are united to Christ’s work of the cross by my true Faith in Him and all He said, which are the doctrines of His Church."
          A very good summary, I think, Phillip. Let us study a few points of refutation for these heresies of "faith without works" and "once saved, always saved" promulgated three times by the Frauds, first in the time of St. Paul, secondly in the Albigensian revolt of the 13^th century and third, in the Protestant Revolution.
          Let us just read a passage from Scripture, Phillip.

James 2:14-26 "What shall it profit, my brethren, if a man say he hath Faith, but hath not works? Shall faith be able to save him? And if a brother or sister be naked, and want daily food: And one of you say to them: Go in peace, be ye warmed and filled; yet give them not those things that are necessary for the body, what shall it profit? So faith also, if it have not works, is dead in itself. But some man will say: Thou hast faith, and I have works: shew me the faith without works; and I will

70

shew thee, by works, my faith. Thou believest that there is one God. Thou dost well: the devils also believe and tremble. But wilt thou know O vain man, that faith without works is dead? Was not Abraham our father justified by works, offering up Isaac his son upon the altar? Seest thou, that faith did co-operate with his works; and by works faith was made perfect? And the scripture was fulfilled, saying: Abraham believed God, and it was reputed to him to justice, and he was called the friend of God. Do you see that by works a man is justified; and not by faith only? And in like manner also Rahab the harlot, was not she justified by works, receiving the messengers, and sending them out another way? For even as the body without the spirit is dead; so also faith without works is dead.

          James and Paul, the other Apostles too, probably, had to preach against this heresy from the beginning. The heart of the Protestant error is very ancient.
          Here are some other quotes I have long ago written down.

II St. Peter 1:20"Understanding this first: That no prophesy of the Scripture is made by private interpretation."
St. James 2: 10"Now whosoever shall keep the whole law, but offend in one point, is become guilty of all. "The commentary says, "That is, he becomes a transgressor of the law in such a manner that the observing of all other points will not avail him to salvation."
St. Augustine, 430 AD, Bishop and Doctor of the Church: "Heretics think false things about God, and call it their faith."
Galatians 5:6"For in Christ Jesus neither circumcision availeth any thing, nor uncircumcision, but faith, which worketh by charity."
Romans 11: 20-22"Well: because of unbelief they were broken off. But thou standest by faith: be not high-minded, but fear. For if God hath not spared the natural branches: he may not perhaps spare thee also. See, therefore, the goodness, and the severity of God: towards them, indeed, that are fallen, the severity: but towards thee, the goodness of God, if thou continue in goodness, otherwise thou also shalt be cut off."
I Corinthians 9:27"But I chastise my body, and bring it into subjection: lest, perhaps, when I have preached to others, I myself should become reprobate."
I Corinthians 10:12"Wherefore let him that thinketh himself to stand, take heed lest he fall."
Philippians 2:12"Wherefore, my dearly beloved, (as you have always obeyed, not as in my presence only, but much more now in my absence) work out your salvation with fear and trembling."
Apocalypse 3:11"Behold I come quickly: hold fast that which thou nbsp;hast, that no man take thy crown."

          There are many more passages that disprove the Protestant heresies; for the works of faith cannot be separated from the acts of belief, both of which must be persevered in until life's end. In fact, one of the works of a living faith as opposed to a dead faith is

perseverance in faith and its works until death. Another is leaving God’s Word unchanged by one's willful interpretation.
          "It is a fearful thing to alter God's Word, Father, to misrepresent God Himself."
          It is now time, Phillip, to read from Philip II, a historical work about aspects of the Protestant Revolt. It was written by the great historian, Dr. William Thomas Walsh, who documents all he says from original sources. Few could ever duplicate his learning. In this great book and others he exposes of the roots of the Protestant Revolt in fascinating details. Let’s begin with some passages about the Spanish Inquisition that reveal the heart of the problem.

          "It is difficult to understand how Prescott could have been ignorant of what the Church understood by an auto de fe. There was nothing bloody about it. It was literally an act of faith in the teachings of Christ and His Church on the part of King, Inquisitors, populace and penitents. Very often, and perhaps in the vast majority of autos in Spanish history, there was no execution afterwards; simply a reconciliation or the imposition of penances. In extreme cases the Inquisitors declared that a prisoner was an impenitent and incurable heretic. The State then declared that if such was the character of the prisoner, he was an enemy of society, and, like any traitor, must be put to death.
          … Thus Philip carried out rigorously the dying wish of his father, the very last words addressed to him by the tolerant Emperor in the codicil of his will, that he bring every heretic to justice, without exception or fear or favor. The lives of a few agitators, most of them descendants of the Jews who had summoned the Mohammedans to ravage Spain for nearly eight centuries, were to be sacrificed to keep peace and unity in Spain. Germany had had her Peasants’ War, and in the next century would know the horrors of the Thirty Years’ War, with the butchery of many thousands, the waste of farms and cities, and a people forever divided, all as a result of the tolerance of Charles.
          In Spain, as long as the Inquisition lasted, there would be no religious wars, no burning churches, no slaughtered priests. France would know these atrocities, and England, and the Netherlands. It would be centuries before the enemies of Christendom could introduce them again in Spain. If the method seems cruel to us, it is because we forget the cruel fate, the long crucifixion of a great people, to which it was the harsh reply. It at least had the merit of proceeding judicially. It could at least claim that the evil it caused was far less than the horrors it averted.
          … Among historians it is Leti, writing at a great distance and under a strong Protestant bias, who first creates the Black Demon of the South, ghoulishly rejoicing over the shrieks of the victims and over the vile smell of burning hair and flesh. To this legend historians cling even after they have set forth the facts that proved it without foundation.
          … The Protestant revolt, which in a truer sense than is generally understood was the answer to the Spanish Inquisition, made the most effective use of its horrors for propaganda purposes. To the enemies of Christendom it made no difference that the gloomy cells and black dungeons they described had never existed. They were not interested in the discovery, made when the Inquisition came to an end in 1808, that the prisoners were kept in decent houses, often homes of nobles donated to the Holy Office with pious intent; that they contained no calabozos; and that the cellars had never been occupied, except perhaps by wine and vegetables.
          … In England, where it was needful to wean from the Church a whole population still Catholic in principle but disturbed and confused by change and by the deprivation of the sacraments, the dungeons, the torture chambers, the

72

thumb-screws, the rack and the strappado were of inestimable value: even though thumb-screws were never used by the Holy Office, but were employed freely in the Tower of London.
          … The Church tolerated the Inquisition, as she still tolerates capital punishment, not as a good in itself, but as the lesser of two evils.
          The instinct of men to protect their culture and their institutions by The most effective means is illustrated by Graetz’s account of an Inquisition In Holland by Jews whose ancestors had suffered from the Holy Office. "The Amsterdam rabbis introduced the innovation of bringing religious opinions and Convictions before their judgment-seat, of constituting themselves a sort of Inquisitorial tribunal, and instituting autos-de-fe which, even if bloodless, were not less painful to the sufferers. Before we become too pharisaical about the Christian Inquisitors, who were so careful to shed no blood and to leave the onus of capital punishment to the State, let us weep for a moment with our Jewish brethren over the frailty of our common humanity.
          … Also, in literal fulfillment of the prophecies of Christ, the hatred that had mocked, slandered and baited Him, misrepresented His teachings and actions, sought repeatedly to kill Him, and finally, by trickery, induced the power to Caesar to crucify Him – this too would always remain. There would always be a Caiaphas, the spiritually blind Abet Din, misleading the synagogue, always some crafty Annas, the Nasi or political Prince directing and corrupting the Sanhedrin. To these the Judases would flee when the Church rejected them, and these the Caesars of every age would use and despise. Even as good Jews would furnish the sinews of the Church in many ages, so men remarkably like those scribes and pharisees whom Christ had called the children of the devil would perpetuate the hatred that had once crucified Incarnate Love.
          No philosophy of history that leaves out of account this gigantic aspect of reality can be considered realistic. It is for this reason that the best hints for a philosophy of history may be found in the encyclicals of various Popes.
          The intense hatred that Jesus foretold would follow all who sincerely believed in Him was manifested in the earliest days of the Church. When Saint Paul went to Rome to preach "One Lord, one faith, one baptism" he encountered such opposition from his own race that he somewhat bitterly wrote of "the Jews, who both killed the Lord Jesus, and the prophets, and have persecuted us, and please not God, and are adversaries to all men; prohibiting us to speak to the Gentiles, that they may be saved." It must be noted, however, that later on he sent a letter to the Christians at Rome sternly warning them against the wickedness of Jew-baiting. The Acts of the Apostles abundantly testify that most of the first Christian converts were Jews. Jews of good will formed the sinews of the Church. Everywhere another type of Jew, perhaps in a small minority, refused even to listen to the arguments he condemned, and prevented well-meaning Jews, as well as Gentiles, from hearing the Gospel.
          The author of the apocalypse, too, adverts more than once to the same astonishing concentration of hate that followed the children of Christ as they scattered through the Roman world: "I know thy tribulation, and thy poverty, but thou art rich: and thou art blasphemed by them that say they are Jews and are not, but are of the synagogue of Satan." And "Behold, I will bring of the synagogue of Satan, who say they are Jews and are not, but do lie. Behold, I will make them to come and adore before thy feet. And they shall know that I have loved thee." The first major persecution of Christians in the Gentile world, that of Nero, was probably set in motion at the instance of the Jews surrounding his wife Poppaea.
          There were Judases in every age to attempt to pervert the Church from within. Not a few of the later scandals of Christendom were the result of their work. Simon Magus, perhaps a precursor of Gnosticism, was only the first to attempt to purchase the gifts of the Holy Ghost. Arius, the Catholic Jew, would yet make an insidious attack on the divinity of Christ that would divide the Christian

73

world for centuries. Valentinus, called the chief of the Gnostics by Saint Irenaeus, was a Jew of Alexandria.
          As the colossal struggle continued century after century, the chief means employed by the Annas and the Caiaphas of each age to keep the mass of the Jewish people in ignorance of the true nature of Christianity, and to fan their misunderstanding of it to hatred, was the Talmud. This melange of wisdom, tradition and superstition contained the most scurrilous and vindictive blasphemies against Christ. Wherever its true character became known, it was condemned by Christian authorities; as in France under Saint Louis, and in Rome under Pope Paul IV, who had thousands of copies burned. Yet it survived, to carry into the modern world the spirit of the Pharisees who rejected Christ, with those rabbinical interpretations which made it, as Lazare noted, "the creator The most vituperative parts were omitted in translation. In dangerous times they were handed down orally by the rabbis.
          The historical importance of this book may be judged from the opinion of the Jewish historian Graetz, whose inaccuracies, omissions and wrong judgments have poisoned the whole Jewish world, but whose interpretations of that world cannot be ignored. He goes so far as to say, "We can boldly assert that the war for and against the Talmud aroused German consciousness and created a public opinion without which the Reformation, like many other efforts, would have died in the hour of birth, or perhaps would never have been born at all.
          In the Middle Ages it was customary for Jews to deny that the Talmud contained anti-Christian libels. Pretense in the modern world is no longer necessary. The Talmud is recognized as a sort of link between the early Gnostic onslaught on the Catholic Church, and the even more serious modern assault behind the mask of Freemasonry.
          …Another Jewish book that had a powerful effect not only on Jews but on the history of the world was the Kabbala. Originally that part of the Mosaic Law which was handed down by tradition, it had become, by the thirteenth century, a collection of occult and esoteric doctrines borrowed from Buddhism, Gnosticism, the neo-Platonists and all manner of eastern pseudo-mystics. Out of the dark labyrinths of its imagery came many heresies and revolutions: rosicrucianism, theosophy, and all modern freemasonry. As Rabbi Benamozegh wrote, "It is quite certain that Masonic theology is at root nothing else than Theosophy, and that it corresponds to the theology of the Kabbala."
          For a thousand years after she had emerged from the Catacombs – say roughly from the time of Constantine in the fourth century to the middle of the fourteenth – the Catholic Church successfully defended herself from such attacks both within and without. At times the very existence of the State and of society was threatened. In such crises, the Church not only permitted the use of force to avert worse evils, but even cooperated with it.
          The Crusades were the defense of Christian homes, Christian women and children, Christian civilization, against an Islam deliberately bent upon exterminating them. A crusade ended the anti-social insanity of the Cathari who opposed marriage but taught suicide in that part of southern France known as Judea Secunda. The Inquisition followed them to Spain, and later saved the Christian Spanish State from the secret treachery of the pretended Catholics who were in league with the Moors in the war of liberation. As the ancient Jews had fought and slain idolaters, and had stoned spiritualistsand similar dark heretics to death, so the Catholic Church, heir of the Jewish revelation, protected her children from destruction of body and soul while they were building the happiest and most balanced culture and civilization that have ever existed in this world.
          The turning point in this vast drama (so far as our vantage point in time

74

allows us to see) was the Black Death in 1346. It seemed to men as if Satan himself had burst the chains that had bound him for a thousand years. More than half the priests in the world died. Christendom was still staggering under this blow when other blows fell, one after another: the papal exile at Avignon, the Great Western Schism, the return of paganism under the guise of the Renaissance – all these onslaughts in the City of God itself, while the Turks struck from without, gaining and laying waste one Christian country after another. Corruption and disorder were inevitable under these circumstances. Confusion became so widespread that only a divine institution could have survived it.
          … In the Protestant Revolt there was something more than the mere breaking away of the northern communities from the jurisdiction of Rome; much more than the nationalism to which Professor Carlton Hayes ascribes perhaps too much importance. There was a spirit in Protestantism in its first phase that sought something more than freedom; it sought nothing less (and this was more evident in Calvinism than in Lutheranism) than the utter destruction of the Catholic Church. Here was a hatred that began manifesting itself by the burning of churches and convents, the violation of nuns, the torture and execution of priests, the defiling of the Cross and the unspeakable desecration of the Blessed Sacrament.
          It was an old and international hatred. It was the hatred of the church-burning Donatists, the hatred of Islam, the hatred that had opposed Saint Paul in Rome and Saint James in Jerusalem, the hatred of Annas and the Scribes and pharisees crying, "Come down from the Cross, and we will believe!" There was nothing new about it except the form it took; but the preparation and organization were better, and the time was ripe.
          Nor was this Protestant phase of the revolt a peculiarly northern or German product, though it has been convenient to make it appear so. It might have happened in southern Europe. In fact, it almost did happen in France, especially in southern France, before it happened in Germany. Lefevre, under the patronage of Marguerite of Angouleme and others of the anti-Catholic House of Navarre, taught justification by grace before Luther did, And profoundly influenced Beza, Farel, Rousel and other leaders who passed Quickly through a Lutheran phase to the more radical organization of Calvinism. The roots of the revolution went deeper than the German affair. It was not local, but international.
          If we may believe Graetz and other Jewish historians, the Jews played a much more important part in all this than Christians, for some mysterious reason, have generally admitted. Incalculable was the number of this virile and gifted race who had settled in all countries of Europe during the so-called Dark Ages and the Middle Ages; incalculable the number who were assimilated as sincere Catholics, or who, as pretended Catholics, formed the nucleus for any international revolt. They were everywhere, in communication with one another and with the Jews of the Synagogue. There were so many of the latter in England and France that one Jewish writer of the sixteenth century, often cited by modern Jews, attributed to this fact "the inclination of the English and the French" to Protestantism. Dispersion, secrecy and organization gave them a Power out of all proportion to their numbers, a power so remarkable that Napoleon Bonaparte suspected that the political structure of the Jewish State had survived under cover for eighteen centuries. Was there any historical foundation for such a theory?
          There may or may not be significance in the fact that the title of Nasi (Prince or King of the Jews) which belonged at the time of the Crucifixion to Annas, father-in-law of the High Priest, or Ab et Din, Caiphas, was assumed by one of the bitterest, most intelligent and more persistent enemies of King Philip II – Joseph Miques or Mendes, the Jewish international banker of the

75

Spice Trust of Portugal and Antwerp, who had in his debt William of Orange and many other noblemen of the Low Countries. About the time when Philip was returning to Spain, this millionaire was establishing himself in Turkey, throwing off the last pretense of Christianity and assuming the antique and princely title of Nasi.
          …There was, for instance, a Nasi Levi who presided over a meeting of delegates from all the Jewish communities in southern France in 1215, as Annas had presided over the Sanhedrin in Jerusalem.
          Even then, among the Jewish communities of southern France, the anti-Christian Revolution was being silently prepared. Prosperity and wealth had rewarded the industry and intelligence of the exiles in Montpelier, Nimes, Tarbes, Carcassonne – a score of places in that part of France where later the Huguenots would flourish – until they almost rivaled the medieval empire of their brethren in Spain. Slave-traders, purveyors of silks and other luxuriers, usurers – they excelled generally in the commerce of intangibles, in the handling of money per se. Culture and power followed upon wealth. It was their great tragedy that, having failed to understand Who Christ was, they could not get rid of the messianic consciousness for which they had been chosen and consecrated. Finding closed to them the only spiritual door to salvation, they were constantly driven to seek redemption in the here and now, in the resources of nature, in gold and power, in anything, anywhere but Christ. When all their kingdom had turned to dust in their patient hands, and the inevitable scourge of persecution came to scatter them again and again, they still followed leaders who kept them blind, and remained missionaries of what Saint John called "the spirit that dissolves Christ."
          In the thirteenth century, when the Catholic Church rejoiced in the full burgeoning of that rich and generous civilization she had reanimated and purified, the Jews were creating at Troyes a remarkable school of exegensis in which were being forged most of the arguments to be used by Protestant preachers against the Church and to be turned by the "higher critics" of later times against the heart of Christ Himself. The center and master of the group was a very rich Jew named Isaac Chatelaine, better known now as Isaac of Troyes; a man learned in the Talmud …
          … Rabbi Salamon, the son of this hapless Isaac, became famous under the name of Raschi as founder of the Talmudic school of Champagne and the chief rival of Maimonides. Through Raschi the ideas of Isaac were transmitted to Protestantism. They were adopted early in the fourteenth century by a Franciscan monk of Jewish descent, Nicholas of Lyra. The arguments of this Nicholas of Lyra powerfully influenced Luther, Calvin and Zwingli. "Raschi And the Toraphists made Nicholas of Lyra," wrote the nineteenth-century Christian apostate Renan, whose writings were financed and published by Jews, and who borrowed many of his brilliant sophistries from the arsenal of Narbonne, "and Nicholas of Lyra made Luther."
          … Another Jew who did valiant spade work for Luther’s sowing was Elias Levita, founder of the modern Hebrew grammar and teacher of many Christians. "He, with Jacob Loans and Obadiah Sforno," observes a Jewish historian, "must be allowed a large share in producing the Protestant Reformation." Sforno was the teacher of Reuchlin and many others. The so-called Reformation, adds Abrahams, "drew its life blood from a rational Hebraism." Luther naturally employed Jews in preparing his German Bible. Jews were The most successful agents in the printing and distribution of Protestant Bibles and tracts in all parts of Europe.
          Not only the ideas of Luther, but the very occasion for their dissemination, Was furnished by the fertile activity of Jewish minds. The Battle of the Books, preliminary skirmish in the war of ideas about to commence at Wittenberg, could never have occurred if the Talmud and the Kabbala had not first done their deadly work.

76

          … In the most critical and decisive age of the Church, this descendant of Florentine usurers, this son of Lorenzo de’Medici, kind and generous intellectual, Cardinal at thirteen, Pope at thirty-seven, was too busy with his pictures, his hunting and his plays to give sufficient attention to the ruin of the world. The Jews have always been well pleased with him. Like all the Medici, he surrounded himself with them and showered them with favor and protection, even to the extent of allowing the printing and dissemination of the Talmud, of whose true nature he was perhaps in ignorance. This genial collector, to whom Luther was only a joke, went to his death (too suddenly for the last sacraments) with little more than a suspicion of his own share in the business, not only by the abuses permitted in connection with indulgences, but by his long negligence and vacillation in the matter of the Jewish books.
          Johann Reuchlin, a friend of Erasmus, started the famous Battle. Saturated, like young Pico della Mirandola, with the imagery and fanatical theosophy of the Kabbala, which he imagined he understood, he urged all Christians to study this and other Jewish books, for a better understanding of their own religion. A Dominican of Cologne, Jakob Hochstraten, replied to him publicly in 1519, protesting against the notion that the pseudo-Judaism of the Jewish mind in revolt against its own messias could possibly cast anything but a baleful light on Christianity. As the controversy continued, there entered into the lists against Reuchlin another Dominican monk, Johan Pfefferkorn. This man was a Jewish convert to the Faith. Graetz calls him, with more vigor than truth, "an ignorant, thoroughly vile creature, the scum of the Jewish people." Reuchlin, who defended the Jewish books, was of course, "a pure, upright character," with "admirable love of truth and a soft heart." The fact was that Pfefferkorn was a good sincere man, a none too brilliant student, who carried the zeal of the convert to the verge of fanaticism; his vileness apparently consisting of his being a true Jew in the sense in which the Apostles understood the term. He recognized the divinity of Christ and the untruthful obscenity of the Talmud. Urging the people of his race to turn from the man-made books of the rabbis to the living Christ in the Catholic Church, he defended the Jews against the worst charges made against them, including the ritual murder accusation. This did not save him from the lasting enmity of the Annases of his day. As for Reuchlin, Graetz might have added that he had not only a soft heart but a rather soft head.
          Pfefferkorn accused him, in a pamphlet called Handspiegel, of having been paid by the Jews to disseminate their propaganda. Reuchlin replied with a violent denial in his Augenspiegel, and after further vituperation, pro and con, appealed to the Pope. By means of a flattering letter, he gained the favor of the influential Jew, Bonet de Lattes, physician to Pope Leo X. The physician naturally had no objection to interceding with the Holy Father in such a cause. The upshot was that the pleasure-loving Pope handed over this mere squabble of monks, as he considered it, to the Bishop of Spires, a youth of twenty-seven, who in turn passed it on to Canon Truchsess, a disciple of Euchlin; who gave the decision to his friend, completely exonerating the Augenspiegel.
          The more discerning friends of the Catholic Church were highly alarmed. The Inquisition, better aware from long experience of what was going on among the Jews, appealed from the verdict to the Pope. Leo summoned both disputants to Rome in 1514. Delay followed delay, until Reuchlin, by a false statement, got the case transferred to another judge at Spires, who again exonerated him. Another appeal was filed. The Pope continued to delay, however, as various rich patrons of Reuchlin, and such liberal but not very profound Catholics as Erasmus, brought pressure to bear upon him; as did also

77

the Emperor Maximilian I. It was not until the Lutheran bombshell exploded in 1517, on the hard-fought field of the Battle of the Books, that the real significance of Reuchlin’s proposals became generally evident. Even then the easy-going Pope made no decision.
          At last, in 1520, the findings at Spires were reversed. The Pope forbade the Augenspiegel as a scandalous and offensive book, unlawfully favorable to the Jews, and condemned Reuchlin to pay the costs of the litigation.
          … What is equally certain, but strangely kept well in the background of most historical research, is that the Protestant Revolt, far from being an "advance" or a "progressive step," was a long retrogression toward the moribund Judaism of the Pharisees of the time of Christ. Its multitudinous offspring of more than 200 sects would lead in the course of time to a return of the dismal skepticism of the Sadducees. Caiphas was a Pharisee, Annas a Sadducee. It was old Annas, the Nasi, who would have the last word.
          If there is exaggeration in that astonishing but almost unnoticed statement of Cabrera, himself of a Spanish Marrao family, that "most of the heresiarchs and heretics of this present century have been of those people," it is beyond question, as a Jewish historian says, that the first leaders of the Protestant sects were called semi-Judaei, or half-Jews, in all parts of Europe, and that men of Jewish descent were as conspicuous among them as they had been among the Gnostics and would later be among the Communists.
          The origin of Calvin (whose real name was Chauvin) is obscure, as is that of his chief aide and successor, Theodore Beza. But Farel, Rousel and others of the stormiest preachers who carried their propaganda through Europe were of Jewish descent. Michael Servetus may have been, and was certainly influenced by Jews. At Antwerp in 1566 the chief minister of the Calvinist synod, which was the center of the most telling Protestant intrigue and propaganda in the Netherlands, was a Spanish Jew."
          Modern research by Jewish historians has made it clear that in the sixteenth century large numbers of the English Protestants (and doubtless the most active in propaganda and organization) were Jews who had put on the convenient mask of Calvinism at Antwerp. For example, "from an early period," says Dr. Lucien Wolf, ‘the Marranos in Antwerp had taken an active part in the Reformation movement, and had given up their mask of Catholicism for a not less hollow pretense of Calvinism. The change will be readily understood. The simulation of Calvinism brought them new friends, who, like them, were enemies of Rome, Spain and the Inquisition. It helped them in their fight against the Holy Office, and for that reason was very welcome to them. Moreover, it was a form of Christianity which came nearer to their own simple Judaism. The result was that they became zealous and valuable allies of the Calvinists."
          There was something more in most Calvinist teaching than the desire for religious freedom and the reform of abuses. It was more like the ancient hatred which had followed the Catholic Church from her cradle, seeking not her reform but her utter destruction. Calvin himself was as ruthless in this regard as Mohammed. One of his letters to English Protestants declares that those who refuse to give up the Roman Catholic faith must be put to the sword. Calvinism quickly became an international movement, with a world capital at Geneva and with Calvin as a Pope ruling over a city with a regimentation uncomfortably suggestive of some totalitarian state of the future.
          The most active intelligencers, liaison officers and propagandists of this international army were Jews. Only four years after Luther’s first outburst, Cardinal Aleander, papal nuncio, reported that Jews were printing and circulating the German monk’s books in Flanders. From the Netherlands they send Bibles even to Spain, concealed in double-bottomed wine-casks.

78

In Ferrara, a great Jewish financial center, they printed heretical bibles for distribution in Italy and elsewhere. No less a person than Carranza, now languishing in the prisons of the Inquisition in Spain, said that this was the reason why the Church had to discourage the reading of the Bible in the vernaculars, save in approved versions.
          … That was the thing, the old and evil thing, the insidious and destructive thing, that Philip was resolved to destroy, if possible, before it ruined the world. It would be far-fetched to say that he saw all its potentialities in 1559. He could hardly have seen what Pope Pius IX saw in 1849, when he declared that all the evils of the modern world (including Communism and its attendant miseries) had their origin in the tragic sixteenth-century assault on the Catholic Faith in the name of Protestantism.
          Did Philip imagine, then, that the Jews were to blame for all the ills of humanity? Not even his bitterest enemies could fairly accuse him of that. A Jew-baiter in the vulgar sense he certainly was not. When at attempt was made to introduce into Spain an organization known as the Order of the White Sword aimed against Jews as Jews, he put his foot down against it. He knew and employed too many excellent men of Jewish ancestry to be taken in by any stupid and vicious theory of "Nordic" or "Aryan" superiority. It must have been apparent to a man of his shrewd common sense (in most matters) that even those Jews who persisted in the iniquity of attempting to destroy the Church could have accomplished very little without collaboration from within, from unworthy Christians. It always takes a Judas to complete the work of Annas and Caiaphas.
          … One of the largest factors in causing all this corruption was the interference of the State, newly conscious of its unity and power, in the affairs of the Church. Priests were badly disciplined because there were too many political bishops. There were political bishops because kings, even in Spain, had seldom missed an opportunity to wring privileges from unwilling Popes when they had them in their power. Often the Pope had to allow the King to name the bishops, as the price of having Christianity preached at all, and he chose the lesser of the two evils. In view of all this, it is strange than men go on repeating cant phrases about the interference of the Church in the State in the Middle Ages. Sometimes, yes; but more often the other way around. Philip took it as a matter of course that he was to be consulted before the Pope nominated a bishop in any of his dominions. If any Pope had dared to dictate Philip’s appointments --!
          …Documents of the Alta Vendita, made public by the papal government in 1846, disclosed a systematic and deliberate campaign of slander. One letter said:
          "Our ultimate end is that of Voltaire and of the French Revolution – the final destruction of Catholicism, and even of the Christian idea. The work which we have undertaken is not the work of a day, nor of a month, nor of a year. It may last many years, a century perhaps … Crush the enemy whoever he may be; crush the powerful by means of lies and calumny. … If a prelate comes to Rome from the provinces to exercise some public function, learn immediately his character, his antecedents, above all, his defects. If he is already a declared enemy, an Albania, a Pallotta, … envelop him in all the snares you can lay under his feet; create for him one of those reputations which will frighten little children and old women … paint him cruel and sanguinary: recount regarding him some trait of cruelty which can easily be engraved in the minds of the people."
          If this was never formulated so concretely until the nineteenth century, it describes, with startling accuracy, what the enemies of the Church had been doing for centuries. It describes what they did to the reputation of Philip II.
          … In England it was the reformed Observantine Franciscans who

79

withstood Henry VIII even to death, while the relaxed Conventuals and other badly disciplined monks and priests formed the nucleus of the Church of England. The first Protestants, as a rule, were bad Catholics.
          For a whole century or more before Philip II, most of the Popes and large numbers of prelates had been striving to reform the Church. A great deal had been accomplished. A great deal more remained to be done. Some Popes of the highest intentions were compelled to devote most of their energies to the defense of Christendom against the conquering Turks. Others were foiled by the selfishness and criminal quarrelsomeness of European rulers. When Protestantism appeared, its leaders called loudly for reform. Most of them, however, could be depended upon to reject, resist and misrepresent any attempt to hold a General Council of all Christendom, without which no thorough reform would be possible."