I have heard that more people DIED as a result of the Inquisition, which I would never call Holy, than died in the Holocaust. And that most of these people were women, midwives, women who had knowledge of and skill with healing herbs. They were accused of being witches, enemies of the Catholic Church. What they really were was a threat to the absolute authority of the Church and the rigidly hierarchical and oppressive structure of society.
I acknowledge that you probably know more about it than I do. And that an atmosphere of terror was undoubtedly created by both the public and private activities of the Inquisition. However, regardless of the level of one's formal knowledge of the Inquisition, MOST people associate it with PHYSICAL torture and horrible PHYSICAL deaths. This is why I called you on making the comparison that you did and offered a compassionate reason as to why you made it. ________________________________ From: turquoiseb <no_re...@yahoogroups.com> To: FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com Sent: Monday, October 29, 2012 7:01 AM Subject: [FairfieldLife] Re: Fw: The Science of Compassion, for Wednesday --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, Share Long <sharelong60@...> wrote: > > Your comparing mindset of TMO to the Inquisition which > included physical torture and killing says more about > the truth of your extreme and unresolved feelings about > the TMO than it does about the truth of the TMO. No, in actuality your comment says a lot about your ignorance of the Inquisition and how it worked. I'm somewhat of a scholar on this subject, having studied it for many years. Very *few* of the activities of the Holy Inquisition involved physical torture or murder. What they specialized in was *mental torture* and the use of psychology to create an atmosphere of fear in the people. The purpose of the torture, when it occurred, was NOT to get people to "confess." They were already guilty the moment they were called before the Inquisition. The purpose of torturing them or getting them to "confess their sins" was to create an effect *in the people watching from the sidelines*. This is written about in some depth by the Inquisitors in the manuals they wrote for training purposes. In other words, they wanted the people they brought to trial to rat on other people, to create an atmosphere of fear in those other people, and proactively keep them in line. They also wanted the ones they tried to serve as examples of "what's going to happen to you" if you don't toe the line. I would submit that the TMO's policies are *very much* designed to do exactly the same things.
