Love Under Fire

The Thunder of Condemnation

The pope's condemnations thundered against Geneva. How could this little city resist the powerful hierarchy that had forced kings and emperors to submit? LF 98.4

With the first triumphs of the Reformation past, Rome called up new forces to destroy it. She created the order of the Jesuits, the most cruel, unscrupulous, and powerful of all the champions of the papal system. Dead to the claims of natural affection, and with consciences completely silenced, its members acknowledged no rule, no tie, except that of their order. (See Appendix.) LF 98.5

The gospel of Christ had enabled its followers to endure suffering, cold, hunger, toil, and poverty, to uphold truth in face of torture, the dungeon, and the stake. Jesuitism inspired its followers with a fanaticism that enabled them to endure similar dangers and to bring all the weapons of deception against the power of truth. There was no crime too great to commit, no deception too evil to practice, no disguise too difficult for them to assume. It was their calculated aim to overthrow Protestantism and reestablish the pope's supremacy. LF 98.6

They wore an appearance of holiness, visiting prisons and hospitals, ministering to the sick and the poor, and bearing the sacred name of Jesus, who went about doing good. But under this blameless exterior, they often concealed criminal and deadly intentions. LF 98.7

A fundamental principle of the order was that the end justifies the means. Lying, theft, perjury, and assassination were commendable when they helped the aims of the church. Under disguise the Jesuits worked their way into offices of state, climbing up to be the counselors of kings and shaping the policy of nations. They became servants in order to act as spies against their masters. They established colleges for princes and nobles, and schools for the common people. They drew the children of Protestant parents into observing Catholic rites. In this way the liberty for which the fathers had worked and bled was betrayed by the sons. Wherever the Jesuits went, a revival of Catholicism followed. LF 98.8

To give them greater power, the pope issued a decree reestablishing the Inquisition. Church rulers again set up this terrible tribunal, and atrocities too horrifying to bear the light of day were repeated in its secret dungeons. In many countries thousands upon thousands of the nation's best, the most intellectual and highly educated, were killed or forced to escape to other lands. (See Appendix.) LF 99.1