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Isn't It Amazing The Similarities Between Calvinists and the RCC

Discussion in 'Baptist Theology & Bible Study' started by The American Dream, Feb 9, 2013.

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  1. The American Dream

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    Is it not amazing the similarities between the RCC and Calvinists and/or Calvin?

    Both promote infant baptism.

    Both persecuted those who did not agree with their stated doctrine, and ran those under them as thugs and tyrannts, guilty of first degree murder, suppression of human rights dignity, liberty and freedom.

    Most denominations who follow Calvin’s doctrines do not know of the following accounts and historical facts. The following events were conducted under the direct supervision of John Calvin him self.

    February 1545 - Freckles Dunant dies under torture without admitting to the crime of spreading the plague. His body was then dragged to the middle of town and burned.

    1545 - Following the incident with Dunant, several more men and women were apprehended including a barber and a hospital supervisor who had "made a pact with the devil."

    March 7, 1545 - Two women executed by burning at the stake (presumably for the crime of sorcery, i.e. spreading the plague). CALVIN INTERCEDED apparently to have them executed sooner rather than later after additional time in prison. The Council followed his directive happily and urged the executioner to "be more diligent in cutting off the hands of malefactors."

    1545 - more executions, tortures carefully watched to prevent death. Most of the tortured refused to confess. Means of death varied a little to include decapitation. All under the crime of spreading the plague. Some committed suicide in their cells to avoid torture, afterward the rest were handcuffed. One woman then threw herself through a window.

    1545 - CALVIN HAD the magistrates seize Belot, an Anabaptist (against infant baptism) for stating that the Old Testament was abolished by the New. Belot was chained and tortured.

    May 16, 1545 - The last execution concerning the plague outbreak, bringing the total dead to 7 men and 24 women. A letter from CALVIN attests to 15 of these women being burned at the stake. CALVIN'S only concern was that the plague had not come to his house.

    April 1546 - Ami Perrin put on trial for refusing to testify against several friends who were guilty of having danced. She was incarcerated for refusal to testify.

    July 1546 - Jacques Gruet was accused of writing a poster against Calvin. He was arrested and tortured until he admitted to the crime. He was then executed."

    http://www.amazon.com/dp/0802842895/?tag=baptis04-20

    Interesting to note:

    John Calvin went to his grave unrepentant, as the letters he wrote later in his short life were often filled with excuses and reasons for the many people he had tortured and killed.

    Discipline and opposition (1546–1553)
    Calvin forced the citizens of Geneva to attend church services under a heavy threat of punishment. Since Calvinism falsely teaches that God forces the elect to believe, it is no wonder that Calvin thought he could also force the citizens of Geneva to all become the elect. Not becoming one of the elect was punishable by death or expulsion from Geneva. Calvin exercised forced regeneration on the citizens of Geneva, because that is what his theology teaches.

    Michael Servetus, a Spaniard, physician, scientist and Bible scholar, was born in Villanova in 1511. He was credited with the discovery of the pulmonary circulation of the blood from the right chamber of the heart through the lungs and back to the left chamber of the heart. He was Calvin's longtime friend in their earlier resistance against the Roman Catholic Church. Servetus, while living in Vienne (historic city in southeastern France), angered Calvin by returning a copy of Calvin's writings, Institutes, with critical comments in the margins. Servetus was arrested by the Roman Catholic Authorities on April 4 but escaped on April 7, 1553. He traveled to Geneva where he attended Calvin's Sunday preaching service on August 13. Calvin promptly had Servetus arrested and charged with heresy for his disagreement with Calvin's theology. The thirty-eight official charges included rejection of the Trinity and infant baptism. Servetus was correct in challenging Calvin's false teaching about infant baptism for salvation, but he was heretical in his rejection of the doctrine of the Trinity. Servetus pleaded to be beheaded instead of the more brutal method of burning at the stake, but Calvin and the city council refused the quicker death method. Other Protestant churches throughout Switzerland advised Calvin that Servetus be condemned but not executed. Calvin ignored their pleas and Servetus was burned at the stake on October 27, 1553. John Calvin insisted that his men use green wood for the fire because it burned slower. Servetus was screaming as he was literally baked alive from the feet upward and suffered the heat of the flames for 30 minutes before finally succumbing to one of the most painful and brutal death methods possible. Servetus had written a theology book, a copy of which Calvin had strapped to the chest of Servetus. The flames from the burning book rose against Servetus' face as he screamed in agony.

    John Calvin celebrated and bragged of his killing of Servetus. Many theological and state leaders criticized Calvin for the unwarranted killing of Servetus, but it fell on deaf ears as Calvin advised others to do the same. Calvin wrote much in following years in a continual attempt to justify his burning of Servetus. Some people claim Calvin favored beheading, but this does not fit charges of heresy for which the punishment, as written by Calvin earlier, was to be burning at the stake. Calvin had made a vow years earlier that Servetus would never leave Geneva alive if he were ever captured, and Calvin held true to his pledge. Truly John Calvin is burning in Hell for his heresy, blasphemy of God and murder of many.

    Another victim of Calvin's fiery zeal was Gentile of an Italian sect in Geneva, which also numbered among its adherents Alciati and Gribaldo. More or less Unitarian in their views, they were required to sign a confession drawn up by Calvin in 1558. Gentile signed it reluctantly, but in the upshot he was condemned and imprisoned as a perjurer. He escaped only to be incarcerated twice at Berne where, in 1566, he was beheaded. Calvin also had thirty-four (34) women burned at the stake after accusing them of being witches who caused a plague that had swept through Geneva in 1545. The number of people murdered by John Calvin has been a dispute -- not the fact that he murdered them. Calvinists reject the references describing John Calvin's reign of terror because they worship him. John Calvin's actions were very paganistic like his mentor, Saint Augustine. Jesus and all of the Apostles would have abhorred and condemned these blatant mass murders.
    Witches were never (well, hardly ever) accused of spreading the plague. Those who were accused of spreading the plague were "greasers" (engrasseurs), who were employed to remove bodies, fumigate and clean houses after death by disease. This job became quite a money-maker during the plague. Some greasers, during slow times, were suspected of mixing plague germs with grease and smearing it on doorknobs, so as to increase their income.[1] Burns claims that Geneva (1541-1564) had the lowest rate of execution of arrested witches (20%) in Europe, the majority of witches being banned from the city as their punishment.Markewilliams (talk) 18:30, 8 January 2013 (UTC)
    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:John_Calvin

    Then again, maybe he should have been a member of the Church of Christ.

    "To sing the praises of God upon the harp and psaltery," says Calvin, "unquestionably formed a part of the training of the law and of the service of God under that dispensation of shadows and figures, but they are not now to be used in public thanksgiving."1 He says again: "With respect to the tabret, harp, and psaltery, we have formerly observed, and will find it necessary afterwards to repeat the same remark, that the Levites, under the law, were justified in making use of instrumental music in the worship of God; it having been his will to train his people, while they were yet tender and like children, by such rudiments until the coming of Christ. But now, when the clear light of the gospel has dissipated the shadows of the law and taught us that God is to be served in a simpler form, it would be to act a foolish and mistaken part to imitate that which the prophet enjoined only upon those of his own time."2 He further observes: "We are to remember that the worship of God was never understood to consist in such outward services, which were only necessary to help forward a people as yet weak and rude in knowledge in the spiritual worship of God. A difference is to be observed in this respect between his people under the Old and under the New Testament; for now that Christ has appeared, and the church has reached full age, it were only to bury the light of the gospel should we introduce the shadows of a departed dispensation. From this it appears that the Papists, as I shall have occasion to show elsewhere, in employing instrumental music cannot be said so much to imitate the practice of God's ancient people as to ape it in a senseless and absurd manner, exhibiting a silly delight in that worship of the Old Testament which was figurative and terminated with the gospel."3

    ENDNOTES:
    1. On Ps. lxxi. 22.
    2. On Ps. lxxxi. 3.
    3. On Ps. xcii. 1.

    Calvinists obviously think the Institutes are more inspired than Scripture. Some Calvinists pick and choose their own parts of the Institutes to meet their warped doctrine. No doubt some worship Calvin in the privacy of their homes like Catholics do their saints.

    For Calvinists reading this, here is an image as you contemplate how wonderful he was.

    [​IMG]
     
  2. Tom Bryant

    Tom Bryant Well-Known Member

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    I'm not a Calvinist, but maybe you could spend much more productive time in attacking other things besides Bible believers. Calvin wasn't perfect. He was wrong in these issues. But the Calvinism of then and the Calvinism of now are as different as east and west.
     
  3. quantumfaith

    quantumfaith Active Member

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    I am (as many here will tell you) fervently not a calvinist. And to the ilk of some, I happily wear the label of "non-cal". However I see in your recent posts no other motivation except to attack one strand of christian theology as if you were given a quest to do so. To be certain, there should be no problem with you taking a different christian theological track, but you and everyone else would have much more to learn when engaged in discussion and even spirited debate. My suggestion would be that you try to be engaging rather simply being a theological provocateur.
     
  4. Winman

    Winman Active Member

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    Calvin was a devotee of Augustine and generally rejected earlier church fathers.

     
    #4 Winman, Feb 9, 2013
    Last edited by a moderator: Feb 9, 2013
  5. preachinjesus

    preachinjesus Well-Known Member
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    Wow, it isn't everyday that I can honestly say that though I am not Reformed (or a Calvinist) that this OP is both historically misinformed and utterly disingenuous.

    Whether you're drawing all of this from one book or a website, it is bad history and a terrible analogy. I'd encourage you to consider a broader read of history and a more generous approach to other believers.

    Calvinists and Reformed Christians are not the enemy...the enemy is Satan and sin.

    I count many Calvinists and Reformed Christians as good friends and well educated colleagues. Though we disagree over some issues we are still friends because Jesus is bigger than our naive thoughts.
     
  6. The Archangel

    The Archangel Well-Known Member

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    Seriously?! The moderators and administrators MUST do something about this person and his posts.

    These posts, including the now-closed thread equating Calvinism with mental illness, MUST NOT and CANNOT be tolerated if this board is to retain any idea of true debate and discussion.

    If this poster were a Calvinist writing these things about Arminians and, say, John Wesley (who was indeed a great man of God) there'd be an outcry of biblical proportions and this person's membership revoked. But of course, since he's bashing Calvinism, he's given a warm welcome and a free pass.

    Most of the so-called moderators and their so-called moderation are proving to be nothing more than a joke--if this type of thing is allowed to continue. But, this is indeed what happens when the foxes guard the hen house.

    The Archangel
     
  7. preachinjesus

    preachinjesus Well-Known Member
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    I don't know the poster has been given a free pass since the posts have, as I have seen, only been today and yesterday. Generally, it isn't a good practice to ban someone on their first offense. Of course now we see the pattern and would encourage the moderators to take appropriate actions.

    This kind of tone, of the poster, is just a hyper-troll who is both obnoxious and disrespectful. Give the moderators time and I'm sure they'll take appropriate action. :)
     
  8. Dr. Bob

    Dr. Bob Administrator
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    Warning - the poster starting these trolling hate-threads will stop or be on the outside of the BB looking in.

    Shameful.
     
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