Monks, Popes, and their Political IntriguesAlberger, John
History
Monks, Popes, and their Political Intrigues
Alberger, John
Catholic Church; Catholic Church -- United States; Church and state
We have now enumerated some of the sources of the pope's revenue; but
we have mentioned but a few of them. In fact the rites of the Catholic
church partake so plainly of a financial character, that they seem to
have been instituted for purposes of ecclesiastical revenue. With a
fiscal system principally based on them, extending over Christendom,
rigorous in its exactions on all classes, the church unites a rapacity
so unprincipled, measures so oppressive and unjustifiable, deeds so
horrible and arrogations so presumptuous, that were it not for her
religious aspect she might be mistaken for the demon of avarice. While
rolling in opulence and luxury, she stoops to the basest trickery to
filch from laborers and servant girls their wages; to disinherit lawful
heirs; taking advantage of ignorance and superstition, and pretending to
regulate the condition of the soul in the eternal world. The immense sum
of gold which she has, by means of her fiscal system, been piling up
in her coffers for ages, has had no visible outlet except what has been
expended in the support of her officials, and on bribery, corruption,
and political intrigue. The policy that dictates the accumulation
and reservation of this vast amount of treasure, must contemplate
the undertaking of some gigantic enterprise; and the world may yet be
startled from its slumber by the martial assertion of the church to her
pretensions of supreme dominion over the world; and by the fact that she
is better organized for war, and better furnished with its sinews than
any other power.
As an independent sovereign the pope has oaths of allegiance which he
prescribes to such of his subjects as he judges proper. According to
the authority of William Hogan, the consecration oath of the Jesuistical
bishops is as follows:
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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