Catholic Law: Anti-Semetic Sermons and Published Propaganda and Blood Libels

Timeline of Anti-Semitic Publishings, Sermons, Speeches and Blood Libels.

379 A.D. Vicious writing by St. John Chrysostom and St. Ambrose in Milan who said: “The Jews are the most worthless of all men. They are lecherous, greedy, rapacious. They are perfidious murderers of Christ. They worship the Devil. Their religion is a sickness. The Jews are the odious assassins of Christ and for killing God there is no expiation possible, no indulgence or pardon. Christians may never cease vengeance, and the Jew must live in servitude forever. God always hated the Jews. It is essential that all Christians hate them.” He was called the Bishop with the Golden Tongue. St. Ambrose, Bishop of the Church offered to burn the synagogue himself.

395 A.D. St. Gregory of Nyssa in sermons and writings characterized Jews as assassins of the Prophets, companions of the Devil, a race of vipers, a Sanhedrin of Demons, enemies of all that is beautiful, hogs and goats in their lewd grossness.

415 A.D. Bishop Severus BURNED THE SYNAGOGUE IN THE VILLAGE OF MAGONA. BISHOP OF ALEXANDRIA, ST. CYRIL EXPELLED JEWS FROM ALEXANDRIA AND GAVE THE MOB JEWISH PROPERTY. ACCUSATION of Ritual murder by the Jews during Purim. Christians confiscated synagogues in ANTIOCH. These were not hooligans but Church Fathers! AUGUSTINE, JEROME, AMBROSE AND LESSER SAINTS AS ST. CHRYSOSTROM AND CYRIL, added to untruths the new ones that Jews were dishonest and prone to sexual perversions.

1144 A.D. First recorded blood libel. In Norwich it was alleged that the Jews had “bought a Christian child before Easter, tortured him with all the tortures wherewith our Lord was tortured and on Friday hanged him on a rood in hatred of our Lord.” (England) This notorious allegation that Jews murder non-Jews, especially Christians, in order to obtain blood for the Passover or other rituals is a complex of deliberate lies, trumped up accusations, and popular beliefs about the murder-lust of the Jews and their blood-thirstiness, based on the conception that Jews hate Christianity and mankind in general. It is combined with the delusion that Jews are in some way not human and must have recourse to special remedies and subterfuges in order to appear at least outwardly, like other men. The blood libel led to trials and massacres of Jews. Its origin is rooted in ancient almost primordial, concepts concerning the potency and energies of blood. It is one of the most terrible expressions of human cruelty and credulity. These blood rituals are expressly forbidden in Judaism. (See Leviticus 17;11 etc.)

1235 A. D. Thirty-four Jews are burned to death in Fulda (Germany) on a blood-libel charge.*

1267 A. D. Pope Clement IV instructs the Franciscans and Dominicans to deal with the “new Christians” who had reverted to Judaism.*

1270 A. D. St. Thomas Aquinas writes that the Jews sin more in their unbelief than do pagans because they have abandoned the way of justice “after knowing it in some way”.*

1348 A.D. JEWS blamed for the BLACK DEATH. Charge laid to the Jews that they POISONED the wells to kill CHRISTIANS.

147 5 A. D. The entire Jewish community in Trent, northern Italy, is put to death on the allegation that it had murdered a boy for religious purposes.*

1506 A.D. Murders in Lisbon – 4000, “conversos”, men, women, and children thrown from windows to street mobs below, due to preaching by Dominicans against the Jews.

1544 A.D.The Reformation. At the end of Martin Luther’s life the German reformer vilified the Jews in violent pamphlets which could not fail to exert their influence. But because Calvinists were steeped in Old Testament theology, the Dutch people respected the Jews as “the Chosen” people; and were not anti-Semitic in their faith. The reformation was a time of turmoil as the Roman Church and feudalism lost their supremacy. There was a rising up of Nationhood and Luther was a German nationalist. The Talmud was seized and burned everywhere by Papal authority. Jews in Catholic countries and Polish Jews suffered greatly. Luther’s anti-Semitic writings were later used in anti-Semitic literature.

1840 A.D. BLOOD LIBEL in DAMASCUS.

1853 A.D. BLOOD LIBEL in RUSSIA.

1879 A.D. Word anti-Semitism comes into existence.

1882 A.D. FIRST ANTI-JEWISH CONGRESS HELD. In Dresden, Germany.

1894 A.D. ALFRED DREYFUS TRIAL in France. Details follow further on in this summary.

1894 A. D. The Catholic Church took an active role in the famous wrongful conviction for treason case of Alfred Dreyfus, a Jewish French military officer.

1903 A.D. APPEARANCE of a new issue of the PROTOCOLS OF THE ELDERS OF ZION. In Russia. This spectre of a worldwide Jewish conspiracy aiming at reducing the Gentiles to slavery or extermination loomed up in the medieval Christian imagination and grew out of legends about well poisonings and plague spreading. It was concocted in Paris by an unknown author working for the Russian secret police. It was an alleged conference of the leaders of World Jewry. It was translated into all the world languages. In 1963 a Spanish edition was published. During World War II, the Protocols of the elders of Zion became an implicit justification for the GENOCIDE of the Jews and Nazi propaganda relied on them until the last days of the Third Reich. Smaller pamphlets of it have been distributed in B.C. 1983 published in California… Required reading in most Arab countries, in schools, to this day.

1904 A. D. In an interview with Zionist leader Theodor Hertzl, Pope St. Pius X says: “I know, it is disagreeable to see the Turks in possession of our Holy Places. We simply have to put up with it. But to sanction the Jewish wish to occupy these sites, that we cannot do. . . The Jews have not recognized our Lord, therefore we cannot recognize the Jewish people. . . If you go to Palestine and your people settle there, you will find us clergy and churches ready to baptize you all”.*

1920 A.D. Appearance of ADOLPH HITLER. Also Henry Ford the 1st believes the Protocols; and publishes anti-Jewish articles in his newspaper, the Dearborn Independent.

1921 A. D. Speaking for Pope Benedict XV, a Vatican spokesman informed representatives of the Zionist Movement that they did not wish to assist “the Jewish race, which is permeated with a revolutionary and rebellious spirit” to gain control over the Holy Land.*

1925 A.D. MEIN KAMPH appears. Hitler’s Plan published in Germany

1925 A. D. At a conference of Catholic academicians in Innsbruck, Austria, Bishop Sigismund Waitz calls the Jews an “alien people” who had corrupted England, France, Italy, and especially America.*

1933 A. D. In a series of Advent sermons, Cardinal Faulhaber of Munich defends the Old Testament against Nazi attacks but emphasizes that it is not his intention to defend contemporary Jewry, saying that a distinction has to be drawn between Jews living before and after the crucifixion of Jesus. *

1933 A. D. In a pastoral letter on January 23, Bishop Johannes Maria Gföllner of Linz, Austria, declares that while the radical anti-Semitism preached by Nazism is completely incompatible with Christianity, it is the right and duty of Christians to fight and break the harmful influences of Jewry in all areas of modern cultural life. The Austrian episcopate condemns the letter in December for causing racial hatred and conflict.*

1933-1939 The general consensus among the Catholic papers in Poland is that Jewish influence should be reduced in all areas of life, that the Polish and Jewish communities should be separated as much as possible, and that the most desirable option is mass emigration of the Jews from Poland. St. Maximilian Kolbe is an active promoter of antisemitic literature.*

1935 A.D. Hitler writes his Nuremberg Laws which lead to his Final Solution.

1936 A. D. Cardinal August Hlond, the primate of Poland, issues a pastoral letter, stating: “I warn you against that ethical attitude that is fundamentally and uncompromisingly anti-Jewish. It is contradictory to Catholic ethics. It is permissible to love your nation more than others, but it is not permissible to hate anyone. Not even the Jews. . . You should close yourselves to the harmful influence of Jewry. . . But you may not attack Jews, beat them, hurt them, slander them. In a Jew you should also respect and love a human being and your neighbor”.*

1937 A. D. Austrian bishop Alois Hudal publishes a book defending Nazi racial ideology, supporting laws preventing a flood of Jewish immigrants, and criticizing the “Jewish” press for playing off Austrians against Germans. His book receives the support of Archbishop (later Cardinal) Theodor Innitzer of Vienna.*

1937 A. D.: The Palestine Post reported that a large number of Jews had been attacked and beaten in riots in Memel, Shavli and Wilkomir in Lithuania. This outburst of anti-Semitism took place two years before the outbreak of World War II. This is an example of the inherent European anti-Semitism that helped to make the Holocaust possible and provided the Nazis with willing accomplices in completing the Final Solution.*

1938 A. D. In a speech before Belgian pilgrims, Pope Pius XI denounces antisemitism and says: “Spiritually we are all Semites.” His comments are reported in various newspapers but not in the Vatican’s L’Osservatore Romano.*

1941 A. D. In Croatia, Bishop Ivan Saric of Sarajevo appropriates Jewish property for his own use. His diocesan newspaper declares that “Jewish greed increases. The Jews have led Europe and the world towards disaster, moral and economic disaster. Their appetite grows till only domination of the whole world will satisfy it.” Bishop Aksamovic of Djakovic teaches that “today it is the sacred duty of every citizen to prove his Aryan origins.” Meanwhile, Archbishop Aloys Stepinac of Zagreb preaches in a sermon that “it is forbidden to exterminate Gypsies and Jews because they are said to belong to an inferior race”.*

1941 A. D. Provost Bernard Lichtenberg of Berlin’s St. Hedwig Cathedral publicly declares that he will include Jews in his daily prayers. On October 23 he is arrested and sent to Dauchau, but dies on the way.*
Great Britain, the Polish Government-in-exile, Brazil, the United States, and Uruguay press Pope Pius XII to condemn the Nazi treatment of Jews. The Pope responds to this international appeal with his Christmas radio address, but does not specifically mention the Jews.*

1943 A. D. At their annual meeting in Fulda, the German Catholic bishops debate whether to speak out about the Holocaust and confront Hitler with a direct accusation. They decide not to do so.*

1943 A. D. Slovakia’s Catholic Bishops protest the deportation of Jews in a pastoral letter read in Latin from the pulpits. Many priests refuse to read it or insert their own negative comments.*

1945 A. D. Addressing the College of Cardinals after the end of the European war, Pope Pius XII speaks of the hundreds of priests and religious who died in Nazi concentration camps, but makes no mention of the Jews.*

1965 A. D.The Second Vatican Council issues its Declaration on the Relationship of the Church to Non-Christian Religions: “True, authorities of the Jews and those who followed their lead pressed for the death of Christ; still, what happened in His passion cannot be blamed upon all the Jews then living

1967 A.D. SIX DAY WAR. Also new publication of Elders of Zion in Arabic.

1982 A.D. War in Lebanon begins after many years of terrorist attacks against the Jews in the Upper Galilee area from the vantage point of Beaufort Castle. Many Lebanese killed over long period of time, but was ignored by the News Media. War in Lebanon gets slanted coverage.

1983 A.D. Word from Christians in Israel that the PLO planned their next battleground to be Canada via Quebec. Documented proof that Russia planned in 1982 to attack Israel.

1984 A. D. The National Conference of Brazilian Bishops declares: “All forms of anti-Semitism must be condemned. Every unfavorable word and expression must be erased from Christian speech. All campaigns of physical or moral violence must cease. The Jew must not be considered a deicide people”.*