Papists Quotes
This is a particularly interesting historical quotation because it succinctly gives a history of the various horrors of religious strife in British history—a history that was very well known to the American Founding Fathers and the general American Colonial population. This history was the major driver behind the public insistence for the Bill of Rights and the 1st Amendment which erected a wall of separation between church and state with government never favoring or abetting any particular religion.
In this extraordinary act, the people who are persecuted are made to pay extra taxes to facilitate their persecution
Official List of groups which were prohibited from religiously criticizing the Catholic Church—the established church of Maryland. One interesting observation is that the Jesuits—a Catholic order were on this list. Catholic orders did not then subject their representatives to the authority of the local bishops and took direction only from the Pope. In the case of the Jesuits at the time, there were many who believed the Jesuits were beyond the de facto control of the Papacy and some Jesuits thought they should be—thus the two designations of Jesuits. This makes clear the fundamental intolerance that was common on many parts of Colonial America, that criticism of and heresy to the Established Church was not to be permitted. To the orthodox Catholics of Maryland, they were as concerned with the potential criticisms of Catholic Jesuits as they were with those of Puritans or Anabaptists. Compare Maryland, a Catholic colony with a huge antipathy towards Puritans, with Massachusetts, a Puritan Colony, and its strong antipathy and intolerance for Catholics. It is almost impossible to imagine a union of the American colonies without a 1st Amendment.
See Justice Richard Cox for a similar view.
There has been a similar demographic condition since.
Before the Protestant Reformation of Martin Luther, there had been a schism of the Catholic Church into the Western Roman Empire—the Latins, headquartered in Rome; and the Orthodox Church—the Greeks, headquartered in Constantinople (Byzantium). One of the main issues of the schism was the Papacy itself. As this quotation shows, Luther was by no means the first to attack the Papacy. Saint Mark’s quotation here was more than 50 years before Luther was born.
The relationship between Irish Catholics and the organized priesthood has at times been contentious. Forced tithing to support clergy in a lifestyle that was greater than average, together with some corrupt priests and monks produced hostility from even many Catholics.
