The Index of Forbidden
Books
Objection: “The Index of Forbidden Books proves that Rome has
always sought to repress religious truth and scientific knowledge. At
least the rest of the world has managed to free itself from ignorance
and superstition!”
In all places and at all times the Catholic Church has used and promoted
books as a means of fulfilling her mission to spread the Gospel of Christ.
Always cautious of propagating and preserving the truth, the Church has
certainly and properly exercised a firm hand in ensuring that various books
are submitted for her examination before publication, and/or banning the
publication, sale, reading, retaining of prohibited books.
In a world today deluged by all sorts of literature and new forms of visual
and electronic communication, and where meaningful censorship has been
suppressed by the ideologues of unrestrained liberty, the Catholic Church
has now become an easy target for her past and present policies concerning
the control of information. Even to suggest censorship of any form these
days is to invite howls of protests from all quarters allegedly claiming to
uphold rights of free speech, expression and access to information. In fact,
the Catholic Church is not only the victim of attacks for supporting
censorship, but is herself constantly ridiculed, mocked and vilified for any
or all of her beliefs and practices by a media taking advantage of the
present climate of license.
Unfortunately, discussion of such issues as the Index or censorship is
hampered not only by religious and historical bias against the Catholic
Church but also by an equally appalling ignorance of the intention and
operation of the Church’s regulations. One of the worst offenders is the
professional anti-Catholic Loraine Boettner, who in his work Roman
Catholicism published in 1962 reduces the Index to nothing more than an
anti-Protestant mind-controlling tool:
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