The 16th Century was a brutal period. The use of torture and execution by
burning at the stake was common in Catholic and Protestant Europe. In the
Elizabethan courts of Protestant England, people were hung, drawn and
quartered for hearing Mass in their own homes. Contemporary English
propaganda would have us believe that Elizabeth I was “good Queen Bess”
and that Mary Tudor was “Bloody Mary” for executing Protestant leaders
after she became Queen. In fact, Elizabeth’s reign of 44 years and 4 months
was one of repression and persecution. The Protestant historian Hallam
asserts that “the rack seldom stood idle in the Tower for all the latter part of
Elizabeth’s reign.”
Furthermore, not only was the Mass illegal in Elizabethan England but
anyone who did not attend Anglican services was fined. Anyone who
refused to take the Oath of Supremacy after two refusals was executed.
Bringing Catholic religious items into the country was punished by
confiscation of property. To convert to Catholicism was high treason;
priests could be executed if caught; informers roamed the country reporting
on priests and Catholic activity.
The Spanish Inquisition, in fact, was perhaps the most just court system
established before the modern period. Only 3,000 of the 100,000 put on
trial were executed in the Inquisition’s 340-year history. By keeping Spain
Catholic, that country avoided the religious wars that racked the rest of
Europe. In addition, the witchcraft hysteria that swept through Protestant
Germany, England, Scotland and America (which saw thousands of women
executed on little or no evidence) was found to be baseless by the
Inquisition, saving many innocent lives.
The Roman Inquisition
The Roman Inquisition was established in 1542 and was the least active of
the three Inquisitions, yet this fact has not spared it from criticism––mainly
for the celebrated case of Galileo Galilei. Since this case, the Church has
had to suffer the accusation of being anti-scientific and bent on keeping
mankind in the darkness of superstition.
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