[richlevy]

I think that Philosopher is taking his guidence from the fact that in 2004, the Vatican released a study clarifying that the Inquisition was not as bad as everyone thought.

The study was released shortly after the Vatican released a statement that the sex abuse scandal was overstated.

Of the 235,000 Jews in Spain in 1492, 165,000 were estimated to have emigrated, 50,000 were estimated to have been baptized, and 20,000 were estimated to have perished while fleeing.

Someone should have told them that everything was really ok and they just misunderstood the intentions of their inquisitors, who were really just spiritual counselors.

From here

Everybody has a suggestion but nobody really knows the number of victims purged by the Inquisition in the time of Torquemada. Thousands, tens of thousands, and perhaps more, were given punishments ranging from small fines to life imprisonment. Early in the nineteenth century, the secretary of the Spanish Inquisition, Juan Antonio Llorente, defected to France with a cartload of documents. Soon after, he published at Paris an unsympathetic history of that organization, which the Faithful still denounce today as a pack of lies. Among other unkind cuts was the author's announcement that Torquemada and his men had burned upwards of nine thousand persons at the stake in eight years. The "spiteful exaggerations" of Llorente have been revised downward and some of Torquemada's modern friends assure us that (a) he really burned only two thousand human beings, and (b) the actual execution of the death sentence was performed by the secular arm of the government, for "the Church does not shed blood." Without venturing further into this swamp of statistics and dialectics, we may reasonably guess that (a) burning accounted for some five percent of the total, and (b) that Torquemada took a lively interest in the proceedings.

Even articles which appear to conceded that no accurate totals can be made do not deny the link to the holy see.

From here

(4) Historical Analysis

The Spanish Inquisition deserves neither the exaggerated praise nor the equally exaggerated vilification often bestowed on it. The number of victims cannot be calculated with even approximate accuracy; the much maligned autos-da-fé were in reality but a religious ceremony (actus fidei); the San Benito has its counterpart in similar garbs elsewhere; the cruelty of St. Peter Arbues, to whom not a single sentence of death can be traced with certainty, belongs to the realms of fable. However, the predominant ecclesiastical nature of the institution can hardly be doubted. The Holy See sanctioned the institution, accorded to the grand inquisitor canonical installation and therewith judicial authority concerning matters of faith, while from the grand inquisitor jurisdiction passed down to the subsidiary tribunals under his control. Joseph de Maistre introduced the thesis that the Spanish Inquisition was mostly a civil tribunal; formerly, however, theologians never questioned its ecclesiastical nature. Only thus, indeed, can one explain how the Popes always admitted appeals from it to the Holy See, called to themselves entire trials and that at any stage of the proceedings, exempted whole classes of believers from its jurisdiction, intervened in the legislation, deposed grand inquisitors, and so on. (See TOMÁS DE TORQUEMADA.)

So even if the actual number of deaths was smaller than the worst estimates, we still have the issue of institutionally sanctioned conversion by the sword. Personally, threatening families in order to convert them and actually attempting to execute them doesn't really seem like much of a distinction to me.

The whole 'It wasn't really the official church that committed most of the atrocities' argument also doesn't work. As Philosopher is quick to point out, the Catholic church is a very strict organization whose members are expected to obey church authority. There are not supposed to be any 'rogue Catholics'. I have not heard of any mass excommunications of individuals participating in the Inquistions, therefore it was a sanctioned event.

Originally posted by Philosopher
But that’s not what he says. By saying that he believes Catholics who have abortions should be excommunicated, not jailed, he is saying that he doesn’t believe it’s murder, and that he will side with those who want it to continue to be the law of the land. And it is THAT that is an untenable Catholic position. If you hold it, and are unrepentant, and would actually aid those who want to continue it, then you are automatically excommunicating yourself as a Catholic. By all means, be honest with yourself, and go campaign away, but call yourself what you are. And that is NOT a Catholic.

Basically, by attempting to downplay the damage caused by the Inquisition, and it's role in actively encouraging or at least failing to discourage the process for hundreds of years, the church is attempting the greatest handwashing since Pontius Pilate stuck his hands in the sink.