The Progress of Liberty

The Catholic Church, especially in the past 40 years, has become increasingly tolerant, civilized, and respectable – even to the point of issuing a pardon for Galileo’s “transgressions” in 1992 – about 359 years too late, but better than never at all.

Yet, while Catholics should be proud of many, though not all, of the directions their Church has taken recently, they should be ashamed of its activities during the majority of its history. Until the 1960s, the Church has functioned as an active foe of rational ideas and attempted to suppress the free exploration of ideas. Some of the most talented writers of all time have been put on the Index Librorum Prohibitorum, the Index of Prohibited Books, which was only discontinued in 1966.

Among the writers proscribed on the Index are John Locke, Voltaire, Montesquieu, Francis Bacon, Johannes Kepler, Galileo, Jonathan Swift, John Stuart Mill, Victor Hugo, and Giordano Bruno (whom the Church also burned at the stake, by the way). You can see a vast list of prohibited writers by following the link above.

Interestingly enough, Karl Marx and Adolf Hitler are not on the list, even though both were alive while the list was still being published.

Sincerely,
Gennady Stolyarov II

Editor-in-Chief, The Rational Argumentator: http://rationalargumentator.com

Writer, Associated Content: http://www.associatedcontent.com/user/46796/g_stolyarov_ii.html

Author, Implied Consent, A Play on the Sanctity of Human Life: http://rationalargumentator.com/impliedconsent.html

Author, A Rational Cosmology: http://rationalargumentator.com/rc.html

Author, The Best Self-Help is Free: http://rationalargumentator.com/selfhelpfree.html                           

Author, The Progress of Liberty Blog: http://progressofliberty.today.com/   

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