MANKIND MONSTERS

Dear God,

The "Problem of Evil" is philosophically complex. You gave mankind the gift of will and freedom of choice, so that we have
the power to do good or to do evil.

None of us is perfect. But some people have been so notoriously cruel that their sins truly "cry to heaven for vengeance."

Let me not judge any person, but I think
You would want me to recognize the depths
of degradation to which mankind can fall
- to remind myself on occasion of just
how horrendous evil can become.

I pray for the wicked persons who perpetrated the events which I recall here, and I pray, of course, for the victims who suffered
such inhuman cruelty and lost their lives
so painfully and so tragically.

Sadly, religious faith, or belief
as a cultural pretext, was inextricably involved in several of these horrific events.

I remind myself of these tragedies here
to apologize to You, God, in my capacity
as a member of the human race, for these egregious, terrifying crimes and sins
committed by my fellow human beings,
and to caution myself that no one is beyond the temptations of Satan and the commission of evil deeds, large and small.

Here, God, are my understandings.

THE INQUISITION - 1100's-1600's

Before the 12th century, prior to full separation of Church and State, the Catholic Church suppressed heresy, through ecclesiastical proscription or imprisonment.

Pope Gregory IX (who reigned 1227–1241) assigned the duty of conducting Inquisition trials and proscribing punishments,
including death, to the Dominican Order.

Convicted heretics were handed over
to the civil authority for punishments
which included horrendous tortures, horrible death by public burning and other inhumane procedures. Some lucky victims had bags
of gunpowder tied around their necks, providing them a quick death as soon
as they were set afire.

Jewish converts, Your Chosen People, suspected of remaining secretly faithful
to Judaism, were among the victims,
awhen Ferdinand and Isabella drove all Jews
out of Spain.

The 1578 handbook for Inquisitors noted that, “punishment does not take place primarily
and per se for the correction and good
of the person punished, but for the public good in order that others may become terrified and weaned away from the evils
they might otherwise commit."

The "Supreme Sacred Congregation
of the Universal inquisition", later became the “Roman Inquisition.” In 1908 Pope Saint Pius X renamed it the "Supreme Sacred Congregation of the Holy Office." In 1965
it became the “Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith,” as it exists to this day.

Forgive, Lord, all who perpetrated these inhumane tortures and killings, committed
in Your name, and please bountifully
bless their many victims.

SAINT BARTHOLOMEW'S DAY MASSACRE - 1572

This event was a group of targeted assassinations in Paris, followed by a wave of Roman Catholic mob violence, both directed against the Huguenots (French Calvinist Protestants), during the French Wars
of Religion.

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Traditionally believed to have been instigated by Queen Catherine de' Medici,
the mother of King Charles IX, the massacre
took place six days after the wedding
of the King's sister Margaret
to the Protestant Henry III of Navarre
(the future Henry IV of France).
This marriage was an occasion for which
many of the most wealthy and prominent Protestant Huguenots had gathered
in largely Catholic Paris.

The massacre began on 23 August 1572
(the eve of the feast of Bartholomew
the Apostle), two days after the attempted assassination of the military and political leader of the Huguenots. The king ordered
the killing of a group of Huguenot leaders, and the slaughter spread throughout Paris. Lasting several weeks, the massacre expanded outward to other urban centers
and the countryside. Modern estimates
for the number of dead vary widely,
from 5,000 to 30,000.

The event "printed on Protestant minds
the indelible Conviction that Catholicism
was a bloody and treacherous religion."

Have mercy, Lord God, on the perpetrators
and the victims of this horrendous time.

THE TRAIL OF TEARS - 1830's

The United States "Indian Removal Act
of 1830," forced Native American tribes
from their desirable homeland properties
on marches by foot to other territories.
Many suffered from exposure, disease
and starvation on the long journies
to their destinations, and countless thousands died from exhaustion, or starved
or froze to death.

Have mercy, Lord, on those who conceived and carried out this patently horrendous
and inhuman Act, and on all those helpless innocents, whose lands were stolen and who suffered so terribly in this grave injustice
and barbaric cruelty.

THE HOLOCAUST - 1941-1945

This frightening event in my own lifetime
is too familiar in recent memory to need explanation here. That civilized societies can be gripped in such maniacal hatred,
and stoop to such enormity of horror,
such barbaric cruelty, and such naked atrocities is frightening.

Lord have mercy on all those who lived through, or died during, these unspeakable, terrible tragedies,
and let them not be forgotten.

May all the victims of hatred
now rest in peace, robed in shining glory
in the comfort of Your heavenly grace.

Lord, cleanse my heart of all evil,
all judgment of others, and please let me root out all wickedness from my own soul.

All this I pray
in the name of the all-merciful Jesus.

Amen

(c) 2012 Donn B. Murphy

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