‘This will not be an anti-Catholic programme. I have great sympathy with grassroots Catholics who want a more open, democratic, liberal and inclusive church.’

I have great sympathy for those who want the moon on a stick.

It’s a defining feature of organised religion that they are closed, undemocratic, illiberal and exclusive. That’s why people join them.

Vote with your feet.

They couldn’t have got someone more balanced? Like maybe Ian Paisley?

I love Peter’s line that of course he isn’t anti-Catholic, he has full sympathy for those grassroots Catholics who agree with his project of abolishing the Catholic Church. Perhaps he can tell parishioners that the next time he tries to disrupt worship at Westminster Cathedral.

Anyway, what’s with the constant papist-baiting on LC? Did this somehow become an Orange Order forum and nobody told me?

Let’s not overlook the indisputable fact that the Catholic Church was at one time regarded as a terrorist organisation:

“Guy Fawkes could have changed the face of London if his 1605 plot had not been foiled, explosion experts have said. His 2,500 kg of gunpowder could have caused chaos and devastation over a 490-metre radius, they have calculated. Fawkes’ planned blast was powerful enough to destroy Westminster Hall and the Abbey, with streets as far as Whitehall suffering damage, they say.”
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/3240135.stm

Well, it was outlawed in England for over 300 years. Some folks around here seem to wish it still was.

“Some folks around here seem to wish it still was.”

By many accounts in academic history texts, the Duke of Wellington as PM in the Lords and Robert Peel in the Commons had much difficulty in pushing the Catholic Emancipation Act of 1829 through Parliament.

But is that altogether surprising? In Mary Tudor’s mercifully short reign 1553-58, at least 280 people were burned at the stake in public for heresy, meaning they were not willing to subscribe to Catholic doctrines. Those burned included the Oxford martyrs: Bishops hugh Latimer and Nicholas Ridley and Archbishop Thomas Cranmer, author of the Book of Common Prayer, an atrocity still commemorated by a plaque on the wall of Balliol College. In her lifetime, Mary Tudor was popularly known as Bloody Mary.

The Spanish Armada of 1588 in Elizabeth’s reign was sanctified by commission from the Pope to invade England to restore Catholicism to her realm. And that was followed by the attempt in 1605 by Guy Fawkes and his fellow conspirators to blow up Parliament at the state opening.

But all that seems almost insignificant compared compared with the scale of the St Bartholomew’s Day massacre of Huguenots in France in 1572 and the subsequent religious wars there – a steady stream of Huguenot asylum seekers sought refuge in England well into the next century:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_Wars_of_Religion

The recollection of that was sufficiently fresh in collective folk memories to sustain a reference in Daniel Defoe’s satirical poem of 1701: The True-born Englishman:

Dutch, Walloons, Flemings, Irishmen, and Scots,
Vaudois and Valtelins, and Hugonots,
In good Queen Bess’s charitable reign,
Supplied us with three hundred thousand men.
Religion—God, we thank Thee!—sent them hither,
Priests, Protestants, the Devil and all together:
Of all professions and of every trade,
All that were persecuted or afraid . .

http://www.luminarium.org/editions/trueborn.htm

Well, it’s nice to know that the killing of tens of thousands of religious dissenters under Henry VIII and Elizabeth I is of so little moment, not to mention Cromwell’s genocidal military campaign in Ireland.

This would make a wonderful sitcom.
The adventures of Peter the lodger at then Vatican with pope as a Rigsby type landlord.
Peter trying to sneak in gay lovers and condoms

Good, I look forward to it. Catholics for Choice is another organisation that should be noted as well http://www.catholicsforchoice.org/

“it’s nice to know that the killing of tens of thousands of religious dissenters under Henry VIII and Elizabeth I ”

That’s rubbish. The numbers of Catholics killed in England for their faith during the reigns of Henry VIII and Elizabeth I was relatively small in scale, certainly small as compared with the scale of the massacre of Huguenots in France which did run into many tens of thousands. The Elizabethan attitude was one of tolerance towards Catholics providing their loyalty to the crown was unequivocal.

The legacy of Cromwell’s campaign in Ireland in 1649-53 was in an entirely different league:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cromwellian_conquest_of_Ireland

Rightly or wrongly, English sentiment is instinctively anti-catholic. Evidence for that is the continuing annual celebration on 5 November of the capture of Guy Fawkes and the extensive Gordon Riots in London in 1780, which amounted to an anti-catholic pogrom:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gordon_Riots

Cromwell had invited jews to resettle in England in 1655:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Resettlement_of_the_Jews_in_England

Historically, anti-catholic sentiment in England has long been more pervasive and influential that anti-semitism, which helps to explain how Disraeli, the grandson of immigrants to Britain, could become one of our more illustrious prime ministers.

This smacks of complete anti-Catholic bias. How about a documentary on Islam by Ayaan Hirsi Ali? Or one on gays by Anne Atkins? A little bit of sensitivity for the 4 million+ Catholics in this country won’t go amiss by a public broadcaster ahead of a papal visit.

“Peter Tatchell to present film on Pope”

Will he also be making a film about Mohammed and his views on homosexuality?

[11] “Will he also be making a film about Mohammed and his views on homosexuality?” – I doubt if anybody would be brave enough to commission such a programme?

PTs piece is likely to focus on the Rat’s position in relation to homosexuality and condoms, etc, but as archaic as the catholic church might be when it comes to such issues, at least it does not sanction state sponsored capital punishment for same-sex intercourse, unlike Saudi Arabia, Iran, Mauritania, Sudan, and Yemen.
http://en.wikinews.org/wiki/Execution_of_two_gay_teens_in_Iran_spurs_controversy

Will he also be making a film about Mohammed and his views on homosexuality?

Knowing Tatchell, he probably would

“Knowing Tatchell, he probably would”

Knowing the BBC and Channel 4, they probably would not even broadcast it.

“This smacks of complete anti-Catholic bias”

Why do you suppose an invitation was extended in 1688 to William to accept the throne and rule with his wife Mary as joint Sovereigns in place of James II?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_III_of_England

Why did the Act of Settlement 1701 ensure Protestant succession to the throne?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Act_of_Settlement_1701

What do you suppose would have been the fate of Newton and his scientific theories of the universe had Catholicism prevailed in England? Hint: Galileo was officially exonerated in 1992 for publicising his theory of a heliocentric universe.

Given Peter Tatchell’s advocacy of lowering the age of consent to 14, he should be quite popular among certain elements of the Catholic clergy.

Bob B

That’s going back some way to justify your anti-Catholic bias TODAY! I assume you’re a proud English Protestant. But some sense of balance might be helpful here. Don’t you think the timing of this documentary is particularly provocative? And that to by one of the Catholic Church’s fiercest critics?

My question remains: will they do this just before the start of a visit by the head of another faith? I don’t think so. C4 are doing it for controversy and publicity.

Incidentally, “Catholics for Choice” aren’t Catholics. And their feminist boosters always manage to overlook them being bankrolled by Playboy.

Just had a look at that “Catholics for Choice” site, in what way do they think they are Catholic? I know plenty of that brand of God-botherer and none of them agree with abortion or contraception. Causes great arguments down t’pub though.

@17: “That’s going back some way to justify your anti-Catholic bias TODAY! I assume you’re a proud English Protestant”

That’s more nonsense. I was simply recounting documented history to show why and how there is a prevailing (and understandable) aversion to Catholicism in English history since Elizabethan times.

The predictable response from Catholics is usually a flurry of efforts to divert and suppress the analysis, which fails to take account of the “Glorious Revolution” of 1688 and what motivated that important development in the evolution of what passes for our constitution or why Wellington and Peel had such difficulty in pushing the Catholic Emancipation Act of 1829 through Parliament. And as to why we still celebrate on 5 November the capture of Guy Fawkes in 1605.

Keynes’s assessment of Newton (as “not the first of the age of reason, he was the last of the magicians”) was pertinent and well-considered. Science owes Newton much but his views on religion and his scientific theories were hugely heretical in terms of Catholic doctrines so there can be little doubt as to his fate had Catholicism prevailed in England, given what had happened to Galileo, who was not officially exonerated by the Catholic church until 1992.
http://www.kton.demon.co.uk/newton.htm

Btw I’ve no religion. My interest is in understanding the continuing aversion to Catholicism as a thread running through English history from Elizabethan times. The heretics burned at the stake during the reign of Mary Tudor and the Spanish Armada of 1588 can’t just be conveniently swept out of sight under the carpet as though those events were of no consequence. Why do you suppose there is a plaque on the wall of Balliol College commemorating the burning of the Oxford martyrs?