Roman Popes teaching that slavery is a good, celebrating and promoting it

Did you guys know this?.. I just discovered it myself

Paul III is famous for writing Sublimus Deus, an encyclical that actually promoted slavery in the New World… written 1537
1545 - Sanctioned slavery in the city of Rome, and repealed the law where slaves reaching Capitol Hill gained their freedom…
1548 - Authorized the purchase of slaves for the Papal estates…

to me it is proof#11305 for why Roman popes are not and never were the vicars of Christ

 

It is quite a mixed and shameful record the the Catholic Church has on slavery, though it certainly isn't alone in that regard.

This website provides an eye-opening timeline on the Catholic Church and slavery:

https://www.africanamerica.org/topic/the-role-of-the-roman-catholic-church-in-slavery

At least one pope, Pope Innocent VIII, owned slaves from the New World (a gift from Queen Isabella) but there are many sources stating that he was not alone.

I read once that the papacy had a number of Romany slaves, but I can't recall the source at the moment.

 

Elizabeth I was happy enough to make money from the slave trade so long as the slaves were ok with it

 

Elizabeth I never made much money from the slave trade. There was a small slave industry in Ireland, but the English never signed off on and started collecting revenues from the transatlantic slave trade until around 50 years after QE1 kicked the bucket. That was when it really exploded, before 1650 it was sort of a legal gray area for British merchants.

We can all agree that the British monarchies complicity in the slave trade was absolutely abhorrent, but I think it's a good deal different from what @anglican74 is talking about. Sure, the monarchy didn't say anything against the slave trade for ~150 years while they made exorbitant sums of money off it, but they never used their influence to convince the public it was a good thing.

The Church of England - divorced from the economic pressures and biases of the monarch - was pretty consistently opposed to it, a few aberrant pockets in the Americas notwithstanding. Their slowly escalating voice of condemnation, especially post the separation of the clergy in the US after their revolution, was a meaningful part of the liberal push that led to it being completely outlawed, and then the navy flipping from protecting slaver's ships to arresting them.

 

What does this have to do with anything?.. she didn’t claim to be the vicar of Christ did she?

 

I think a lot of the Pope 'Innocents' were never actually so very innocent at all really. As for them being vicars of Christ, I wonder how many of the Borger Bunch heard the words, "Well done thou good and faithful servant", after their corrupt spirits were dragged out of their debauched bodies on earth, to meet the judgment of their Master, Christ?
.

 

Fortunately we’ve come a long way from 1548.

 

I have been thinking about this, can anyone say why this doesn’t violate the claim of Papal infallibility?.. Let’s steelman their responses and use the ones most sympathetic to them

-“it’s just discipline” no this was doctrine
-“it wasn’t definitive” no this was taught universally for centuries, Ordinary Universal Magisterium which is infallible
-“there were always bad tares” no this is the successor of Peter prevented from the Holy Ghost from definitively teaching erroneous doctrine

 

I am not sure why the pope, and by extension probably Roman Catholics, are being singled out on this particular issue. I see no evidence of any other Christians at the time rising up to condemn slavery. We had slavery here in the UK and I am quite certain it was done with the support of the Established Church, i.e. the Church of England.

 

The issue is not whether Christians have sinned in practicing slavery at times, but that some of those Christians claimed infallibility to all their doctrines, including this one... so what I wonder is, how this does not disprove their claims

 

Are you sure about that? According to the Wikipedia page :

In Sublimis Deus, Paul III declares the indigenous peoples of the Americas to be "truly men and that they are not only capable of understanding the Catholic Faith but, according to our information, they desire exceedingly to receive it", and denounces any idea to the contrary as directly inspired by the "enemy of the human race" (Satan). He goes on to condemn their reduction to slavery in the strongest terms, declaring it null and void for any people known as well as any that could be discovered in the future, entitles their right to liberty and property, and concludes with a call for their evangelization.[13]

 

From the text:

'The said Indians and all other people who may later be discovered by Christians, are by no means to be deprived of their liberty or the possession of their property, even though they be outside the faith of Jesus Christ; and that they may and should, freely and legitimately, enjoy their liberty and the possession of their property; nor should they be in any way enslaved; should the contrary happen, it shall be null and have no effect.' ('Sublimus Deus'; my emphasis).

Either the OP is condemning a Papal Bull he has never read; or else he has chosen to ignore - for his own purposes - this particular clause.

I guess this is what passes for Christian honesty and integrity in his particular neck of the woods.

 

It says in your bio that you're a mohammedan heretic

 

In what way does my being a Muslim excuse sloppy reporting on your part?

 

I have heard this from others and wanted to pass it on for a discussion with my fellow brethren, an interesting discussion on an interesting topic, during spare time... and if I make mistakes I have always been happy to be corrected

I will be researching this further, but perhaps my source meant to cite the 1493 papal Bull, Inter Caetera, which gave the conquistadors a Catholic and Christian license to take all lands of the New World, and anyone found within them
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Inter_caetera

 

Not a mistake....merely an opportunity for improvement.

 

I don’t see any reason to presume malice. Most mistakes are honest and I find the level of integrity on this forum to be high.

I did not read the bull myself, I only read the Wikipedia page on it.

 

‘Dislike’ button.

 

Apropos of the topic of papal infallibility, I’ve spent the last few hours listening to James White debate Tim Staples on the very subject.

you have to bear through it for two hours, twenty eight minutes and forty four seconds to get to this gem of a comment from a member of the audience:

“as an Anglican, I have the glorious situation of thinking that you are both wrong”

https://www.sermonaudio.com/saplayer/playpopup.asp?SID=622151742460

 

You listened to James White for more than 2 hours straight? There should be an entry in Guinness for that!