Church History: The Protestant Reformation and its Enemy the Vatican

This post is to be mostly a collection of links to talks and sermons about Roman Catholic efforts to destroy the Protestant Reformation.

1)  Here is a link to a talk by ex-Catholic-priest Richard Bennett,  Response of the Papacy to the Reformation, Part I which is a historical sketch of the Counter Reformation, or Roman efforts to undo the effects of the Reformation, principally through the Jesuits from the time of Jesuit founder Ignatius of Loyola to the present, including remarks on 

• The success of Jesuit education in turning minds toward Romanism; 
• The Oxford Movement in 19th century England to Romanize the Anglican Church;
• Dispensationalism, its Futurist eschatology & the Scofield Bible;
• Vatican Concordats with various nations including Germany through Hitler;
• Alliances with Islamic states;  a "call for peace" signed by "Christians" (acommonword.com);  Muslim-Catholic Forum;
• As a nation state Vatican makes civil laws and civil agreements about marriage, economics, property rights, laws about education, what can be on the radio; can shut down churches;  How Vatican increases through civil power.
• How Romanism fulfills scripture about the Harlot Church;
• How Dispensationalism blinds the Church to Romanism as the Antichrist

Bennett has the website Berean Beacon.org where you can find his personal testimony about his life as a priest and how he came to Christ.

2)  This talk is really Response of the Papacy to the Reformation, Part 2, but under the title Papal Rome, the European Union, Antichrist, Prophecy, Jesuits, Reformation, Martyrs  in which Michael De Semlyn of Richard Bennett's ministry gives the history of Rome's intention to recreate the Holy Roman Empire in Europe, showing among other things the Roman Catholic symbolism in the formation of the European Union.   [And here's a link where someone has very helpfully made a transcript of this talk with footnotes.]

• Papal Pronouncements on Europe:  8/31/2003 Pope John Paul II dedicated Europe to the Virgin Mary.
• "Last Sunday" (date is not given) the Pope "urged" that the final draft of the European Constitution recognize explicitly "the Christian roots" of Europe, by which of course he means only Roman Catholicism.  "...As described by the London Sunday Telegraph, 'The Pope is calmly preparing to assume the mantle which he solemnly believes to be his divine right, that of the new Holy Roman Emperor reigning from the Urals to the Atlantic'.  [July 21, 1991]

3)  Alan Cairns has a great Irish accent from his homeland ("faith" is "fee'yeth," "grace" is "gree-ess") but preached in South Carolina for many years before his retirement a few years ago.  He has in his sermons what I think must be the strongest Reformation emphasis I've ever heard.  You can find him at Sermon Audio.com as well as Richard Bennett,  Here's the Sermon Audio page of Posts on "Reformation" by Alan Cairns.

This sermon from 1995 The Reformation, A Battle to be Fought and Won Again is a powerful reminder of the truths of the Reformation and our need to continually be reminded of them, to study them and defend them.  He makes it clear that Inquisitional style persecutions of Protestants by Catholics are ongoing in predominantly Catholic countries, not something that ended centuries ago as we are so often misled into thinking.  There is a glitch in the audio around 6:36 where he has apparently begun discussing these persecutions but it is interrrupted.  How much is left out I don't know.

4)  In this sermon from 2004, The Failures of the Reformation, Cairns answers some familiar attempts to discredit the Reformers, often by Fundamentalists, and offers some thoughts of his own about how the Reformation stopped short of full success.  I found particularly interesting his remarks about the Anabaptists, who are often characterized as victims of the Reformers and generally get a positive press from today's Reformed teachers.  Cairns presents them in a less-than-positive light and claims they are NOT the forerunners of today's Baptists as is so often thought.

Side note:  One might suspect Jesuits behind the smear campaign but Cairns doesn't mention that possibility.  Fundamentalists with no sense of history are apparently sufficient for the task.

5)  [1/18] The Lord just led me to this one, A Historical Sketch of the Persecution of Christians (2006) by Joe Morecraft, and what a powerful sermon this is, on the persecutions of believers from the earliest days of the Church, so effectively preached that no matter how much I've already learned about these things, which is really quite a bit, I feel convicted more deeply than ever of my own cowardice and shrinking from the true call to martyrdom for Christ.  I thank the Lord that He seems to be leading me to deeper and deeper expressions of the life in Christ as I work on this blog post, and all I can do is pray for even a tenth of the courage of the martyrs down the centuries who died as true witnesses.

• AMERICAN CHRISTIAN COMPROMISERS.  Around 28:00 he mentions those "Christians" who are in favor with the world, who are invited to inaugurations etc., the compromisers as opposed to the true Christians Christ told us the world will hate.  Billy Graham who is a closet Romanist comes immiedately to mind of course.  But others might take note who are tempted in the same direction.
• TWO AMERICAN HERITAGES.  Around 29:08 he starts talking about two streams of American heritage, saying that Christians belong to the older one, the one that goes back to the original Puritan and Pilgrim settlers and NOT TO THE GENERATION OF THE AMERICAN REVOLUTIONARIES OR "FOUNDERS" which he characterizes as UNITARIANS.  I hadn't heard this message before except from from Chris Pinto.   Morecraft says Teach your children to be patriotic toward that older heritage and to shun the newer heritage!  Interesting!  This must be a stream of preaching I've somehow just never encountered before. 

Cairns and Morecraft are both Presbyterians and such powerful preachers of the truth I could be persuaded to become a Presbyterian, a REAL Presbyterian, not like that liberal Presbyterian USA church I once belonged to.  Why didn't I discover them earlier?  I probably didn't deserve to, that's the most likely reason, because I AM a weak cowardly Christian.  He who has shall receive more...   Every little thing we do in the right direction will move us further along that path.  Every little dying to self we do will give us the ability to die more.  I pray for the strengthening of the Church, and if it be the Lord's will that there might still be revival, that Christians who are giving in to compromises in so many many ways might see their error and repent, that so many who still live in complete darkness might see the great Light and be saved.  IT CAN'T HAPPEN UNTIL THE CHURCH LEARNS TO DIE, and that can start with recognizing and repenting of our sins, and our sins of compromising with the world are MAJOR these days.

6)  Here's a talk that's just chock full of information that's new to me: History of the Conflict in Ireland by Ivan Foster.   It's a very balanced presentation of the strife in Ireland which covers the effects of deceitful machinations by Romanists plus the neglect and indifference of apostate and ecumenized Protestants both English and Irish.

From the Sermon Audio page on Ivan Foster:

Mr. Foster, a former member of Omagh District Council and the Northern Ireland Assembly, believes it is essential for Christians to actively strive for the preservation of civil and religious liberty. Such striving must be done in the knowledge that only by national repentance and a return to God and Biblical Protestantism can Ulster be saved. 

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POST UNDER CONSTRUCTION

{I'm still working on this post and have already rearranged and added to the material above, and expect to do more as I continue to study this topic.  I hope I will be forgiven for continuing to work on this after it's published.}   

The Popes and the Reformation -- Alan Cairns (1998)
http://www.sermonaudio.com/sermoninfo.asp?SID=6144

The Counter-Reformation -- Alan Cairns (1997)
http://www.sermonaudio.com/sermoninfo.asp?SID=6030

The Anabaptist Reformation - Alan Cairns (2007)

http://www.sermonaudio.com/sermoninfo.asp?SID=10210718235710

One Bible, One Gospel - Alan Cairns (2002)
http://www.sermonaudio.com/sermoninfo.asp?SID=21702133347
This is Cairns' answer to Dispensationalism

One Bible, One Gospel, Part 2 - Alan Cairns
http://www.sermonaudio.com/sermoninfo.asp?SID=2240222408