When it comes to things Catholic, such as the information I've been gathering lately about how Jesuits were behind the assassination of Abraham Lincoln, there is no way to get even a moment's open-minded consideration of the idea, which they label as a "conspiracy theory" as if that magic label all by itself dispels the very possibility. You even get accusations of believing in Bigfoot or the like as if there's any connection whatever. The way these people think is hard to follow, they just leap from one category to another within some bizarre frame of reference entirely of their own, but it all adds up to an abiding bias against Bible Christianity whatever mental route they take. About all we can glean from this is that prophecy is being fulfilled more rapidly and consistently than we might have expected only a few years ago.
About the Lincoln assassination, I first learned of a Jesuit connection from the book by Charles Chiniquy, 19th Century priest who eventually left the Church of Rome. He knew Lincoln from the time Lincoln as a lawyer successfully defended him against some false charges by his Catholic superiors. He described all this in his book Fifty Years in the "Church" of Rome. Now there is a book out by a Paul Serup, a Canadian who researched Chiniquy's claims over a couple of decades and ended up confirming them. I have yet to read his book, Who Killed Abraham Lincoln? but of course I'm already well disposed toward it because Chiniquy is a credible witness.
But you can't tell the World about this without being treated to heaps of scorn and abuse. Don't we already know enough about the assassination? It was all Confederate vengeance for the Civil War according to current wisdom. The idea that perhaps the truth of who was behind it has been suppressed is just proof of "conspiracy thinking" that couldn't possibly have any merit.
A typical taunt from this quarter goes:
When you have a letter from Pope Pius IX to John Wilkes Booth you let us know, okay?I wonder if correspondence between Pope Pius IX and Jefferson Davis would suffice, in which the pope tacitly recognizes the Confederacy as a nation unto itself by referring to Davis as "President of the Confederate States of America," making him the only head of state to recognize the Confederacy. Could this suggest a connection between Catholicism and the Confederacy that might then suggest a connection with the conspirators to kill Lincoln?
Then there is this quote of Lincoln given by Chiniquy, which of course is denied by Catholic apologists and therefore also denied by those who must believe all this a mere case of conspiracy thinking that has no real substance:
This war would never have been possible without the sinister influence of the Jesuits. We owe it to Popery that we now see our land reddened with the blood of her noblest sons. Though there were great differences of opinion between the South and North, on the question of slavery, neither Jeff Davis nor any one of the leading men of the Confederacy would have dared to attack the North, had they not relied on the promise of the Jesuits, that, under the mask of Democracy, the money and the arms of the Roman Catholics, even the arms of France, were at their disposal if they would attack us.”
Here's an interesting website, or perhaps a rather strange website, but its content is interesting. They make the following accusations including the above quotation:
That Pope Pius IX did plan, coordinate and deliberately instigate the conditions and actions that directly led to the American Civil War, in particular the rise of the secessionist movement of wealthy slave owners, the funding of extremists on both sides (North and South), on the political successes of Southern President Davis an in particular on the attach of Fort Sumter in South Carolina which started the conflict.
That the motivations of the Papacy were not only to sustain its last profitable enterprise of slave trade, but to actively destabilize the largest constitutional democracy in the world.
That so directly involved were the Papacy in causing the war that President Abraham Lincoln himself did write and say: “This war would never have been possible without the sinister influence of the Jesuits. We owe it to Popery that we now see our land reddened with the blood of her noblest sons. Though there were great differences of opinion between the South and North, on the question of slavery, neither Jeff Davis nor any one of the leading men of the Confederacy would have dared to attack the North, had they not relied on the promise of the Jesuits, that, under the mask of Democracy, the money and the arms of the Roman Catholics, even the arms of France, were at their disposal if they would attack us.” President Lincoln.
Furthermore, the direct and constant involvement of Pope Pius IX is also evident in his attempt to prolong the war by pledging support in a letter to Confederate President Jefferson Davis in 1863 in which the Pope pledged his sympathy to the Southern cause, that there were people loyal to their cause in the North and all around the world. That when this letter was published to encourage support in 1863, it did have the opposite effect whereby of 144,000 Irishmen that enlisted, 104,000 deserted after the recognition of the Confederacy by the Pope. That because of the direct and deliberate involvement of the Vatican and Pope Pius IX in deliberately destabilizing the United States, the Roman Catholic Church is directly responsible for the death of 498,332 people because of the Civil War and the ensuing decades of misery and cost it caused. Of murder (political assassination) (1865)
That Pope Pius IX did authorize the funding and mission that resulted in the assassination of President Abraham Lincoln on April 15, 1865. That John Wilkes Booth and other conspirators were recruited, funded and controlled for their mission by the Jesuit emissaries of the Pope. That on at least one occasion there was clear evidence of the connection between the Vatican’s involvement when John Wilkes Booth did spend ten days in October 1864 in Montreal with Catholic priests and several days in Toronto at St. Patrick Hall, an important meeting place for the Irish Catholic Benevolent Union. It is in Canada, that it is believed Booth was shown (never given) letters of authority from the Pope himself for the assassination mission.
That of the conspirators discovered and arrested, a number of their family did successfully escape through the direct and known assistance of the Roman Catholic priests from Montreal. That John H. Surratt (son of conspirator Mary Surratt) upon reaching Rome was appointed to the Pope's Zouave military unit but was arrested by U.S. officials and brought back to trial in Washington, D.C. in 1867.
That upon US authorities discovering the extent of the Papal involvement, it did end all diplomatic ties with the Vatican in the same year. (1867). That these relations with the US were only normalized in 1984.
Of crimes against humanity for the purpose of promoting the international slave trade : (1866) That the Holy Office upon the orders of Pope Pius IX did declare on 20 June 1866: “Slavery itself, considered as such in its essential nature, is not at all contrary to the natural and divine law, and there can be several just titles of slavery and these are referred to by approved theologians and commentators of the sacred canons.... It is not contrary to the natural and divine law for a slave to be sold, bought, exchanged or given”. That this position was officially published as part of a campaign to encourage European and Latin American Catholic nations to enter the war on the side of the South to ensure the most profitable slave market for the Vatican remained operational.
Of historic false statement, moral indignity, heresy and contempt for the fundamental rights of common law (1871)
I would like to see all this documented of course, but since I find Chiniquy credible and many others who have written similarly about the machinations of the Vatican, I don't have any reason to doubt it. I will eventually get Paul Serup's book, hoping he's done a lot of the needed documentation there.
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Here's an earlier post I did on this subject at my Catholicism blog, including links to Chris Pinto's radio shows on the subject.
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http://xpknights.net/images/lettertoJeffersonDavispdf
http://one-evil.org/content/people_19c_pius_ix.html
