Vatican to release study on Inquisition

Vatican, Jun. 09 (CWNews.com) - The Vatican will soon publish a study on the Inquisition, containing the proceedings of an international conference held in Rome in 1998.

The Vatican has scheduled a press conference for June 15, at which three cardinals will speak about the new study. Cardinal Roger Etchegary was involved because the original conference on the Inquisition, held in October 1998, was organized by the committee to prepare for the Jubilee Year 2000, which he chaired. Cardinal Georges Cottier, the theological of the pontifical household, presided over the conference. And Cardinal Jean-Louis Tauran, the Vatican archivist, has custody over the records that remain from the work of the Inquisition.

The October 1998 conference brought together 30 scholars, who met behind closed doors to discuss the actions of the Inquisition, putting that work in the proper historical context. The research submitted to that committee was partially responsible for the decision by Pope John Paul II (bio - news) to issue an apology for the episodes of intolerance that have marked the history of the church; he included the use of coercive methods by the Inquisition.

Cardinal Cottier had been asked by the Jubilee preparatory committee to preside over a theological commission that would assess the excesses and errors committed by Catholics in the name of the Church. Prior to the conference on the Inquisition, he had also chaired a previous meeting, in October 1997, on the roots of anti-Jewish bias within Christianity.

As he opened the conference on the Inquisition, Cardinal Cottier stressed that the aim of the committee's work was to establish the real facts about the Inquisition, eliminating popular misconceptions and allowing a fair and balanced view of the historic phenomena. He pointed out at the time that the Inquisition was set up to address a very real problem, "the heresy that threatened the people's faith and destroyed the unity of the Church." Citing the oft-repeated desires of Pope John Paul, he said that the Church should undertake a "purification of memory" in preparation for the Jubilee celebration.

Cardinal Cottier said that the conference should focus on the Inquisition as a single phenomenon, rather than on "inquisitions," because "the different tribunals constitute a single reality." He encouraged scholars to avoid confusion between the acts of a government (Spain) and the acts of ecclesiastical bodies.

The historical research on the Inquisition was made possible by the opening of Vatican archives from the Holy Office-- the body originally known as the Inquisition, and now as the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith. The records date back to the 12th and 13th centuries, when the first Church tribunals were set up to combat the Catharist heresy. After a long and turbulent history, the Inquisition finally ended in Spain in 1834.

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