Today, almost all the major Christian sects tell their followers what they can or cannot read. The truth could be disastrous to their faith. In 1562, the Vatican established a special censoring office called Index Expurgatorius, whose sole purpose was to prohibit the publication of Erroneous Passages of the Early Church Fathers, which carried statements opposing their modern-day dogma.
The Word is whatever the Christian Church says it is and when Vatican archivists came across genuine copies of the Church Fathers, they corrected [edited, added, abridged, condensed, and supplemented] them according to the Expurgatory Index (Index Expurgatorius Vaticanus, R. Gibbings, ed., Dublin, 1837; The Literary Policy of the Church of Rome, Joseph Mendham, J. Duncan, London, 1830, 2nd ed., 1840; The Vatican Censors, op. cit., p. 328).
But throughout history, few but the great thinkers of society understood this symbiotic relationship of politics and religion, and those who spoke out became stigmatized by both the powerful priesthood and the ruling oligarchy. You sniveling priest, you are imposing delusions upon society for your own aggrandizement (Voltaire, French philosopher, rationalist, free thinker).
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All developed societies are but an extension of the political views of the ruling oligarchy upon the many, the suffering poor. If every criminal and inhumane act ever committed were traced to its root because, that root would be buried deep in religion (Sherry Matulis, activist, 1931).
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The most infamous Catholic of the all-time, one of historys great mass murderers, Hitler, realizes the symbiotic relationship between children and religion and puts it succinctly in the twentieth century: The state must declare the child to be the most precious treasure of the people. As long as the government is perceived as working for the benefit of the children, the people will happily endure almost any curtailment of liberty and almost any deprivation (Adolf Hitler, Mein Kampf).
