Pius IX Quotes

[King Charles’ ecclesiastical reforms] tend to the re-establishing of the Popish religion and tyranny, and [are a danger] to the subversion and ruin of the true reformed religion, and of our liberties, laws and estates.

every human being is free to embrace and profess that religion which, led by the light of reason he/she believes to be true…. in our time it is no longer convenient to have the Catholic religion as the only religion to the exclusion of any other religion.

We also forbid all our subjects, of whatever quality and condition, from carrying off by force or persuasion, against the will of their parents, the children of the said religion, in order to cause them to be baptized or confirmed in the Catholic Apostolic and Roman Church; and the same is forbidden to those of the said religion pretended Reformed, upon penalty of being punished with especial severity.

The chief cause that I fell out with the pope was this: the pope boasted that he was the head of the Church, and condemned all that would not be under his power and authority …. If the pope were the head of the Christian Church, then the Church were a monster with two heads, seeing that St. Paul says that Christ is her head. The pope may well be, and is, the head of the false Church.

I am not sure I can make clear what it means to say I come from the Catholic side of Protestantism, but at the very least, it means that I do not think Christianity began with the Reformation.

The three great elements of modern civilization, Gun powder, Printing, and the Protestant religion.

(People object to education and Christianization of Negroes on the grounds that:) That it would make them less governable; the contrary to which is experimentally known amongst their Neighbours, both French & Spaniards in those parts. Now 'twould be too great a blemish to the Reformation, to suppose that Popery only makes its Converts better, but Protestancy worse; as this Allegation being admitted, it must be granted

There is this difference between the Church of Rome and the Church of England: the one professes to be infallible, the other to be never in the wrong.

Thou hast signified to us, indeed, most beloved son in Christ, that thou dost desire to enter into the island of Ireland, in order to subject the people to the laws and to extirpate the vices that have there taken root, and that thou art willing to pay an annual pension to St. Peter of one penny from every house, and to preserve the rights of the churches in that land inviolate and entire. We, therefore, seconding with the favour it deserves thy pious and laudable desire, and granting a benignant assent to thy petition, are well pleased that, for the enlargement of the bounds of the church. for the restraint of vice, for the correction of morals and the introduction of virtues, for the advancement of the Christian religion, thou shouldst enter that island, and carry out there the things that look to the honour of God and to its own salvation. And may the people of that land receive thee with honour, and venerate thee as their master; provided always that the rights of the churches remain inviolate and entire

We have said and we now repeat it, that slavery and the Catholic Church could never get along well together.

As to the matter of relics, it is almost incredible how impudently the world has been cheated. I can mention three relics of our Saviour's circumcision; likewise fourteen nails which are exhibited for the three by which he was fixed to the cross; three robes for that seamless one on which the soldiers cast lots; two inscriptions that were placed over the cross; three spears by which our Saviour's side was pierced, and about five sets of linen clothes which wrapped his body in the tomb. Besides, they show all the articles used at the institution of the Lord's supper, and an infinite number of similar impositions. There is no saint of any celebrity of whom two or three bodies are not in existence. I can name the place where a piece of pumice stone was long held in high veneration as the skull of Peter

And in order to leave no occasion for troubles or differences between our subjects, we have permitted, and herewith permit, those of the said religion pretended Reformed to live and abide in all the cities and places of this our kingdom and countries of our sway, without being annoyed, molested, or compelled to do anything in the matter of religion contrary to their consciences

The truth is that we are all Hussites

Seeing this and envying it, the enemy of the human race, who always opposes all good men so that the race may perish, has thought up a way, unheard of before now, by which he might impede the saving word of God from being preached to the nations. He has stirred up some of his allies who, desiring to satisfy their own avarice, are presuming to assert far and wide that the Indians of the West and the South who have come to our notice in these times be reduced to our service like brute animals, under the pretext that they are lacking the Catholic Faith. And they reduce them to slavery (Et eos in servitutem redigunt), treating them with afflictions they would scarcely use with brute animals….Therefore, We, ... noting that the Indians themselves indeed are true men and are not only capable of the Christian faith, but, as has been made known to us, promptly hasten to the faith, and wishing to provide suitable remedies for them, by our Apostolic Authority decree and declare by these present letters that the same Indians and all other peoples-even though they are outside the faith-who shall hereafter come to the knowledge of Christians have not been deprived or should not be deprived of their liberty or of their possessions

Protestantism derived its penultimate conclusions — namely, that religion rests upon morality, and not morality upon religion, as in Catholicism.

Early modern Calvinism—like Catholicism, Lutheranism, and other Christian isms were a political ideology as much as a set of religious doctrines.

You say you're supposed to be nice to the Episcopalians and the Presbyterians and the Methodists and this, that, and the other thing. Nonsense, I don't have to be nice to the spirit of the Antichrist.

The same thing which is now called Christian religion existed among the ancients. They have begun to call 'Christian' the true religion which existed before.

I can't bear Catholicism.

I'm a Catholic, but I used to love going to Vacation Bible School with my fundamentalist friends.

I have now disposed of all my property to my family. There is one thing more I wish I could give them, and that is the Christian religion.

I'd like to write a history, maybe of the Reformation.

I have friends who are Roman Catholics. I have friends who are Lutherans.

When I hear Mitt Romney say that he believes that Jesus is the Son of God, that He's the Christ, raised from the dead, that He's his savior - that's good enough for me.

By our form of government, the Christian religion is the established religion; and all sects and denominations of Christians are placed upon the same equal footing, and are equally entitled to protection in their religious liberty.