In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit.
Amen.
About 2,500 years ago, God gave the prophet Daniel a vision of four strange
beasts, representing the four world empires which are now history.
The Babylonian,
Medo-Persian, Grecian,
and Roman.
Daniel's vision foretold with such astonishing accuracy, numerous details of
these empires, that critics were sure his prophecies must have been written after
the events occurred, and tried unsuccessfully for years to prove it.
The fourth beast alone concerns us.
Symbolic of the Roman Empire, it retained characteristics of the three empires that
preceded it.
Yet it was far more dreadful and terrible, and strong exceedingly, and it had great
iron teeth.
It devoured the known world, breaking and trampling all that opposed it.
That Rome fulfilled these prophecies, and the other details of Daniel's vision,
is history.
Nearly 700 years after Daniel, around 95 A.D., the Apostle John was given
three further prophetic visions of this terrible fourth beast, as recorded in
Revelation 12, 13, and 17.
At that time, the world empires, represented by the first three beasts,
had come and gone exactly as Daniel had prophesied.
The fourth beast, the Roman Empire, was then at the height of its power.
It too would fall, but unlike its three predecessors, and exactly as the Bible
foretold, it would not be conquered by a successor.
No fifth world empire would arise to take its place.
Instead, Scripture prophesied that the Roman Empire itself would be revived,
in a more powerful form, to control all of earth just before Christ's second coming.
Numerous scriptures indicate this.
The fourth beast's ten horns represented ten kings that shall arrive.
Since ten kings were never part of the Roman Empire when it existed in the past,
we know that fourth empire must be revived worldwide, composed of ten regions under
separate sub-rulers accountable to Antichrist.
Only then will the second coming take place with Christ returning to destroy
Antichrist and his kingdom, and to set up his own millennial reign over the earth
from Jerusalem.
2 Thessalonians chapter 2, verses 8 and 9 states, And then shall that wicked be
revealed, whom the Lord shall consume with the spirit of his mouth, and shall destroy
with the brightness of his coming, even him whose coming is after the working
of Satan with all power and signs and lying wonders.
Chapters 12, 13, and 14 of Zechariah prophesy these events quite clearly.
So did Daniel.
A stone, that is, Christ, was cut out without hands, which smote the image,
which became like the shaft of the summer threshing floors, and the wind carried it
away.
And the stone that smote the image became a great mountain, Christ's kingdom,
and filled the whole earth.
When will this occur?
Verse 44 explains, And in the days of these kings shall the God of heaven set up
a kingdom, which shall never be destroyed.
Antichrist's worldwide kingdom, the revived Roman Empire under ten heads,
must be established first.
Then Christ destroys it and sets up his own kingdom.
Interestingly, today's world has already been divided into ten regions by the Club
of Rome, a division which is now followed by mutual agreement in the banking and
computer worlds.
John saw this fourth beast three times, first as a red dragon seeking to destroy
Israel.
And behold a great red dragon, having seven heads and ten horns,
and seven crowns upon his heads.
And the great dragon was cast out of heaven, that old serpent, called the devil
and Satan, which deceiveth the whole world.
In chapter 13, this dreadful beast appears again, representing the revived Roman
Empire, whose deadly wound was healed.
And also its ruler, the Antichrist, whom all that dwell upon the earth shall
worship.
Notice, the dragon gave him his power and his seat and great authority.
So the red dragon, who is Satan, is actually building his kingdom and using
Antichrist to his own ends.
Prophecy for telling the future.
Assorted psychics claim to do it, but fail miserably.
Nor is prophecy found in the Koran, Hindu Vedas, Bhagavad Gita, the sayings of
Buddha, Confucius or Muhammad, the Book of Mormon, or the writings of
Mary Baker Eddy, and so forth.
The Bible alone reliably foretells the future.
About 30% of God's Word is comprised of hundreds of specific prophecies and a
record of 100% accuracy.
These are not clothed in the ambiguous language of the French quatrains of
Nostradamus, but are clear declarations about world-shaking and history-making
events hundreds and even thousands of years beforehand.
For example, that the Jews would be cast out of the promised land and scattered to
every corner of this earth.
And today, the wandering Jew, as they are called, is everywhere.
That they would be hated, persecuted, and slaughtered as no other people.
The outrage of anti-Semitism is a phenomenon absolutely unique to the Jews,
precisely as the Bible foretold.
Yet the Bible also prophesied that in spite of being scattered worldwide for
2,500 years since the Babylonian captivity, with every reason to intermarry
and change their identity to escape persecution, and in spite of a thousand
Hitlers determined to exterminate them, the Jews would be preserved as an
identifiable ethnic people and brought back to their own land in the last days
just before Antichrist would set up his kingdom.
And so it happened in 1948.
Even more astonishing, the Bible said that Jerusalem would become the key to world
peace, and would be a cup of trembling, a burdensome stone around the necks of all
nations.
And today, exactly as it prophesied, Jerusalem is the United Nations' number
one problem.
And the world looks on in fear and trembling, knowing that the next world war
could break out at any moment over that tiny city.
The undeniable fulfillment of these and scores of other prophecies provides
irrefutable evidence that God exists and that the Bible is His revelation to man.
Prophecy is likewise unique to Israel's Messiah.
There were no prophecies concerning Buddha, Mohammed, Confucius, Zoroaster,
Joseph Smith, or any of the founders of the world's religions.
Yet there are over 300 prophecies concerning the Jewish Messiah,
that he would be born of a virgin in Bethlehem, a descendant of King David,
that he would perform miracles, convert the Gentiles, that he would ride
into Jerusalem on a donkey and be hailed as the Messiah, and that this would occur
on April 26, 32 AD, now celebrated as Palm Sunday, and that four days later,
having been betrayed for exactly 30 pieces of silver, he would be crucified,
a form of execution unknown at the time of that prophecy in Psalm 22, and that three
days later, he would rise from the dead, an astonishing event that separates
Christianity from every religion and for which we have irrefutable evidence.
These are but a few of the prophecies concerning the Messiah, prophecies so
numerous and specific and their fulfillment in the life, death,
and resurrection of Jesus Christ so indisputable that no one can honestly deny
that he is the prophesied Savior of sinners.
And the Bible says that he is coming back to earth in judgment.
The 100% fulfillment of biblical prophecies right on schedule assures us
that those still future will also be fulfilled.
The last book in the series of visions given to the Apostle John.
There are three visions of the fourth beast representing Satan, the Antichrist,
and the revived Roman Empire that he will rule.
There is another intriguing figure, however, which is given even more space
and prominence than the beast, a mysterious woman.
In John's third vision of this scarlet beast with seven heads and ten horns,
a woman rides the beast, and not as in a rodeo on a creature that is trying to buck
her off, but sitting relaxed and comfortable, obviously a key player in the
unfolding drama of Antichrist's rule over the revived Roman Empire.
First of all, she's a city built on seven hills.
The beast's seven heads are seven mountains, or hills, on which the woman
sits.
Several cities sit on seven hills, but John's vision eliminates all but one.
Emblazoned on her forehead are the words, Mystery Babylon.
Saddam Hussein began building Iraq's ancient city of Babylon, headquarters of
the first world empire.
Today, though Saddam is no longer in control of Iraq, and construction has
ceased, many Christian leaders teach that the woman is that city, rebuilt as world
headquarters for the Antichrist.
But the Bible says that the fourth empire, headquartered in Rome, will be brought
back to life, not the Babylonian empire.
And Babylon was not built on seven hills.
Rome was, and has been, known universally as the city of seven hills.
The Catholic Encyclopedia states, quote, It is within the city of Rome,
called the city of seven hills, that the entire area of Vatican State
proper is now confined.
Interestingly, Rome was also known as Babylon.
Catholic apologist Carl Keating writes, Babylon is a code word for Rome.
It's used that way six times in the last book of the Bible and in extra-biblical
works such as Sibling Oracles, The Apocalypse of Baruch, and Esdras.
Eusebius Pamphilius, writing about 303, noted that Peter referred to Rome
figuratively as Babylon.
Could Rome be the woman on the beast?
That would make good sense, because the beast she rides is the revived Roman
Empire.
This woman is also called the Great Whore, with whom the kings of the earth have
committed fornication.
Obviously, literal whoredom and fornication would be impossible for a
city, but spiritual fornication would be possible if the city were a spiritual
entity.
Jerusalem is such a city.
It is called the holy city and the city of God, having been chosen by God to
represent him to the nations.
Tragically, Jerusalem violated that relationship and was repeatedly accused by
God's prophets of spiritual harlotry and adultery.
Isaiah said of Jerusalem, How is the faithful city become a harlot?
Jerusalem, however, can't be the woman riding the beast, because it wasn't built
on seven hills, nor does it meet any of the other criteria in John's vision.
One other city, and only one in the world, is a spiritual entity and could therefore
commit spiritual fornication with the kings of the earth, and it is built on
seven hills.
Again, that city is Rome, the headquarters of Roman Catholicism, which declares
itself to be the headquarters of the true church.
Its pope claims to be the vicar of Christ.
Moreover, the Roman Catholic Church asserts that its members have replaced
Israel, the true people of God, and that Rome is therefore the new
Jerusalem.
Catholic Rome claims the very titles God gave to Jerusalem, the holy city,
the city of God, and even the eternal city.
We have already discovered from John's vision that these four criteria,
being a city known as Babylon, built on seven hills, and committing
spiritual fornication with earth rulers, have ruled out every city on earth except
Rome.
We are, of course, not talking about political civil Rome, but about religious
Rome, and more specifically, the Vatican and the Roman Catholic Church.
John Paul II has gathered leaders of the world's major religions a number of times
and embraced them all as worshippers of the true God, including Hindus,
Buddhists, Muslims, Animists, Shintoists, shamans, witches, and others.
He told Hindu audiences in India that he had not come to teach them anything,
but to learn from their rich spiritual heritage to which the entire world ought
to give heed.
Everyone is embraced by Rome, except evangelical Christians, whom the Pope
calls sects, and warns Catholics against their errors, as he did in Mexico City in
May 1990, and elsewhere since that time.
One need only read the quote ecumenical unquote documents coming out of the
Vatican from the Pope and Cardinals, such as Cardinal Cassidy, President of the
Pontifical Council for Promoting Christian Unity, and Cardinal Orrinze, President of
the Pontifical Council for Interreligious Dialogue, to realize that by ecumenism,
Rome means all religions uniting under the Pope.
This was clear in the general report of Cardinal Orrinze to the Extraordinary
Consistory of Cardinals at the Vatican in April 1991, as it is in Orrinze's new
book, Religions for Peace.
The deception is such that the Lutheran World Federation signed with the Vatican a
declaration saying that Lutherans and Catholics were now in agreement and
basically renouncing the Reformation.
Yet nothing in Catholicism's false gospel of works and rituals has changed.
The prophesied world religion is in the process of being formed before our eyes,
and the Vatican is the headquarters of the movement.
Is this not spiritual fornication?
Has spiritual Rome violated its claimed relationship with Christ, and thus been
guilty of spiritual fornication?
Christ said that his kingdom is not of this world, and that his servants do not
fight.
Yet the Popes, who included some of the greatest military commanders in history,
fought with armies and navies in the name of Christ to build a huge kingdom,
an unrivaled world-wide empire of property, wealth, and political influence
that is very much of this world.
And they have repeatedly engaged in partnership and thus spiritual fornication
with emperors, kings, and princes, claiming to be the Bride of Christ.
The Roman Catholic Church has been in bed with ungodly rulers down through history.
In more recent times, there were even alliances with Mussolini and Hitler.
The Vatican literally put Mussolini into power.
Pope Pius XI and his cardinals praised him as a man chosen by God, and forbade Roman
Catholics to oppose him politically.
In turn, Mussolini signed the Concordat with the Vatican in 1929, making Roman
Catholicism the sole religion of Italy.
The Vatican received 750 million lire in cash and 1 billion in state bonds.
Vatican money helped to start the Nazi Party.
And in 1933, the Vatican made a similar Concordat with Hitler, resulting in its
reception of hundreds of millions of German marks from the Nazi regime.
During World War II, one could not ask for clearer examples of fornication with the
kings of the earth.
Christ never joined forces with Caesar, nor did Peter or Paul.
But the Roman Catholic Church has continually engaged in illicit
relationships with secular rulers right up to the present.
The alliance between Reagan and Pope John Paul II, between the CIA and the alleged
vicar of Christ, can only be called spiritual fornication.
It violated everything Christ taught regarding his church not being of this
world.
Former Secretary of State Alexander Haig acknowledged that, quote, the Vatican's
information was absolutely better and quicker than ours in every respect.
Unquote.
A Vatican liaison to the White House, Archbishop Pio Laghi, kept reminding
Americans officials, quote, listen to the Holy Father.
We have 2,000 years experience in this.
Unquote.
2,000 years of political intrigue, of which the Vatican is clearly the
master.
Hardly what Christ had in mind.
Former Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev has called the Pope, quote, the highest
spiritual authority on earth.
Unquote.
Gorbachev summed up the earthly power of the Roman Catholic Church when he
declared, quote, Pope John Paul II played a major political role in the collapse of
communism in Eastern Europe.
The events in Eastern Europe might not have been possible without the presence of
this Pope, without the great role which he knew how to play on the world scene.
Unquote.
Such praise could never have been directed at Christ or his apostles who were
martyred by the secular world, a world that the Popes have embraced in
spiritual fornication and have even dominated.
Papal worldly power has been wielded for centuries in fulfillment of another part
of John's remarkable vision.
In John's day, it was the Rome of the Caesars that ruled the world.
After the Caesars lost their power, the Popes ruled in their place over even
wider territories and often more ruthlessly.
Pope Gregory XI's papal bull of 1372 in Cunea Domini claimed papal dominion over
the entire Christian world, secular and religious, and excommunicated all who
failed to obey the Popes and to pay them taxes.
That bull was confirmed by subsequent Popes.
And in 1568, Pope Pius V swore that it was to remain an eternal law.
Pope Alexander VI drew a north-south line down the global map of that day,
and in the name of Christ, who possessed nothing on this earth but his robe.
He gave Africa, India, and Asia to Portugal, and the newly discovered North
and South America he gave to Ferdinand and Isabella of Spain, on the condition that
the native inhabitants of those lands must be made to join the Roman Catholic Church
and pay taxes to the Popes.
Rome's dominance in Latin America remains to this day, nor is empire building
relegated to the past.
The Second Vatican Council in Lumen Gentium on November 21, 1964 declared
that, quote, the Catholic Church ceaselessly and efficaciously seeks for
the return of all humanity and all its goods under Christ, unquote, meaning,
of course, under the Pope's, Christ's alleged, vicars.
Pope Alexander II decreed that Harold, the lawful king of England, was the
usurper.
He excommunicated him and his followers and gave the throne to William,
Duke of Normandy.
With the Pope's blessing, William the Conqueror killed Harold in battle,
took over England, and was crowned in London on Christmas Day in 1066.
He accepted the crown of England, quote, in the name of the Holy Sea of
Rome, unquote.
Hundreds of other examples could be given.
There can be no doubt at all about Catholic Rome's identity as the city known
as Babylon, built on seven hills, which committed spiritual fornication with
the kings of the earth and which reigned over the kings of the earth.
No other city even comes close to her in this regard.
Not only is Babylon the code name for Rome, but Rome's connections to Babylon go
much deeper.
Ancient Babylon was built around the ruins of the Tower of Babel, from which its name
was derived.
That tower, designed to reach heaven, was the headquarters of the first world
religion, just as Rome will be for the coming world religion of Antichrist.
Furthermore, just as Babel's tower and city united church and state, so the popes
wielded both civil and religious authority.
And in like manner, the woman and the beast she rides will unite the coming
world government and world religion.
With its attempt to reach heaven by steps of its own making, Babel, Babylon,
was the ultimate works religion.
And so it has always been in Roman Catholicism.
Salvation is unquestionably by works.
Vatican II declares, to gain indulgences, the work prescribed must be done.
From the most ancient times in the church, good works were also offered to God for
the salvation of sinners.
All men may attain to salvation through faith, baptism, and the observance of the
commandments.
Clearly, good works play a key role in earning salvation in Catholicism,
as even the average Catholic would testify.
The Council of Trent, as re-proposed by Vatican II, decreed, if anyone says that
the sacraments of the new law are not necessary for salvation, and that without
them, men obtain from God through faith alone the grace of justification,
let him be anathema.
Unquestionably, by its practice of salvation through good works and ritual,
Catholic Rome fits the description of the woman whose name is Babylon.
John tells us that the name Babylon, emblazoned on the woman's forehead,
is preceded by the word mystery.
And again, mystery is the very heart of Roman Catholicism.
Pope Paul VI's encyclical on the Eucharist is titled Mysterium Fide.
Vatican II refers repeatedly to the mystery of the Eucharist.
The Vatican's new universal catechism declares that all of the church's liturgy
is mystery, and that its aim is to initiate souls into the mystery of Christ.
It is mystagogy, it says.
By claiming to be the custodian of a mystery which only its priests and bishops
can mediate, the Roman Catholic Church keeps its members dependent upon it,
rather than upon Christ, for their salvation.
John notes that the woman on the beast is clothed in purple and scarlet,
once again the very colors of the Roman Caesars and also of the Roman Catholic
hierarchy.
The Catholic Encyclopedia declares cassock, also called soutane, the
close-fitting ankle-length robe worn by the Catholic clergy as their official
garb.
The color for bishops and other prelates is purple, for cardinals, scarlet.
The woman riding the beast has a golden cup in her hand.
A golden chalice is used in the Eucharist or Mass and is the holiest instrument in
Roman Catholicism.
John perceives that this golden chalice is filled with the filthiness of her
abominations.
Could that be the Bible's view of the sacrifice of the Mass, which is the very
heart of Roman Catholicism?
Such was the conviction of hundreds of thousands of Christians throughout history
who were burned at the stake for refusing to participate in the sacrifice of the
Mass, which they earnestly believed was the greatest abomination conceivable.
Why?
Because it claims to be the literal sacrificial offering presented again and
again of the Body and Blood of Christ.
Whereas the Bible clearly states that Christ's sacrifice upon the cross was
completed once and for all, never to be repeated again.
Quote, Now once in the end of the world hath he appeared to put away sin by the
sacrifice of himself.
Hebrews 9.26.
Catholicism claims that when at the Last Supper Christ said, This is my body,
this is my blood, he had to be taken literally.
The bread and wine he held in his hands had with those words become his literal
body and blood.
And when the priest speaks those words today, the bread and wine become again
Christ's literal body and blood, to be sacrificed endlessly on Catholic
altars, as truly as Christ was sacrificed on the cross.
Yet no one takes it literally.
When Christ said, I am the door, I am the light of the world, I am the good
shepherd, or when he called his disciples sheep, Christ was obviously speaking
figuratively when he referred to bread and wine as his body and blood.
There is no way that the bread could literally be his body when he was sitting
there in his physical body holding it, much less can millions of tiny wafers each
be simultaneously Christ's literal body, soul, personality, divinity, whole and
entire, as Catholicism claims.
That is not literalism, but mysticism, the mystery emblazoned on one's forehead.
Christ said, I am the bread of life.
If any man eat of this bread, he shall live forever.
John 6, 48 and 51.
Yet he was not referring to physical bread, nor did he refer to physical life
and death.
There is another grave error involved.
Vatican II declares, our Savior at the Last Supper instituted the Eucharistic
sacrifice of his body and blood.
The Council of Trent agrees that Christ, at the Last Supper, offered up to God the
Father his own body and blood under the form of bread and wine.
If so, then he was sacrificed for the sins of the world at the Last Supper before he
went to the cross, which is rank heresy.
Indeed, he didn't need to endure the literal physical suffering of the cross at
all if Catholic priests, as they claim, can truly turn bread and wine into the
literal body and blood of Christ and offer it as a propitiatory sacrifice on their
altars.
The Pocket Catholic Dictionary states, The Mass is a truly propitiatory
sacrifice, by which the Lord is appeased, he grants grace, and he pardons
wrongdoings and sins.
The Council of Trent declared, The Eucharist is the true and only
sacrifice.
If so, the literal cross isn't needed.
Of course, Catholicism teaches that the cross is essential, yet it reduces the
cross to the same level as the Mass, declaring that Christ's sacrifice upon the
cross is only effective in its repetition in the Mass and then only partially each
time the Mass is repeated.
It takes many repetitions of the Mass to take a soul to heaven.
Indeed, the Pope himself cannot tell how many Masses may be needed, as the Pocket
Catholic Dictionary explains.
Finally, the Mass is the divinely ordained means of applying the merits of Calvary.
These blessings are conferred gradually and continually since Calvary through the
Mass.
The priest is indispensable since he alone, by his powers, can change the
elements of bread and wine into the body and blood of Christ.
The more often the sacrifice is offered, the more benefit is conferred.
In other words, Christ's sacrifice is not yet complete, but is still in process
through the Mass.
Vatican II says, For in the sacrifice of the Mass, our Lord is immolated.
The Mass is a sacrifice in which the sacrifice of the cross is perpetuated.
The Pocket Catholic Dictionary explains that in the Mass, Christ offers himself as
really as he did on Calvary.
Then what did Christ mean when he cried in triumph, it is finished?
The Bible declares that the very fact that the Old Testament sacrifices had to be
repeated daily proved that they could never take away sin.
But in contrast, this man, Christ, after he had offered one sacrifice for
sins forever, sat down on the right hand of God.
For by one offering he hath perfected forever them that are sanctified.
Therefore there is no more offering for sin.
There is a vast difference between the Christ of the Bible and the Christ of
Catholicism who is still being sacrificed and suffering perpetually.
Trying to soften this error, Vatican II explains that in the Mass, Christ
perpetuates in an unbloody manner the sacrifice offered on the cross.
But the Bible plainly declares, Without the shedding of blood there is no
remission for sins.
So the unbloody sacrifice of the Mass, without real suffering on the part of
Christ, can't take away sin.
Catholicism explains that Christ is not really being sacrificed over and over,
but that his sacrifice on the cross is being represented or made present.
Such a statement is meaningless.
An event that was completed in the past cannot be made present.
Moreover, if the past event accomplished its purpose, then there is no reason for
wanting to perpetuate it in the present, even if that could be done.
For example, if a benefactor pays a creditor the debt someone owes,
the debt is gone forever.
It would be meaningless to speak of representing or reenacting or perpetuating
the payment in the present.
The debt has been paid by a transaction that was effected and completed in the
past.
One could well remember with gratitude the payment that was made, but no reenactment
would have any virtue, since there is no longer remaining any debt to be paid.
So it is with Christ's payment for our sins upon the cross.
As he died, he said, It is finished.
Using a Greek expression, tetelestai, which meant that the debt had been paid in
full.
Yet the New Catechism of the Catholic Church says, As sacrifice, the Eucharist
is also offered in reparation for the sins of the living and the dead, and to obtain
spiritual or temporal benefits from God.
That is like trying to pay more installments on a debt that has been paid
in full.
Clearly, the Mass is a denial of the sufficiency of the payment Christ made for
sin upon the cross.
That is a grave error, and those who trust in the sacrifice of the Mass receive no
benefit from Christ's actual sacrifice on the cross and are lost forever.
In order to carry on the work of redemption, the Catholic priesthood claims
to perform the miracle of transubstantiation, turning bread and wine
into the body and blood of Christ, quote, under the appearance of remaining
bread and wine, unquote.
This is supposed to be a great miracle, even though the wafer and wine remain
unchanged in physical appearance and taste.
Yet there is no such miracle in the Bible.
Did Christ ever give a blind man his sight under the appearance of the man remaining
blind?
Did he ever raise a dead man to life under the appearance of the man remaining dead?
The dogma of purgatory is another abomination.
Vatican II says that although Christ suffered to bear our eternal punishment,
we must personally suffer to expiate the temporal punishment due for our sins.
Quote, sins must be expiated through the sorrows, miseries, and trials of this
life, or in the next life, through fire and torments or purifying punishments.
In purgatory, the souls of those who died in the charity of God and truly repentant
for their sins and omissions are cleansed after death with punishments designed to
purge away their debt, unquote.
Yet Peter himself declared that Christ has, quote, once suffered for sins,
he the just for us the unjust, that he might bring us to God,
unquote, not to purgatory.
There is a further contradiction.
Although Catholicism says we must personally suffer, it also says we don't
have to.
Masses and rosaries can be said, even after one's death, to reduce one's
suffering in purgatory.
For those who die wearing the brown scapular of Our Lady of Mount Carmel and
fulfill certain other obligations, that apparition of Mary promised to go
into purgatory the Saturday after their death and take them to heaven.
Therefore, they don't have to personally suffer.
Although they believe that Christ's sacrifice on the cross was not sufficient,
it's alleged repetition in the Mass.
If done enough times, we'll eventually get one to heaven.
Moreover, good Catholics may offer their own sufferings to release souls from
purgatory.
Padre Pio, recently deceased and made a saint by John Paul II, manifested the
stigmata, that is, bleeding from the hands and feet and side, for 40 years to pay the
penalty for the sins of the world so that souls could be released from purgatory.
Of such alleged saints, Vatican II says, quote, they have carried their crosses to
make expiation for their own sins and for the sins of others.
They were convinced that by their suffering they could help their brothers
to obtain salvation from God, unquote.
Again, we see the fatal denial of the sufficiency of Christ's sacrifice on the
cross.
For centuries, the payment of money was to have brought deliverance from purgatory.
That practice eventually troubled Martin Luther's conscience and sparked the
Reformation.
Who can forget the infamous sales pitch of the Dominican friar, Tetzel, commissioned
by Pope Leo X to reap a fortune for Rome, quote, as soon as a coin in the coffer
rings, a soul from purgatory springs, unquote.
With such fraudulently obtained money, St. Peter's Cathedral was built and
repaired.
This was nothing new.
Rome had consistently sold salvation for centuries.
Pope Leo X, quote, said that popes published lists of every crime from incest
to piracy to murder, and the price for which the church would give absolution for
each.
For example, a deacon guilty of murder could be absolved for 20 crowns.
The anointed malefactors, as they were called, once pardoned by the church,
could not be prosecuted by civil authorities because the church reigned
supreme.
Here is a further abomination, filling the woman's cup, selling tickets
to heaven that actually send people to hell.
Similar practices continue in Roman Catholicism to this day.
This is a mass card, obtainable from any mortuary.
Fill in your name and the name of the deceased.
In exchange for an offering, the priest will place the card on the altar when he
says mass, allegedly reducing the time of suffering for the deceased in purgatory.
Of course, the church makes no guarantee as to how much the suffering will be
shortened, nor how many more masses must be said before the gates of heaven can be
opened.
Consequently, multiple masses are purchased in the hope that eventually
there will be enough.
A friend told me that at his father's funeral more than $2,000 in mass cards
were purchased.
Vatican II declares, The Church teaches and commands that the usage of
indulgences, such as mass cards, a usage most beneficial to Christians and
approved by the authority of the sacred councils, should be kept in the Church,
and it condemns with anathema those who say that indulgences are useless or that
the Church does not have the power to grant them.
Some Catholics claim they don't believe in purgatory and indulgences, regardless of
what the Church says.
But if they don't fear their Church's anathemas condemning them to hell,
why do they still trust her promises to get them to heaven?
There are 20 complex rules governing indulgences.
Rule 17 explains that the use of a crucifix, rosary, scapular, or medal can
gain a partial indulgence.
But if this object of piety is blessed by the pope or any bishop, the faithful who
use it with devotion can also gain a plenary, that is, a full indulgence,
on the Feast of the Apostles Peter and Paul.
Here's another abomination, filling that gold chalice.
What kind of God grants special favors to those who possess a scapular or bishop and
use it on a feast day of Peter or Paul?
Keep in mind that the Catholic Church is saying that these objects have power to
provide what Christ's sufferings on the cross could not.
Speaking of abominations, the woman is called, quote, the mother of harlots,
unquote.
In addition to spiritual harlots, Roman Catholicism has created literal
harlots by the millions.
Innumerable celibate priests, bishops, cardinals, and popes throughout history
have had their lovers.
There were popes who were the sons of supposedly celibate popes.
Pope Silvarius was fathered by Pope Ormistus and John XI by Sergius III.
The list of bastards who ruled the Church includes Popes Boniface I, Galatius,
Agapetus, Theodore, Adrian IV, and others.
No wonder Pope Pius II, who himself fathered illegitimate children,
said that Rome was, quote, the only city run by bastards, unquote.
For centuries it was a favorite joke that Rome had more prostitutes than any other
city because she had the most celibates.
The sexual exploits of supposedly celibate priests and nuns, once hushed up,
are increasingly being brought to light.
Homosexual priests are dying of AIDS worldwide, with estimates that as many as
70% of priests in some seminaries are practicing homosexuals.
The Roman Catholic Church in America has paid out an estimated $1 billion in the
past few years in out-of-court settlements to conceal sexual abuse among the clergy.
I have a file more than two inches thick, filled with news articles involving sexual
immorality of Roman Catholic clergy, just within the past five years.
It's not that Catholic priests and nuns are any more lustful than the average
person.
They may have started out with higher ideals, but they have had imposed upon
them the unbiblical rule of celibacy, which becomes a burden too great to bear.
The woman in Revelation is also drunk with the blood of the saints and the martyrs of
Jesus.
For centuries, to disobey the popes was heresy punishable by death.
J.
H.
Ignace von Dollinger, a leading 19th century Catholic professor of church
history, confessed, "...since 1183, the view of the Church had been that every
departure from the teaching of the Church must be punished with death, and the most
cruel of deaths by fire." For one thousand years before the Reformation, there were
Christians who refused to give allegiance to Rome, and who were slaughtered by the
millions.
Everyone knows of the Crusades to retake the Holy Land, but few know that even
larger and more numerous Crusades were fought in an attempt to exterminate
Christians all over Europe, who, out of conscience to God and obedience to
the Bible, would not submit to the authority of the popes or embrace Rome's
heresies.
Of these martyrs, historian Will Durant wrote, "...the Roman Church, they were
sure, was the whore of Babylon." Such was the opinion of the Reformers, written into
the Reformation creeds.
One could hardly come to any other conclusion from John's vision,
yet that opinion is being abandoned and even ridiculed by evangelicals in the
interests of ecumenism.
The popes promised instantaneous entrance into heaven for those who gave their lives
slaughtering the heretics.
It took about a century to exterminate the Albigensian Christians, who at one time
were the majority of the population of southern France.
Among the cities wiped out by Pope Innocent III was Béziers, France.
60,000 massacred there, including women and children.
In the infamous St. Bartholomew's massacre in August 1572, 70,000 Huguenots were
killed.
Another 200,000 were slaughtered over a period of months, causing 500,000 to flee
to Protestant countries for refuge.
The Waldenses were all but exterminated, as were the Hussites.
Here is an excerpt from Pope Martin V's letter to the King of Poland in 1429,
100 years before the Reformation.
Know that the interests of the Holy See and those of your crown make it a duty to
exterminate the Hussites.
Remember that these impious persons dare proclaim principles of equality,
that all Christians are brethren, that Christ came on earth to abolish
slavery.
They call the people to liberty.
While there is still time, then, turn your forces against Bohemia.
Burn, massacre, make deserts everywhere, for nothing could be more agreeable to God
or more useful to the cause of kings than the extermination of the Hussites.
We haven't time to mention the horror of the tortures and murders of the
Inquisitions that terrorized Europe for centuries.
There is no city on earth that has shed more blood, both of Christians and Jews,
than Rome.
Pagan Rome threw Christians to the lions and killed them in periodic persecutions
during the first three centuries.
That was nothing, however, compared to the slaughter of both Christians and Jews by
Catholic Rome.
Historian Will Durant writes, candidly, quote, compared with the persecution of
alleged heresy in Europe by the Roman Catholic Church, the persecution of
Christians in the first three centuries after Christ by pagan Rome was a mild and
humane procedure, unquote.
Yes, this woman is indeed drunk with the blood of the saints and the martyrs of
Jesus, and no other city comes even close to Rome in this regard.
The fact that a woman rides the beast also points to Roman Catholicism in which the
main figure is a woman, a supposedly sinless, perpetually virgin, and
all-powerful Mary, whom Rome has invented and worships.
Catholics deny that they worship Mary and insist that the devotion and honor they
give her is of a lesser quality than that given to God the Father, Son, and Holy
Spirit.
Perhaps in theory, but not in practice.
There are thousands of large and ornate shrines to Mary around the world,
nearly 1,000 in France alone, visited by hundreds of millions each year,
yet scarcely a handful of shrines to Christ, and those that do exist are
generally very small, with few visitors.
Pilgrims to Mary's shrines come to ask for her help and protection.
Both the New Universal Catechism of the Catholic Church and Vatican II declare,
quote, From the most ancient times, the Blessed Virgin has been honored with
the title of Mother of God, to whose protection the faithful fly in all their
dangers and needs, unquote.
Why fly to her protection, when God's protection is available?
And if this Catholic Mary can indeed protect all Catholics from all dangers and
supply all their needs, then she must be at least as great as God, and is
apparently more sympathetic, because at least 100 times as many prayers are
offered to Mary, perhaps even 1,000 times, as to the Father and Christ combined.
It is Christ, not Mary, who died for our sins.
Has he not proved his love?
He says, If any man thirst, let him come unto me and drink.
Whoever comes to me I will not turn away.
I give my sheep eternal life, and they will never perish.
No one can pluck them out of my hand.
He that believes on me has everlasting life.
Yet the Catholic looks to Mary.
The most recited Catholic prayer, the Rosary, cries out to Mary for help,
calling her Mother of Mercy, our life, our sweetness and our hope.
The Bible says that Christ is our life and our hope, and surely God's mercy was
extended to mankind before Mary was born, so she could hardly be its mother.
The Catholic Mary is not the Mary of the Bible, but is in fact the woman who rides
the beast.
She is appearing around the world in thousands of apparitions, offering her
plan of peace for the world, and millions are placing their trust and belief in her
rather than in Christ.
Antichrist is coming to establish his world government and world religion in
partnership with the woman who rides the beast.
This city on seven hills whose code name is Babylon, whose colors are purple and
scarlet, who has committed fornication with the kings of the earth and has ruled
over them, who calls her unbiblical doctrines mysteries to deceive her
followers, who has a golden cup in her hand full of abominations, and who is
drunk with the blood of the saints, she will play a vital role until God's
judgment comes upon her.
In the meantime, a voice cries from heaven, Come out of her, my people,
that ye be not partakers of her sins.