Committee Against Making Isabella of Castile a Saint

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WE OPPOSE MAKING ISABELLA OF CASTILE A SAINT, FOR SHE CONTRIBUTED TO CRIMES AGAINST HUMANITY, SAVAGE DEATH, AND ECONOMIC DESTRUCTION OF HER SUBJECTS.

There is a group called the 'International Committee for Queen Isabel' that is actively attempting, through political and religious channels, to honor Isabella of Castile by having her canonized and become a Saint to the Roman Catholic Church. This group produced an essay entitled: 2000 years of reasons why we should love the church/Spanish Inquisition. It also states that the terrible horrors and multitudes of victims of the Spanish Inquisition to be no more than myths and falsehoods www.queenisabel.com

On September 27, 1480 Isabella of Castile gave her blessing to the start of what is termed the Spanish Inquisition. Isabella was intimately involved in obtaining a Papal Bull from Rome for this specific purpose. The results of the Inquisition she founded brought Spain to a low point in its history. It proved to be economically disastrous for the country, and hundreds of thousands of persons over many generations suffered from it. Though both Jews and Protestant were chiefly effected by the Tribunals, the Jewish community of Spain suffered the extremes: emotionally, financially, physically, and religiously.

WHEREAS, once Isabella of Castile ascended to the throne there were wide scale massacres of the Jewish people in Valladolid (1470), in Cordoba (1474) and in Seville (1478).

WHEREAS, Isabella of Castile instituted the Tribunal of the Inquisition which had the result of unjustly sequestering personal and real property from Jewish and Protestant victims;

WHEREAS, Isabella of Castile instituted the Tribunal of the Inquisition which had the result of forcing Jewish and Protestant victims to convert from the religion of their fathers under penalty of death or expulsion;

WHEREAS, Isabella of Castile instituted the Tribunal of the Inquisition in Spain, which had the result of imprisoning Jewish and Protestant victims without proper representation or the right to know their accusers;

WHEREAS, Isabella of Castile instituted the Tribunal of the Inquisition in Spain, which had the result of imprisoning Jewish and Protestant victims, sending them to row in the galleys of ships as slaves for years at a time, who had those accused tortured, and who humiliated generations of families through the forced wearing of the 'san benito,' the garment of shame;

WHEREAS, Isabella of Castile instituted the Tribunal of the Inquisition in Spain, which had murdered Jewish and Protestant victims in the name of religion, some of which were in a most gruesome manner, that of being strangled and/or burned--sometimes burned while alive;

WHEREAS, Isabella of Castile in partnership with her husband Ferdinand of Aragon signed an 'Edict of Expulsion' on March 31, 1492 which lead to the destruction of hundreds of thousands of families through financial collapse and physical separation;

AND LASTLEY, Isabella of Castile instituted the Tribunal of the Inquisition in Spain, which although a monarchy under its own rule, committed savage and numerous crimes against humanity.

THEREFORE, we who have given our signatures DEMAND that Isabella of Castile, DOES NOT get honored by the Catholic Church, for it is she through her actions and words who has brought darkness into the world; caused great malevolence, agony, discrimination, pain, distress, wickedness, persecution, misery, suffering, and sorrow to both the Protestant, and especially the Jewish people.

More info: www.sephardicnews.com/isabella.html