More St. Barthlomew Massacre

Oh you didn't really think that the slaughter of Huguenots in France was over did you.  Death was everywhere.  In the country side, in the cities, everywhere.  Refugees reported that instruments of death had been erected in every town and village in France. 

September 17th saw the beginning of the massacre in Rouen.  The killing was done in Paris and some other places, but it was not yet done throughout the country.  Rouen had sought to protect the Huguenots because of a kindly governor.  But commands from the king came for him to depart Rouen and try to calm the countryside of Normandy.  When he left, the massacre began.  Many Protestants had been arrested or turned themselves in for protection in the prisons.  All the prisons in the city were now full and other Huguenots stayed in the Parliament house.  Those were killed first, then the prisons slaughtered and any who were left in town ridden down and killed or forced to convert.  About 3,000 converted to Romanism before the end of the year.  Many had fled prior to the 17th as the houses of the rich were simply looted because they had left.  Many crossed the channel to Britain.  Thus the majority of the killed were poor or middle class.  After the massacre complete the dead were stripped naked and their clothes given to the needy of the town.  Numbers differ widely on how many died, but what is known is that over 16,000 Huguenots lived in Rouen before the slaughter and only 3,000 remained after it. 

Questions to ask RC Jr.

The Ashley Madison hack has caused lots of problems for lots of people.  One of the people coming to light as having visited Ashley Madison is Pastor RC Sproul, Jr.  He confessed to his presbytery and to Ligonier Ministries.  Ligonier has suspended him.  Since it is a business, and businesses operate on a different model than churches, Ligonier’s response or responsibility is not part of what I want to discuss.  The real question is, what does a church do with someone who visited the site but did not have an affair?  Should such a man be disciplined (or if a paster, defrocked)?  How is this different from thinking about having an affair, which is surely a sin, but then not going through with it?  Sproul’s thoughts happened to be recorded in electronic format.  Is this a discipline issue?  Does it make a difference that the site itself is “immoral” since it is dedicated to affairs? 

So what should a presbytery/classis/church do if they find Ashley Madisonites, even ones who haven’t consummated an affair, in their church?  I suggest that someone needs to lovingly, but firmly ask some follow-up questions.  It is very likely that there are ongoing spiritual battles that might require further confession/counseling/accountability.  Here are 5 questions for RC Jr. to get us started:

    •    “How did you find out about the site?”  This seems an important question since I doubt I was the only one to be amazed that such a site existed.  It is not something one just stumbles across while surfing the internet for commentaries on Hosea or looking up the latest baseball scores.  “Were you told of the site?  By whom?”  This is important as it might give more insight into exactly what the mindset was when being tempted to visit the site.  And the referral might have come from a Christian in your church, too.  It is said that about 400 pastors were on the Ashley Madison list. 

    •    “Are you viewing porn?”  This really ought to be first, but it may also be the answer to question one.  I imagine Ashley Madison advertised somewhere, and porn sites seem likely locations for such ads.  If one is contemplating an affair, it could be that one is participating in other sexual sins as well.  Viewing porn is all too commonplace these days, and this question needs to be asked directly.  We do know that Josh Duggar was viewing porn as well as visiting Ashley Madison.

    •    “Why did you pick a site dedicated to affairs?  Why chose a site where meeting you would cause the other person to break their own marriage vows?”  Ashley Madison is marketed as a site explicitly enabling married people to have affairs.  Why not use eHarmony or any other venue featuring single people?  In RC Jr.’s situation, it seems especially important.  His wife had already passed away, so he is free to date and get remarried, and yet he chose to use a site dedicated to affairs.  He was looking for a married woman, in theory.  “Why” is a question that needs to be asked.

    •    “What has changed since the account was abandoned?  How are you dealing now with whatever temptation led you to sign up with the site in the first place?”  I appreciate RC Jr.’s comments about the grace of fear and shame, but the battle is not only to stay off a horrible website but also to be biblically faithful.  The temptation reveals a spiritual battle, and it will find another way to manifest itself if it is not dealt with. 

    •    “What are your relationships like with women in general?”  Going to a site dedicated to getting women to break their vows might be indicative of a poor view of women.  “Do you view them as sex objects?  Do you fantasize about them inappropriately?  Do you flirt too much?”  A man who is signing up to have an affair may very well behave inappropriately with other women he knows.  Not just in person, but in texts and emails.  Maybe cyber life allows him to take on an unchristian persona. 

Obviously, these questions are geared toward the people who visited Ashley Madison but didn’t actually have an affair.  If that is in doubt, an obvious sixth question should be added: “Did you have an affair?”  Make it plain that not just Ashley Madison affairs are being asked.  Those who signed up at Ashley Madison may have found other outlets as well.  Again, note Josh Duggar, who had other accounts on other hookup sites.  His confessed affair did not come via Ashley Madison, but through another avenue. 

We need to remember as Christians that Satan is against marriage.  Marriage is a picture of Christ and the church, and so Satan seeks to destroy it.  Pray for your pastors and their marriages.  Pray for your own marriage.  And do not give Satan a foothold, or he will barge all the way in. 

St. Bartholomew's Day August 28

August 28, 1572 found the killing spread to Caen.  Very little could be found about the slaughter here other than the date it began, and one account claiming Monsieur de Matignon had kept it from being too general a massacre.  Although this also would have about the time Montsoreau would have arrived in Angers from Saumur.  Here Montsoreau began with De La Riviera, a former Huguenot pastor in Paris now residing in Angers.  Montsoreau kissed De La Riviera’s wife, who led him into the garden to see her husband.  Montsoreau informed De La Riviera that he had been sent by the king to kill him, pulled out a pistol, and shot the pastor dead.  Although some accounts of the killing in Angers include the idea that many Huguenots escaped death here because of a man named Puigaillard.  Puigaillard was a man who loved money and took large bribes to not kill the Huguenots, and was bought off by those who could afford it.  Those who could not died. 

One of the interesting things about the Massacre is how many pastors actually got away.  De La Riviera is more of an exception than the rule.  Only two of the five pastors in Paris were killed, and Coligny's chaplain got away.  La Rochelle after the massacre had 50 pastors within its gates.  All but two or three had sought refuge as they fled the general massacre as it spread from city to town to village all through France.  

St. Bartholomew's Massacre August 27th

This day August 27, 1572 saw the massacre spreads to Orleans and Borges.  It began with Chapeaux, a royal councilor and Protestant in Orleans, receiving La Court, a Romanist and soon to be leader of the massacre, in his home and feeding him a meal.  After the meal La Court informed Chapeaux of the massacre in Paris, took his money purse and killed him.  It then began in earnest the next morning and went for four days.  The murders here went about their killing singing the psalms to mock the Huguenots as they used the psalms in their worship.  One Huguenot fencing teacher managed to kill a few attackers, but the massacre was mostly by surprise and found little resistance.  The killing in Orleans was particularly brutal and had a rather high death toll.  It was afterward boasted that 1200 men, 150 women, and many children were slain by the Orleans mob in the four days and then dumped into the river.

In Paris the murders and hysteria began to abate.  It is this day that people begin to try and flee.  Peter Merlin, the chaplain of Admiral Coligny, got up from his hiding place and began to flee.  He had been sustained for three day by a chicken laying an egg in front of him in the barn he hid every morning.  The future Duke of Sully, who was only 12, was removed from the closet where he had been hidden by a priest for three days.  He was smuggled out of town and eventually grew to be an adviser to King Henry IV.  Still, it was not over in Paris, and as we have seen only just beginning in many other cities. Some say the Royal Family finally left the Louvre, but others say they had not yet felt safe enough to venture outside and would not until the 31st.

It is actually these events that bring forth massacre into the English language.  Before it was simply a French word for butcher block, but because of what happens here it becomes known for mass killing, and is used from this time on in English in that way.

You might want to listen to quick discussion about the massacre with some noted historians.  Thanks to Dr. Clark for posting it. 

St. Bartholomew August 26

On the 26th of August, 1572 the St. Bartholomew’s Day Massacre spread to Troyes and La Charite.  I could not find a description of the massacre in La Charite, but in Troyes the news arrived and the killing did not start immediately.  The gates were closed, however, so that no one could get away.  By the 30th the Huguenots were all arrested and put into jail, but few were slain.  Then Pierre Belin arrived in Troyes.  Berlin had participated in the slaughter in Paris and was now sent to Troyes.  When he discovered the people had not slaughtered the Huguenots, he demanded the killing begin in the name of the King.  The local bishop confirmed Belin’s statements.  The local hangman did refuse to start the killing claiming he only killed those who had been found guilty after trial, but others were less concerned with such things and the prisons were emptied by death.  The bodies then plundered and laid out on the streets.  A parade was held the next day so that all could march past and examine the dead Huguenots and learn the price of “heresy”. 

The story also includes a letter to Montsoreau, an agent of the government, from Henry the Duke of Anjou, the King’s brother.  Montsoreau was tasked with killing all the Huguenots in Saumur and then after he finished there to go to Angers both of which fell under the rule of Anjou.  This man began his work giving the orders in Saumur on the 26th.  We can assume he was in Angers within a day or two to carry the massacre to that city as well. 

In Paris the killing continued as more people died.  One old man who had been thrown into the river to drown was able to swim to the far side.  He made his way to a cousin’s house where his wife was hiding. She refused to let him in, and eventually the man was found and killed this time.  Such was the fear during this time.  This is also the day Peter Ramus, the philosopher and Huguenot.  Accounts of his death differ.  Some say they found him in his study of the college because he had come out of hiding on the third day.  Then many still refused to kill him, but finally the third party did.  Others say he was was found in a cellar at the college hiding by his philosophical rival Jacques Chaarpentier, an Aristotelian Catholic.  He took a large sum of money from Ramus and then killed him anyway and threw him from an upper window at the college and the students then ripped his body apart.  It was the third day of rampaging killing in Paris. 

St. Bartholomew's Massacre the next day

Today on August 25, 1572 the St. Bartholomew’s Day Massacre spread to Meaux.  It arrived in Meaux  with a mid afternoon note from Catherine, who was Countess of Meaux.  The gates were seized in the evening and the Huguenots arrested while at supper with many being killed.  Those that lives in the Grand Marche section of Meaux were able to escape since it was across the river.  The men found only women left in the Grand Marche, but managed to kill 25 of them immediately and many others later died from the beatings they received.  The next morning they plundered the houses, killed all the people in the prisons.  There were so many they had to take a break for supper before finishing up.  They then chased those from the Grand Marche area who escaped to surrounding villages down and tried their best to exterminate all the Huguenots in the area. 

Of course in Paris the slaughter continued.  People were carried to bridges to be dropped off and drowned.  More men died such as Pierre de la Place.  He was a well known jurist and author.  He had survived the first day because he paid off the men who broke down his door with 1000 crowns.  However, La Place and his wife could not find anyone willing to take them in.  They were turned away by at least three different houses.  The next day, the 25th, he and his eldest son were killed.  Men came with orders to take them to the palace.  The wife wept, but to no avail.  His eldest son tried to put on the white cross to show loyalty to Rome, but La Place rebuked his son saying they were being called to carry the true cross now.  His son removed the cross, the two went out to go to the place where they were executed immediately.  Just one story out of thousands in the killing that took place in Paris. 

The killing was not just an accidental overflow of excitement.  it was not a Paris mob getting out of hand while the Duke of Guise simply tried to get even on Admiral Coligny.  This was a premeditated campaign of extinction of those who believed in the gospel of Jesus Christ.  And so today it spread from one city to the next by order of the Queen Mother. 

A day to remember freedom of worship

The 24^th of August is St. Bartholomew’s Day and in 1572 it was the day of a massacre known as St. Bartholomew’s Day Massacre.  But in reality it was the start of a season of massacres.  The Massacre begin in Paris when Duke Henry of Guise took his men to kill French Protestant Admiral Gaspard Coligny.  They got most of his men and family as well.  His son-in-law was shot off the roof trying to get away for example. 

The killing lasted 4 days and actually a while week as one Huguenot was killed seven days after it began when he snuck into a parade the king was taking to try and show calm had returned to the city.  The man was recognized and killed right there by the crowd.  The King was less than pleased, but such was the atmosphere. 

What we don’t realize is that the killing often went on longer.  It spread to places like Orleans, Caen, Toulouse, and throughout the rest of France.  Rouen for example actually had their massacre on over a month later, and some killing was still going on in the first week of October.  In many places Huguenots had sought safety in the jails as the authorities had refused to allow the killing, but he eventually they just gave way and allowed it.  The jails were emptied and the Protestants slaughtered. 

All of this happened because the Huguenots were Protestant.  They would not bow the knee to the Pope, nor would they bow the knee to the Mass.  They worshipped differently and demanded the right to do so.  In return, the King tried to wipe them all out.

So today thank God for the freedom of worship (assuming you are reading this from a place that has such freedom) and say a prayer for those places and believers who do not have that freedom.  There are many who still worship in fear that such a massacre will happen to them. 

Pretending about male and female

We all remember times when we were kids, playing with friends, when someone would propose a race: “First one to the _____ (tree, driveway, end of the block, etc.) wins!”  Then everyone would take off running.  Sometimes the guy in last place would say, “Last one to the tree wins!”  Similarly, you might remember that kid who was always changing the rules mid-game, ruling this or that fair or foul, pretending that his new rules were accepted and right all along.  We all knew that he was really just attempting to benefit himself and nullify the good play of his opponents, but there was no way to talk sense into him.  We also all knew what he was doing was selfish and wrong.

There are people today doing the very same thing, only now they’re called heroes and put on the cover of Vanity Fair.  The whole culture is allowing these grown-up children to selfishly change the rules, but this time there is much more at stake than winning the race to the tree.  Bruce Jenner is a man.  He was created a man.  Blood tests would confirm he is a man.  A thousand years from now, if some scientist digs up his bones, he will conclude Bruce was a man.  To even make the pretense of femininity, Bruce would need major surgery and lots of artificially injected hormones.  Even then, he won’t be a woman.

Genesis 1:27 reads, “So God created man in his own image, in the image of God he created him; male and female he created them.”  Bruce Jenner is denying this verse, among others.  He says God did not create him rightly.  Bruce believes God made a mistake and that he knows better than God whether he is male or female.  Bruce thinks he can re-create himself as a herself.  Bruce thinks he is God.  Or better than God.  One of those two.  Asking the church to accept such transgender behavior is nothing less than asking us to abandon the Bible and to quit being Christians.  It is a call to cease living according to the real world that God created and to start pretending with Bruce and everyone else.

And yet it is not enough for Christians to merely live according to the real world.  We have to speak out.  Yes, the world is hostile toward those who do not play along with their fantasies.  But this fantasy is dangerous; it undermines the whole idea of male and female and all that is built upon it.  Gender distinctions are foundational, and losing them would bring chaos.  For example, should transgender men be able to play women’s sports?  Does a school fulfill Title IX if their women’s basketball team is comprised of men pretending to be women?  Maybe more importantly, do you feel safe sending your little girl into a public women’s restroom that’s accessible to men pretending to be women?  It certainly doesn’t seem like public schools are going to recognize gender distinctions
much longer.  They are already starting to teach that gender is a state of mind; they are already “pretending.”

Bruce Jenner needs us to speak out with the truth.  Transgendered people everywhere need to hear the truth.  They need to know where healing really is found, and that’s in Jesus Christ.  Bruce Jenner is not going to be happier or better off as a woman.  He may pretend, but he won’t be.  Bruce knows there is something broken inside of him.  But instead of getting it fixed, he chose to break his body to match his broken soul.  Now the outside and inside match, but he is still broken.  Only Jesus Christ can make the crooked straight.  In Jesus our sinful brokenness can be forgiven and fixed, redeemed and repaired, saved and sanctified.  Bruce, and any others falsifying their gender, don’t need people lauding their sinful brokenness.  They need to be directed to the One who actually can save them.  They need the truth.  And Jesus is the Way, the Truth, and the Life. 

Why do we praise George Whitefield?

I have to admit I am constantly amazed at how high we hold George Whitefield in Reformed circles.  Thomas Kidd has published a series extoling Whitefield as a goodCalvinist and a defender of the faith.  Kidd even goes so far as to say Whitefield's message was "traditional and Calvinist".  This of course is taken for truth without a moments thought by most as Whitefield did attack John Wesley over predestination.  Thus, the article is reprinted at the Aquila Report and linked on Challies.com.  But, why is it that we ignore and overlook all the Reformed reaction against Whitefield?  Yes, he had Presbtyerian allies, especially among those who favored the revival, but he had his fair share of critics who never seem to get a voice.

The Erskines for one broke with Whitefield.  Ebeneezer and Ralph both corresponded with Whitefield in the early 1740’s, but both would later be against Whitefield.  The Erskines and their allies in the Associate Presbytery worried about Whitefield’s poor ecclesiology for starters.  The group would later rescind all invitations to Whitefield to preach in their pulpits.  This led Whitefield into his usual denunciation of all who disagree with him as unbelievers.  Whitefield in a letter declared Rev. James Fisher and the rest of the Associate Presbytery a modern day Babel, doomed to be destroyed.  Not exactly friendly comments.  Ebeneezer Erskine would refuse to stay and hear Whitefield preach, and the Cambuslang Revival in 1742 was condemned by the men of the Associate Presbytery including Ralph Erskine.  They criticized the excesses at the revival and used those to oppose the entire event and Whitefield.  The Associate Presbytery declared a day of fasting to pray against the delusion that was on going.  Rev. Gib declared the whole thing a Satanic delusion and declared Whitefield a false Christ, though years later he seems to have felt he may have been too harsh.  Even with that later sorrow, it seems clear that the Erskines and the other Marrow Men of the Associate Presbytery of the Church of Scotland believed Whitefield to be anything other than Reformed. (a fuller discussion of this can be found in The Marrow Controversy and the Seceder Tradition by William Vandoodewaard chapter 8).  

If that is not enough, let us not forget that in America he had opponents as well.  We do often dismiss them as Pharisees following Gilbert Tennent’s lead, but we usually don’t look at their actual objections at all.  The New Castle Presbytery helped publish a pamphlet entitled “The Querists” that asked questions of Rev. Whitefield’s public teaching in published letters and sermons.  They claim up front that Whitefield’s teachings “savor of Popery and Arminianism” (Querists intro pg. iii).  They challenge statements in Whitefield’s sermons that join repentance with faith in the blood of Christ as to what washes away our sins.  They attack statements where Whitefield denies in his letters that Genesis 3:15 is the beginning of the Covenant of Grace, and in fact denies that God made a covenant of Grace with Adam at all.  They fear this goes into Antinomianism, which they also question in Whitfield especially as he often applauded Wesley’s works.  They question his statements that said man was created with all the perfections of deity and that they are baptized into the nature of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost.  Of course they too take issue with Whitefield’s weak ecclesiology.  And they also question Whitefield’s statements in his journal that make it sound as if God himself speaks to Whitefield’s soul as if he were a modern day prophet. 

It may be that Whitefield can be cheerfully cleared of such charges; however, we seem to only get pieces that hold Whitefield up as a man who is a brave champion of Calvinism or even the Reformed faith.  Yet, so many Presbyterians of the day on both sides of the Atlantic found his theology wanting, confusing, and weak in many areas.  Seldom does anyone actually interact with his theology.  Seldom do we see people discusses his harsh condemnation of people usually on the basis of opposition to himself or mere rumor.  I know that many hold Whitefield up as a great example of a preacher.  I think he probably ought to be held up as a cautionary tale of what not to do.