You wrote:
“Interesting opinion... not a fact though..”
No, it is a fact. 1) Foxe knew it was propaganda and wrote it with the purpose of attacking the Catholic Church. 2) All Protestant cathedrals and Protestant dignitaries in England were ORDERED by the Protestant government to have a copy on hand so that people could be continuously inculcated with the propaganda.
As the old Catholic Encyclopedia points out:
The Convocation of the English Church ordered in 1571 that copies of the “Book of Martyrs” should be kept for public inspection in all cathedrals and in the houses of church dignitaries. The book was also exposed in many parish churches. The passionate intensity of the style, the vivid and picturesque dialogues made it very popular among Puritan and Low Church families down to the nineteenth century. Even in the fantastically partisan church history of the earlier portion of the book, with its grotesque stories of popes and monks and its motley succession of witnesses to the truth (including the Albigenses, Grosseteste, Dante, and Savonarola) was accepted among simple folk and must have contributed much to anti-Catholic prejudices in England. When Foxe treats of his own times his work is of greater value as it contains many documents and is but largely based on the reports of eyewitnesses; but he sometimes dishonesty mutilates his documents and is quite untrustworthy in his treatment of evidence. He was criticized in his own day by Catholics such as Harpsfield and Father Parsons and by practically all serious ecclesiastical historians.
“The RCC has been tryinh to re-write church history for hundreds of years..”
Nope. The truth is that Protestants invented a fantasy history of the Church which they successfully passed off to their deluded and ignorant adherents. The proof of this is that even Protestants and secularists now recognize facts which their forefathers denied. This is true even in Biblical studies. Hence, DA Carson, who is most definitely a Protestant, can so easily admit that it is just Protestant bigotry which prevents Protestants from admitting that Peter is the Rock in Matthew 16. Times have changed. Just as we now know that the liberals have been lying to us for decades in newspapers and on TV, we now know that Protestants (the fathers of liberalism) were lying about history.
“There is just too much (valid) church history for that to happen though..”
Unlike you, I’m a Church Historian. I studied it on a professional level - and it doesn’t support your fantasies in the least.
I would call that defaming John Foxe..
Talk about propaganda.. The RCC running from its misdeeds is one thing..
Denying them is another..
Telling the truth is not an attack..
Many ex-priests have exposed the RCC for wrong doing...
Martin Luther is not the only one..
Roman catholic church history is a re-write.. and not a subtle one either..
You buy RCC history instead of the real stuff.. your choice..
I post mainly for the lurker.. and seeker allied with no side..
An honest seeker can Google himself and determine what he "will buy"..
and REJECT what appears to fluff and boondoggle..