Holy Inquisition

The Holy Inquisition, or Roman Inquisition was the name given to the group assigned to protect the integrity of their faith by not allowing false or incorrect doctrines and errors to enter the Roman Catholic faith. It was developed in the mid to late 16th century and remaind a group till the mid 18th century. This groups job included ostracizing those who opposed parts of thier religion. The majority of these people that were excommunicated were placed in that position usually due to a crime they commited dealing with heresy. The most common forms of heresy were blasphmy, witchcraft, sorcery,and divination. These blackballed people were often imprisoned or even killed. The Roman Inquisition censored all literature and documents against their beliefs and they felt so strongly about their beliefs that they were willing to go to any extreme measures to preserve their faith. The other goal of the group was to ward off Protestant reformers and their spread across Italy as well as thier influence on Catholics.

The most well-known "inquisitions" happened during the 16th to 18th centuries, like described above. However, there were a couple waves of "inquistions" during medieval times. They were in response to heretical movements that threatened the church. The practice would be used again, as evident above. (added by Schmidt)