Had the power of the state not been stripped from the church and given to secular government you would still be murdering the same people as heretics which you now claim are accepted as christians:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Waldensian ... aldensians
________________________________
Catholic response to Waldensians
Illustrations depicting Waldensians as witches in Le champion des dames, by Martin Le France, 1451.
The members of the group were declared schismatics in 1184 in France and heretics more widely in 1215 by Pope Innocent III during the Fourth Council of the Lateran's anathema. The rejection by the Church radicalized the movement; in terms of ideology the Waldensians became more obviously anti-Catholic—rejecting the authority of the clergy.
...
Later history
In 1655 the Duke of Savoy
commanded the Vaudois to attend Mass or remove to the upper valleys, giving them twenty days in which to sell their lands. In a most severe winter these targets of persecution, old men, women, little children and the sick "waded through the icy waters, climbed the frozen peaks, and at length reached the homes of their impoverished brethren of the upper Valleys, where they were warmly received." There they found refuge and rest. Deceived by false reports of Vaudois resistance, the Duke sent an army. On 24 April 1655, at 4 a.m., the signal was given for a general massacre, the horrors of which can be detailed only in small part.
Print illustrating the 1655 massacre in La Torre, from Samuel Morelands "History of the Evangelical Churches of the Valleys of Piemont" published in London in 1658.
The massacre was so brutal it aroused indignation throughout Europe. Oliver Cromwell, then ruler in England, began petitioning on behalf of the Vaudois, writing letters, raising contributions, calling a general fast in England and threatening to send military forces to the rescue. The massacre prompted John Milton's famous poem on the Waldenses, "On the Late Massacre in Piedmont".[27] The resistance which lasted into the 1660s was then led by a farmer, Josué Janavel.[28]
Waldensian Church of Florence, Italy
In 1685 Louis XIV revoked the Edict of Nantes, which had guaranteed freedom of religion to his Protestant subjects in France. The cousin of Louis, The Duke of Savoy, Victor Amadeus II followed his uncle in removing the protection of Protestants in the Piedmont. In the renewed persecution,
an edict decreed that all inhabitants of the Valleys should publicly announce their error in religion within fifteen days under penalty of death and banishment and the destruction of all the Vaudois churches. Armies of French and Piedmontese soldiers invaded the Valleys, laying them waste and perpetrating cruelties upon the inhabitants. A pastor Henri Arnaud sought help from William of Orange. He gathered a band of followers in Switzerland; and in 1689 made an attempt to regain their homes in the valleys.
... "
__________________________________________
yrs,
rubato