Talk:Third Order of Saint Dominic

Some minor POV formulations.
I've added a weasel-inline and a POV-statement at two places, where the official attitude of the Catholic church of that time is presented as undisputed facts in a way that I think is misleading. Both refer to the formation of military forces, directed against the albigensians. Taken together, they describe a church which had to take to arms, in order not to be military vanquished by the cathars.

This is surely an historically correct description of the official motives for forming the military orders; but it is, expressed mildly, highly disputed from a factual point of view. In fact, I believe that there is a consensus among historians to the effect that the cathars were subjected to military attacs from forces under the banners of the Catholic church, rather than the other way around. If you disagree with this opinion about the consensus, you should probably wish to rewrite the section Catharism, to begin with.

Actually, I think that rather small changes would remove this POV (and without having to enter into any discussion about who in reality threatened whom with a military annihilation). It should be possible to refer to claimed or perceived threats against the church. The implications of a military threat in the subjugate statement
 * ...demanding physical force with which to restrain equally material opposition

could simply be removed, or a source describing the reasons like this could be provided, with an explicit quotation.

Please note that I am not disputing that the catharism was a "threat" against the Catholic church, in the same manner as protestantic movements to-day threaten the Catholic hegemony in some parts of Latin America. For the 13'th century popes, I guess that this would be an unacceptable threat. I dispute the implied claims in the present article, that there is a consensus among historians, considering this as a military threat. JoergenB (talk) 17:41, 29 July 2010 (UTC)


 * I tried to find the author of the formulations in the history. After a bit of work I could trace it back to the Catholic Encyclopaedia. This does give one possible source to quote for the opinion that the church was military threatened by the cathars.  However, I believe that that encyclopaedia is slightly outdated in some of the opinions expressed there; and some care should be taken to check whether it coincides with official opinions of the Catholic church today.  I know that the church has revised its view on the necessity of anti-Jewish actions somewhat; I do not know whether the same holds for its anti-heretics actions. JoergenB (talk) 12:56, 30 July 2010 (UTC)

I did also a minor POV correction, moving USA-centetered POV bit from article's lead to more suitable place. There is no need to start article about world-wide institution older than USA with indication of that institution's presence in USA - with all due respect to american Dominicans, of course. Better to talk about that in relevant place, where is talk about places. Actually the article seems to need a bit more cleaning-up; looking for sources for things I know - meself am actually lay dominican but personal knowledge counts as original research and won't do, would it? :).

JoergenB, I strongly support your opinion of Catholic Encyclopaedia; it does well as general basis for articles, as it is written in good format, but whenever newer research opposes old CE, corrections must be made in relevant articles. BirgittaMTh (talk) 12:30, 10 January 2016 (UTC)