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This is basically a theological debate between two branches of Protestantism: those who oppose dispensationalism and argue that its roots are founded on the doctrine of a Jesuit theologian of the latter seventeenth century, while others (the dispensationalists) maintain that although the priest may have gotten some things right, he was dead wrong in not recognizing the Catholic Church as the biblical Whore of Babylon of Revelation 13, and that, in any event, authentic dispensationalism is biblical.
Those who argue for Jesuit roots base their theory on the writings of only one Jesuit, the Spaniard Fr. Manuel Lacunza, who expressed his eschatological views in his multi-volume work The Coming of the Messiah in Glory and Majesty.
In contrast to authentic Catholic teaching, and similar to the doctrine of later Protestant dispensationalists, Fr. Lacunza espoused a literal, one-thousand-year reign of Jesus prior to the end of the world.
However, Fr. Lacunza’s work didn’t receive support from the Spanish government authorities, and it was later banned by the Spanish Inquisition and put on the Index of Forbidden Books by Pope Leo XII in 1824.
For a faithfully Catholic perspective on premillennialism, dispensationalism, and the related doctrine of the Rapture, see our related tract and articles on catholic.com.
In addition, in a tract on our website, we respond to nine charges of how the Catholic Church is allegedly the Whore of Babylon noted in Revelation 13 (“The Whore of Babylon,” www.catholic.com. In reading this resource, you will see well that the ancient pagan Roman Empire—not Christ’s Catholic Church headquartered in Rome—is the great persecutor of Christians.
We also have a podcast episode on the biblical number 666, a.k.a. “the mark of the beast.”