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By Punkerslut
Giordano Bruno was burned at the stake 400 years ago. He was tied up, as they gathered wood at his feet. Some report that he was wearing a shawl with daemons emblazed on it, and others say that he was stripped. The reason he was burned was his heresy and his refusal to conform to the Vatican's will. A Pantheist, he believed that nature was god, and all other theology was fundamentally flawed. Giordano Bruno was burned alive 400 years ago by cruel, mindless men, and upon hearing what his fate would be, he said, "Perhaps you deliver my punishment with more fear than I receive it." Oh, what bravery, courage, and stamina of life! This may have been the test of humanity. The spirits of charity and courage watched -- they saw the lighting of his body, the soft glow of embers, they saw what we all now know: that humanity failed; that kindness and justice were overthrown, treated as vestiges and given no value. Giordano Bruno was burned 400 years ago, the flames engulfing his torso, blistering his skin, turning his insides molten. And as I read and learn of the glorious martyr, with his death being a sign forever of the extent of cruelty, I come to uneasy questions about myself. Would I do the same? What would the flame taste like? How long would it last? Asking questions to myself, I seem more and more like a strange. Sometimes I wish I could meet this hero of every Humanitarian. And I wish I could ask what was so precious to him, how he had lived, how he died, the loves and hates that spurred into passion this giant among men. Let me see the spark that burst into flames in his soul. I want to know the man as a person, as I already know him as a hero. Giordano Bruno met his fate by the hands of men without thought, without consideration. Their dead, still faith in religion was what made them brutal, ignorant, and merciless in their actions. Bruno's mind had the storm of turmoil, the constant banging of waves of thought against each other, a conviction like a ship, constantly battered and attacked. His brain operated on levels surpassed by those who killed him, and the violators of truth and humanity are of a low incomparable. He had so much compassion, and they had so much animosity and unwillingness. Their decision was biting, whiping sand, slashing at the face of progress, as she struggles to move forward. Giordano Bruno was slaughtered by the cruelest inquisitor 400 years ago. His life was smothered by the flame, just as much as they tried to smother his mind and his thoughts. The church, by defiling the sacred creed of humaneness, and by killing Bruno it has committed the worst atrocity. It has done away with charity and tolerance, burning those values alongside the tender body of our greatest hero. He burned, so do our hearts at these thoughts. Sitting on the fields of our planet, straw grass reaching to the sun, here I ask questions. Did the family of Bruno ever touch this spot? Did his ashes ever reach this location? Possibly. Did he die here? No, he was burned at Campo de Fiori. But did his ideas come here, his strength and boldness existing for eternity and reaching out to anyone who has ever desired truth; did the flame in his heart spurn enough to captivate the minds of humane men and women; did the beliefs of this hero continue on in our world, to inspire, to encourage, to invoke thought and kindness? The only answer I can give to this is the truth: yes. Giordano Bruno was executed by the church 400 years ago. And after his death, the pope called him a coward. Such a physical manifestation as the pope, no more mystical or divine than any other Italian, and so full of brutality and hypocrisy. Bruno, this man of the people, he loved beauty and goodness, he cherished pleasure and happiness, and he treated others with a respect and fairness unparalleled. Yet one so indignant of justice and respect -- a man so full of arrogance to believe that god speaks only to him -- this man, this pope, is nothing more than a rogue controlling fools, nothing more than a vulture swarming over humanity, nothing more than the embers at the feet of justice. Giordano Bruno was burned at the stake 400 years ago by the church, and the world has yet to see such a hero again. Punkerslut,
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