This is a study of the revealed monotheistic religions, and in particular of Catholicism. It discusses the reasons underlying their dogmatism and fundamentalism. The role played by Christian theocracy in the western world over the past two millennia is described and critically analysed: the insertion of religious power into the governance of European political life, the systematic violence exercised against any attempt at autonomous thought which dissented from the official line of ecclesiastical theology or which simply criticised Church malpractice or which might in any way undermine its...