I read the Jesuit Oath that you referred to and it reminded immediatley of a couple of instances in history that were dramatically influenced by both this oath and the counter-reformation. I'm sure there are many, many more!
The portion of the Jesuit Oath that stuck out was:
"...he hath power to depose heretical Kings, Princes, States, Commonwealths, and Governments, and they may be safely destroyed. Therefore to the utmost of my power I will defend this doctrine and His Holiness's right and custom against all usurpers of the heretical or Protestant authority whatever, especially the Lutheran Church of Germany, Holland, Denmark, Sweden and Norway, and the now pretended authority and Churches of England and Scotland, and the branches of same now established in Ireland and on the continent of America and elsewhere and all adherents in regard that they may be usurped and heretical, opposing the sacred Mother Church of Rome. I do now denounce and disown any allegiance as due to any heretical king, prince or State, named Protestant or Liberal, or obedience to any of their laws, magistrates or officers."
The first historical impact that this oath reminded me of was this:
Garry Willis, a Roman Catholic, explains in his book Witches & Jesuits: Shakespeares Macbeth. (Oxford. Oxford University Press. 1995) that Macbeth was just one of many plays in its day that were gunpowder plays. Willis reiterates the historical account of The Gunpowder Plot of 1605 which was a plot by Catholic Jesuits to destroy Englands Parliament and King James in accordance with their oath and in order to destroy the fruits of the Reformation. He provides evidence that in Macbeth, Shakespeare writes of the theme of the Catholic Jesuit Doctrine of Equivocation. This Jesuit doctrine states that one can say something different than what he really believes and remain guiltless in the sight of God. Therefore the Jesuits guilty of trying to kill King James and Parliament could say with their mouths in court that they did not try to kill them but in their hearts say "did try to kill them" and not be guilty before God. This doctrine was discovered in communications between the Jesuits on trial and Jesuits in Rome who were trying to help them. Willis said Shakespeare, who was living through this time and a friend of King James and the Reformation, portrayed the witches in Macbeth as Jesuits and then wove into Macbeth the Jesuit Doctrine of Equivocation. This is what the witches meant when they utter that famous phrase Double double toil and trouble. The most notorious examples of equivocation in Macbeth are the witches prophesies for Macbeth Specifically, Macbeth is prophesied by the witches to become king. So, Macbeth reasons with equivocation that he can kill the current king, because he was prophesied to become king anyway. Also, the witches tell him that None of woman born shall kill Macbeth (4.1.94-95). Macbeth is deceived by this because of this equivocating language but we later find out a man born of a C-Section kills him. Susceptible to these equivocations, Macbeth is misled and indirectly destroyed by them.
The second was this:
Dr. Frank Hancock, an independent scientist, has developed a theory to account for the high mortality rate in Jamestown's early years. He believes that it was a Jesuit plot to destroy the Protestant colony at the same time as the Gun Powder Plot, and that someone could have put arsenic in the settlement's food supply. This theory and substantial evidence supporting it was recently featured on PBS.
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