Cathar

The Cathars were an 11th-13th AD century Neo-Gnostic Christian sect that flourished in the Languedoc region of France. Cathar theology was influenced by the Bogomils and, to an extent, the teachings of the prophet Mani. In the Languedoc, famous at the time for its high culture, tolerance and liberalism, the Cathar religion took root and gained more adherents during the twelfth century until annihilated under King Philip II with the approval and encouragement of the Papacy.

The Cathars believed in two principles—a good creator god and his evil adversary. They practiced lives of simplicity and chastity. Believing the physical world to be inferior to the spiritual, the avoidance of sex was intended to keep more spirit beings from becoming entrapped in physical bodies. The Cathars were said to have committed ritual suicide, presumably as a release from the burdens of a carnal existence, but the claim of Cathar suicide has been described by some historians as mere propaganda.

The Catholic Church called them Albigenses (from the name of the city of Albi in southern France) or, less frequently, Cathars. The military campaign waged against them is often called "The Albigensian Crusade."

Protestantism as a form of Gnostic Christianity

Relativist interpreters emphasize that "the true value of the Gospel" lies primarily in its profound psychological and emotional impact, in the telling of the story, without the necessity of it being factually and historically true, as a powerful means of causing spiritual transformation through personal identification with "the struggle and triumph of the mythical Jesus invented by Paul and the Gospel writers and the developed tradition of Christianity". The Historical-grammatical method (Literal hermeneutic) of orthodox catholic biblical hermeneutics directly contradicts this approach.

The "myth" assertion that the story of Jesus is an archetypical iconic pattern for personal insight and development—being profoundly "awakened" and transformed by being dynamically engaged and absorbed in the telling of the story—is a prime element of gnostic initiation and Cosmic Humanism, which is in direct opposition to the grounded reality of the Christian mysteries. See

• Joseph Campbell & The Hero's Journey - Odyssey Online. Antioch University, Santa Barbara (odyssey.antiochsb.edu)
• Excerpts from Myth and the Movies, Stuart Voytilla, by Christopher Vogler (tlu.ee) pdf (9 pages)
• Does Jesus follow Joseph Campbell's Hero's Journey? (asyourpoetshavesaid.com)
• Are the Gospels a Myth?, by Fr. Dwight Longenecker - Strange Notions: The Digital Areopagus—Reason. Faith. Dialogue (strangenotions.com) They only seem to be, but they are not a myth.—see Fallacy of analogy.
• Are The Gospels Mythical? by Rene Girard (firstthings.com) Some people insist that they are, in spite of evidence to the contrary.

Author Philip J. Lee, Against the Protestant Gnostics shows that Gnostic tendencies are being taught alongside Christian orthodoxy, and that the Reformation at its heart fostered the inherent Gnostic tendencies toward a disdain for authority and the physical nature of things, and the Gnostic disdain of the sacraments and disdain of the doctrine of the physical resurrection of the body, and a sola scriptura reading of scripture sola spiritu with the hope of a bodiless spiritual-only salvation forever in heaven after death, through a direct "personal relation with Christ" (as a cosmic spiritual entity) and "knowing Jesus" by the "chosen elect". He demonstrates how these teachings of Gnosticism have wormed their way into Christian teachings, particularly in North American Protestantism. Pastor and author Peter Dietsch, in summarizing Lee's book, says, "In both the Old and New Testaments, the knowledge of God is not self-discoverable. God has revealed Himself in and through a community (His people, the Church), therefore He may be known only through that community."

See also

Bogomil: Bogomilism

Burning at the stake, Biblical pretext for