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1100 - Cathari

That family of the sects of the Middle Ages which bore the name of Cathari was characterized by an opposition against the Church combined with gnostic beliefs. Under the pretext of wishing to restore Christianity to its original form, they made war against the Church, which, according to them, was disfigured by riches.

The opinion that these destructive sects took their rise from an antipathy conceived by some Graeco-slavic monks against some Latin mode of worship which had been imposed upon them, is not correct. The case is contrariwise ; these sects originated from a union of the gnostic sects of the East, the so-called Paulicians or Bogomiles, with some unquiet spirits who had been scandalized at a rich and powerful Church. This assertion is not only supported by exterior, reasons, but also by the peculiar doctrines and regulations of these sects, which so greatly contradict Christian teaching in every point as to make it scarcely possible to consider them Christian at all. The doctrine of the Cathari is Dualism. They rejected the principal dogmas of Christianity, - the most holy Trinity, the creation, original sin, the incarnation and redemption. They looked on souls as fallen spirits; and the resurrection was to them the reunion with its heavenly body, of the soul, now imprisoned in an earthly body.

The Cathari rejected the holy sacraments, together with the dogmas of the Church. Only by name they retained the Last Supper (blessed bread) and confession (" Servitium, appareillamentum "). Instead of baptism by water, they had what they called the baptism of the Holy Ghost, or the Consolamentum (consolation), which, according to their doctrine, frees the receiver from all sin without any kind of contrition. Most of the Cathari put off receiving the Consolamentum till their life drew to its close. In case the receiver fell back into sin, - as, for example, ate meat, - he must again have recourse to this (reconsolation). To avert this danger, the "consoled" ("consolati") frequently had recourse to the "Endura," - a process by which, through starvation, bleeding, poison, or other means, they put an end to their lives.

Moreover, all the Cathari were opposed to the ecclesiastical hierarchy, to the veneration of pictures and of saints, to pilgrimages, etc. On the other hand, they had a hierarchy of their own, an esoteric and exoteric doctrine ; and they were divided into two classes, the perfect and the believing (" perfect et credentes"), being in this like the old Manichseans, to whose doctrine their system of morals had great resemblance.

Like them, they forbade every touch of matter, rejected matrimony, prohibited the use of flesh, the killing of animals, all intercourse with worldly-minded people, and all warfare, while they kept strict fasts. But all this was only for the perfect; the imperfect had a more extended license, - they might eat meat, perform military service, contract marriage, etc. According to the testimony of Rainer Sachoni, - who for sixteen years was bishop of this sect, but subsequently became a convert and an inquisitor, - many of the Cathari practised the most filthy impurities, and taught that sin was not thereby committed.