Since these Christian movements had their beginnings in different parts of the world, many of them overlap. The "heresies" of the previous section continued for centuries, but in our next section we will consider movements that began after the union of paganism and decadent Christianity that became the Roman Catholic Church.

Vigilantius

Very early in the history of the Roman Catholic church Vigilantius came on the scene. He was born in Western Gaul and was an inn- keeper, but about 395 he was ordained to the priesthood. He visited Jerome and immediately quarreled with him on religious matters. Vigilantius accused Jerome of being a heretic, a charge that Jerome levelled back at Vigilantius. Jerome wrote of Vigilantius, "He clamored with me in the Cottian Alps." Interestingly enough, this is the same geographic area in which the Waldenses held forth the truth of the Gospel for many centuries (see Chapter 5) .

Vigilantius condemned the veneration of images and relics; the invocation of the saints; clerical celibacy and monasticism, and he taught that it was useless to pray for the dead. He and his companions sound like early century fundamentalists.

Jerome, on the other hand, sounds like an early Conway, Rumble or Keating. He wrote a defense of monasticism, clerical celibacy and other practices against which Vigilantius protested. This work, Contra Vigilantium, was written in 406.

Iconoclasts and Beregarians

Priest Markoe tells us that the Iconoclasts of the eighth century held to the "abominable heresy" that veneration of sacred images was idolatry. This resulted from an edict issued by Eastern Emperor Leo the Isaurian in 726 that the veneration of images, pictures and relics was idolatrous. It widened the gap that was developing between Western and Eastern Churches, and also promoted the spiritual position of monks, who most ardently defended the veneration of sacred images and were therefore regarded as orthodox Roman Catholics. It is claimed by some Roman Catholics today that the basis of iconoclasm was the Monophysite heresy which denied the humanity of Christ.

Modern fundamentalists might at times be verbally chastised by Romanists for avowing that Catholic image-veneration borders on worship, but the heart-sentiment that is projected toward a mere idol is in far too many cases superior to that devotion which is exercised toward Christ. Roman Catholic theology tries to steer clear of any hint of image worship, but personal practice belies their stand. The Iconoclasts truly saw a problem that has waxed and waned in Roman Catholicism, but which has as its heart disobedience to the much maligned second Commandment.

It is interesting to note that this whole question of images became a burning issue during the Reformation.

The Berengarians were followers of Berengarius of Tours, who died in 1088. He taught that the substance of bread and wine remain unchanged at the Mass (really, the Lord's Supper; the word "Mass" was supplied by Priest Markoe. At that early time even the Roman Catholics didn't call it "Mass). This is a truth that is an undisputable part of fundamentalist theology in the Christian ordinance remembering our Saviour's death for us, life in us and coming for us.

Karl Keating credits Berengarius as being the first theologian of note to oppose the doctrine of transubstantiation, which, of course, was not formally imposed until the Fourth Lateran Council in 1215 and was in the stage of development in the eleventh century. Every Christian has always stood against the perverse doctrines of continuing sacrifices, as he was trusting the one perfect completed sacrifice of Christ.

If the Berengarians were heretics, so are we, and it might surprise you to know that the only thing that has changed is the name. Rome likes to proliferate names of her opponents to give the impression that they are different. So far I have not found one of these ancient Christian groups with which I would fundamentally disagree.

By the year 1140, the vast number of these reformed Christians alarmed the pope, who persuaded the princes to expel them from their territories, and employed many learned theologians to write against them.

Around the year 1147 they were known as Henricians because their most able preacher was Henry of Toulouse.

Petrobrusians

The Petrobrusians rejected the baptism of infants; they rejected Mass and Holy Eucharist. They also condemned altars and churches, and prohibited the veneration of the cross. B.K. Kuiper, in The Church In History, follows the Roman Catholic logic about these early Christians. His book is part of the curriculum of Christian Schools International. Kuiper lumps all these early groups together in what, he states, came to be called Albigenses. (see Chapter 4). He then claims that these Christians who condemned altars and churches did so because church buildings are built of material things. While present-day fundamentalists have church buildings, they must never be thought of to be God's dwelling place, which of course is the inference that grew up quickly in the deteriorating church from the fourth century on. Likewise Kuiper says they did not reverence the cross because it is a material thing. From careful study of what they really did believe, I like to place them more on the side of the godly Bishop of Turin, Italy, (Claude), who was appalled at the rising tide of cross-worship in the Church.

Years before, the Empress Helena, mother of Constantine the Great, had journeyed to the Holy Land in search of the "True Cross" (the Cross upon which Jesus died). She found three crosses at excavations made at what she assumed to be Calvary, and she applied these crosses to a sick person. The cross that effected the cure was thought to be the True Cross.

Along with the "True Nails", Helena journeyed back to Europe. On the way, the ship on which they were sailing ran into a fierce storm, and the only way to calm the storm was to toss one of the "True Nails" overboard. (Rumor has it that the "True Nail" landed back on the deck after the storm ceased.)

At any rate, fragments of the "True Cross" were sent to Catholic churches throughout Europe. There is controversy as to whether there are enough splinters to build a house, but this is taken care of by the ancient Catholic belief, cited by Msgr. Sullivan in The Externals Of The Catholic Church, of the miraculous multiplication of relics, a theory no longer in favor in the Church.

Faced with the superstitious adoration of the pieces of the "True Cross" (to this day on Good Friday in some Roman Catholic churches people come forward to kiss the reliquary in which a sliver of the "True Cross" is contained), Claude said, "If people want to worship a Cross because Jesus hung on one, they should worship a manger because He lay in one, or a donkey because he rode on one."

(Probably if the "True Donkey" could be found, he would be a prized relic.)

A further understanding of the biblical position from Roman Catholic history may be found by consulting the book against the Petrobrusians written by Peter the Venerable, Abbott of Cluny. In the preface to his treatise, the abbot sums up the errors of the Petrobrusians under five heads, which he then proceeds to answer at length.

The first error, Peter says, is their denial that children, before the age of understanding, can be saved by the baptism of Christ.

The Petrobrusians had declared, "Infants, though baptized by you are by no means saved."

The second error charged was that these heretics said, "It is superfluous to build temples, since the church of God does not consist in a multitude of stones joined together, but in the unity of the believers assembled."

The third error enumerated by the abbot is that the Petrobrusians "command the sacred crosses to be broken in pieces and burned, because that form or instrument by which Christ was so dreadfully tortured, so cruelly slain, is not worthy of any adoration."

The fourth error was that they denied sacramental grace, and especially the doctrine of transubstantiation. They are quoted by Peter as saying, "Oh, people, do not believe the bishops, priests and clergy who seduce you; who deceive you when they falsely profess to make the body of Christ, and give is it to you for the salvation of your souls. They clearly lie."

The fifth error Peter mentioned is that "they deride sacrifices, prayers, alms and other good works by the faithful living for the faithful dead, and say that these things cannot aid any of the dead even in the least."

Again, it looks like a plain competition between Petrobrusians and Peter of Cluny - which of them would you say was the Bible believer?

For these "heresies" the founder of this group, Peter de Bruis, was cast into the flames. The Encyclopedia Britannica tells us, "(the Petrobrusians) denied the sacraments and the authority of the ecclesiastical hierarchy."

Even the New Catholic Encyclopedia raises its voice in defense of this maligned group. In Volume XI, page 245ff we are told that they denied only infant Baptism, the priesthood and the Eucharist. This volume goes on to say that the Second Lateran Council (1139) condemned some Petrobrusian ideas but not the movement itself, and that the repudiation of Matrimony often attributed to them belongs probably to other sects.

Priest Markoe takes a stronger line. He tells us that Peter de Bruis, founder of the Petrobrusians, was a monk who tired of the restraint of the cloister, apostasized, and began to preach his errors about 1118. Markoe admits, however, that most of Peter's errors are those held as truths by fundamentalists today. Among those errors were those cited by the New Catholic Encyclopedia plus another of great interest.

Peter de Bruis denied "the utility of prayers for the dead." His was one early voice to speak out against the doctrine of purgatory, which assigns remedial cleansing to a time and place after death. No doubt Peter knew, as do Christians today, that "the blood of Jesus Christ his Son cleanseth from all sin." (I John 1:7). This was one of the charges of heresy, for which Peter de Bruis was martyred. Truly he finds his place among that noble army designated by Rome as heretics, but truly washed in the blood of the Lamb and standing for His truth.

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