Heretics

One of the defining features of the Provençal Tribunal is the prevalence of heretics in its borders. While heretics can be found throughout Mythic Europe, many heresies are limited largely to academics and theologians, and are not a general danger to the wider community. However, in Provençal, heresy has become so widespread as to form a serious challenge to the Church.

In the tenth century, the Provençal Tribunal saw the growth of a small heretical group, the Cathars. By 1220, the Cathar faith has become a major and entrenched regional rival to the Church. Their enemies call them Cathars, which means "pure ones," in mockery, or Albigensians after the town of Albi, a stronghold of the heresy. They refer to themselves as Believers, and regard themselves as true Christians, and the Church as hopelessly corrupt, and theologically in error.

The Cathars have developed a church structure of their own. Their "priests" are wandering preachers called Good Men or Good Women, or Perfecti. The Perfecti wear a simple black robe, fast regularly and live lives of poverty and service to the Cathar community. Their faith forbids them any food born of sexual union: eggs, milk, or meat. Fish reproduce asexually, so may be eaten. Perfecti carry a copy of the Gospels with them, and preach renunciation of the material world as necessary for salvation. Because most people cannot live up to the ideal, ordinary Cathars usually only take the vows of the Perfecti as death approaches, donning the black robes and taking part in the single sacramental rite

Beliefs of the Cathars

Cathar doctrines vary. As heretics who have rejected the Church's authority, they are prone to internal disputes over doctrine, and Cathars have highly divergent opinions on religion, though the influence of

Minor, Social Status

of the faith, the consolamentum.

You are not tied to any community and survive by performing, entertaining, or doing other casual work. You may take Academic skills during character creation and should have a reputation regarding the sort of material you produce and your adherence to the tenets of courtly love. The Wealthy Virtue and Poor Flaw affect you normally, although if you are wealthy, you are supported by someone. Your supporter does not question your activities in any way, however.

Troubadour characters often possess virtues such as Famous, Free Expression, Inspirational, Puissant Performance, Social Contacts, True Love, and Well-Traveled.

Minor, Social Status

Due to your training, you may take Academic Abilities during character creation; however, notaries may not be members of the clergy and are subject to secular law. Your responsibilities include drawing contracts, witnessing charters, verifying transactions and documents, and affixing a specially designed seal. Notaries generally receive their salary from their employer on Christmas. Notaries only have jurisdiction in specific realms or towns, such as the County of Nimes or the city of Montpellier. The Wealthy Virtue and Poor Flaw affect you normally.

Heresy is the teaching of error as truth; the spreading of false doctrines. To be a heretic, one must remain within the faith in question—if you leave a faith, you are an apostate, and if you never held the faith you may be an infidel, but you are not a heretic. In Christianity truth is known through a number of sources, the most important of which are scripture (the Bible) and tradition (the teachings of the Church). Religious truth may also be known by special revelation (an individual's religious experiences such as visions or angelic encounters) and through natural theology (looking at the world and what can be established by empirical study of fallen creation) and by reason, where one logically examines the nature of things. All of these can be snares for the unwary, where errors or demonic deception can lead one astray, and heresies arise where people think for themselves and choose to ignore the authority of the Church, and are misled or mistaken. It is the duty of the clergy to confront error, and correct it by teaching correct doctrine.

In Ars Magica, all the great monotheistic religions (Judaism, Islam, Christianity, and Zoroastrianism) are by default true and share the Dominion (see Realms of Power: The Divine). Most Bogomils and Cathars, while dualist, still worship the Divine. Some heretics, however, are associated with other realms of power, and these groups are also discussed in this chapter.

the Cathar bishops is creating a more stable theological structure.

Cathars are dualists, seeing the universe as divided between good and evil. All matter and physical things are corrupt and evil; spirit is where goodness resides.

They ask "How can a good God allow the evil and suffering in the world?" and answer "Because the world is corrupt and ruled by the Devil." Humans are spirits ensnared in gross matter and suffering. As such, Cathars reject material things, and see procreation and childbirth—the bringing of another soul into this world of pain—as abhorrent and an evil act. Contraception is therefore a virtue, contrary to Church teaching, and mothers are of very low status, if not outright despised. Celibacy is a moral virtue highly regarded for this reason, while gluttony, avarice, and lust are despised.

Having also rejected much if not all of the Old Testament, they hold the Gospels and parts of the New Testament as the only true revelation. Some believe the God of the Old Testament to actually be the evil demiurge. They embrace poverty, charity, and love, but reject most Christian sacraments, including mass, baptism, and often marriage.

God would have nothing to do with the corrupt physical world, so he chose a pre-existent glorious being, Jesus Christ, to enter the universe and allow a path to salvation. Some believe Jesus to be the second son of God; Lucifer was the first, but his rebellion and act of creating this universe caused the whole problem, and Lucifer has fallen to Hell becoming Satan. So Jesus entered the world as a pure spirit, taking on the semblance of humanity, but not participating in the world in any physical sense, for such a pure being could not actually incarnate. (This is the ancient heresy of Doceticism.) As such he was not crucified, merely appearing to be to deceive Satan, who tried to kill Him, and he did not actually die — the crucifixion and resurrection were symbolic spiritual acts, and the cross has no meaning to Cathars, who often despise the symbol as a sign of Satan's apparent victory. Furthermore the Virgin Mary holds no significance for them — she, after all, only appeared to give birth to Jesus, as he had no physical embodiment. The Cathars are Arian; they deny the Trinity and see the Holy Spirit and Christ as created entities, not part of the Godhead.

Finally, only spiritual sacraments such as the consolamentum are efficacious (denying the power of water in baptism and the bread and wine of the mass), and according to most Cathars they can only be administered by someone in a state of spiritual purity and grace. This is in marked contrast to the Church's teaching, where the grace of God allows the sacraments to be efficacious even if performed by a corrupt or ignorant priest.

All of the Cathar beliefs expressed here are deeply heretical to the Church, and deeply offensive.

Organization of the Cathars

The Cathars historically represented a faith without a formal structure, except for the Perfecti. Following a debate at Lombers in 1165, however, they appointed bishops to preside over four dioceses, creating their own hierarchy. Some Cathars resisted the innovation, but the majority now accepts the system, and the number of dioceses has expanded to five.

Each of the dioceses has a bishop and two elected deacons, the filius major (senior), and the filius minor, all Perfecti. When a bishop dies he is usually succeeded by the filius major, and if a filius major dies, he is replaced by his filius minor. While women can be Perfecta, they cannot hold the rank of bishop or serve as deaconesses. The deacons are the administrators and treasurers of the dioceses, serving the bishops and dealing with mundane matters such as distribution of charity and the running of the houses which serve as gathering places for prayer meetings.

The five dioceses are Agen, Albi, Carcassonne, Razes, and Toulouse. Surprisingly perhaps, none of the bishops has yet been arrested or executed, and indeed the Perfecti are generally free to move about the countryside without interference. Only when the crusaders have first taken a town have executions occurred, and generally the Cathar structure remains unharmed, though Perfecti are careful not to be seen by the crusaders if possible, to avoid arrests, and public preaching is limited to areas where the crusaders cannot enforce their authority.

Six hundred Perfecti, equally split between men and women, survive mainly in the area around Toulouse and the Pyrenees where the heresy is strongest, and whole towns and villages of heretics can be found there. Cathar congregations also exist in the Rhine, Roman, Greater Alps, Normandy, and Iberian Tribunals. Cathars are simply too common and too visible for magi to ignore, and characters must learn to deal with the heretics in some way,

As stated, the Cathars call themselves Believers (Croyants, Occitan, or Credentes, Latin), and their "priests" Good Men or Women (Occitan Bon Homme, Bon Femme). Outsiders call them Cathars, meaning "pure ones" and the "priests" Parfaits (French) or Perfecti (Latin), a jibe aimed at

their supposed "perfection." As the terms Cathar and Perfecti are far more common today, and as Hermetic magi probably use these terms to describe the group, this book uses the familiar versions, but Cathar characters and their supporters use the correct terms.

The consolamentum is the sacred rite of the faith, which baptizes the Cathar in the Holy Spirit and prepares him for death. It is administered by a Perfectus, and involves certain questions and responses, the Lord's Prayer and an exposition of its meaning in terms of the faith, and anointing with oil. It is vital not to sin or relapse in any way after it is administered; it can only be given once and provides a Faith Point (see Realms of Power: The Divine Revised Edition, page 74). As such, it is normally reserved for when death approaches. In the event death does not occur, it is common for Cathars to choose to starve to death, suffering the terminal fast to prevent the possibility of backsliding.

The Cathars and the Dominion

The Cathars, being aligned with the Divine, use the Divine column of the aura interaction table (ArM5, page 183). However, some odd but important exceptions exist. Churches and altars are not the center of Cathar-aligned Dominion auras; instead the auras are focused upon the meeting houses where the Cathars hold their prayer meetings, themselves typically mundane dwelling houses. They are rarely stronger than 1 or 2.

Cathars do not invoke the saints (see Realms of Power: The Divine Revised Edition page 87), and in fact do not pray to saints, even the Virgin Mary. The Cathars despise and mock relics; they do not carry them, though in fact relics work as well for Cathars as anyone else. Apart from the consolamentum, they have no sacraments, but attendance at a prayer meeting grants a single Faith Point until the Cathar next sins, which may be used as a Confidence Point. Sin being ubiquitous in the world, this rarely lasts beyond the day. Of course Cathars can still benefit from the sacraments, so they can be converted, baptized, and do penance, for example.

The Cathars and the Order of Hermes

The Order of Hermes lacks a unified response to the Cathar heresy. While a number of Provençal magi embrace Cathar beliefs, others find the blasphemous tenets appalling. Some magi actively call upon the Church to take action against them, approving of the Crusade as necessary to save souls from damnation. Some argue that the falls of Lariander and Mistridge demonstrate how Cathar magi have brought destruction upon their sodales, justifying their delivery to the Church or Wizard's March. So far no case has been brought against any avowedly Cathar magi; however the tensions have led to a state of internal Wizard's War which has torn the covenant of Tolosa Paratge apart. (See Chapter 4: Toulouse, Tolosa Paratge) There is an Ex Miscellanea tradition, the Gorgiastic Cathars, within the Tribunal who practice a magical form of the Cathar religion mixed with Criamon mysticism. (See Chapter 3: Hermetic Culture, Gorgiastic Cathars).

In turn, most Cathars distrust wizards or witches, and neither understand the Order of Hermes nor know a great deal about it. They are far more likely to attack those they perceive as sorcerers than the Church, as their pacifism often does not extend to supernatural entities and anyone casting spells or using magic is clearly a supernatural entity. Individual magi are fully accepted, and can even become Perfecti, but anything hinting at paganism or supernatural forces opposed to the Divine is usually evil in the eyes of Cathars. At least one Blatantly Gifted magus is believed to have lost his life at the hands of a superstitious mob of Cathars believing him a demon in human form.

Not all heretics deeply oppose the Church like the Cathars. Some accept it, and long only to reform it. Most important of these are the Waldensians. Despite their enthusiasm for reform, they often stray into heresy. They were popular preachers who translated the Bible into Occitan, but 1215 saw the Waldensians condemned as heretics, even though Pope Innocent III believed them "good Christians." Waldensian characters may be modeled upon the Franciscans depicted in The Church, Chapter 8, as can their Dominican adversaries once they come to be organized in their efforts to convert back lost souls.

Not all Cathars ally with the Divine realm, and not all claiming the Cathar mantle hold the same theological beliefs. Some extreme Cathar theologians call for the desecration of holy items and relics, an act considered terrible even by many other heretics. While many are casual diabolists who foolishly allow anger at the crusade and lust for personal power to tempt them down dark pathways of demonic lore, others are sincere holy men and women who have made fundamental doctrinal errors, and see Lucifer as the savior of mankind. This heresy originated in the Rhine Tribunal, but has adherents here, hiding among the Cathars and slowly spreading their corruption. They are detailed in Realms of Power: The Infernal, page 127.