[1] On the Catharan doctrines, cf. Dõllinger's Beiträge.
Still, contemporary writers called them by different names. In Italy they were confounded with the orthodox Patarins and Arnaldists of Milan; which explains the frequent use of the word Patareni in the constitutions of Frederic II, and other documents.
The Arnaldists or Arnoldists and the Speronistæ, were the disciples of Arnold of Brescia, and the heretical Bishop Sperone. Although the chief center of the Cathari in France was Toulouse and not Albi, they were called Albigeois (Albigenses), and Tisserands (Texerants), because many were weavers by trade; Arians, because of their denial of Christ's divinity; Paulicians, which was corrupted into Poplicani, Publicani, Piphes and Piples (Flanders); Bulgarians (Bulgari), from their origin, which became in the mouths of the people of Bugari, Bulgri, and Bugres. In fact about 1200, nearly all the heretics of western Europe were considered Cathari.
Catharism was chiefly a negative heresy; it denied the doctrines, hierarchy and worship of the Catholic Church, as well as the essential rights of the State.
These neo-Manicheans denied that the Roman Church represented the Church of Christ. The Popes were not the successors of St. Peter, but rather the successors of Constantine. St. Peter never came to Rome. The relics which were venerated in the Constantinian basilica, were the bones of someone who died in the third century; they were not relics of the Prince of the Apostles. Constantine unfortunately sanctioned this fraud, by conferring upon the Roman pontiff an immense domain, together with the prestige that accompanies temporal authority.[1] How could anyone recognize under the insignia, the purple mantle, and the crown of the successors of St. Sylvester, a disciple of Jesus Christ? Christ had no place where to lay His head, whereas the Popes lived in a palace! Christ rebuked worldly dominion, while the Popes claimed it! What had the Roman curia with its thirst for riches and honors in common with the gospel of Christ? What were these archbishops, primates, cardinals, archdeacons, monks, canons, Dominicans, and Friars Minor but the Pharisees of old! The priests placed heavy burdens upon the faithful people, and they themselves did not touch them with the tips of their fingers; they received tithes from the fields and flocks; they ran after the heritage of widows; all practices which Christ condemned in the Pharisees.
[1] The Middle Ages believed firmly in the donation of Constantine. It was, however questioned by Wetzel, a disciple of Arnold of Brescia, in 1152, in a letter to Frederic Barbarossa, Martène and Durand, Veterum scriptorunt … amplissima collectio, Paris, 1724, vol. ii, col. 554-557.
And yet, withal, they dared persecute humble souls who, by their pure life, tried to realize the perfect ideal proposed by Christ! These persecutors were not the true disciples of Jesus. The Roman Church was the woman of the apocalypse,[1] drunk with the blood of the Saints, and the Pope was Antichrist.
[1] Apoc. vii, 3, 18.
The sacraments of the Church were a mere figment of the imagination. The Cathari made one sacrament out of Baptism, Confirmation, Penance and Eucharist, which they called the consolamentum; they denied the real presence of Jesus Christ in the Eucharist, and they repudiated marriage.
Baptism of water was to them an empty ceremony, as valueless as the baptism of John. Christ had undoubtedly said: "Unless a man be born again of water and the Holy Ghost, he cannot enter into the Kingdom of God."[1] But the acts of the Apostles proved that baptism was a mere ceremony, for they declared that the Samaritans, although baptized, had not thereby received the Holy Spirit, by Whom alone the soul is purified from sin.[2]