Please visit this link...become enlightened

To begin with the Catholic Church does affect you because every other church sprang from it. Doesn�t matter if you call yourself protestant or Lutheran or Pentecostal or whatever they all sprang from the Catholic Church and are tainted by its roots. (With the exception of the Greek orthodox and the few remaining sects of Gnostics) I�m sure you�ve heard the house built on sand analogy so I won�t bore you with it again.

Now on to your evidence

Reincarnation as believed by the original Christians

Origen on reincarnation

"The soul has neither beginning nor end� [They] come into this world strengthened by the victories or weakened by the defeats of their previous lives" (Origen, De Principiis)

Valentinus on reincarnation

�From the very beginning you have been immortal, and you are children of eternal life� such life as the Aeons enjoy; yet you would have death shared among you that you might spend it and use it up, so that death might die in you and through you. For inasmuch as ye dissolve the world and are not yourselves annihilated, you are lords over all creation and destruction.� (Valentinus, unknown work)

Modern Scholar on Valentinus and Reincarnation
�In order to understand the teachings of the Valentinian School on the resurrection, we must receive the basic components of the individual according to the Valentinians: the spiritual or pneumatic element (the divine spark) or true Self, destined to reunite with the Father; the psychic or soul element, which either reincarnates or is sublimated and absorbed into the true Self; and the physical or material, which is destined to perish.
Ordinary Christians who did not receive the higher teaching believed in and looked forward to a resurrection of their dead bodies at the end of the age or world. This teaching was fostered and promoted by the orthodox bishops in order to counteract or suppress, if possible, the doctrine of preexistence and reincarnation. Those Christians who received and accepted this doctrine were termed "psychic" by the Valentinians because their understanding was at the level of the soul or psyche rather than at the level of the spirit. To these Christians, their hope of immortality was to come back to life in their same bodies, now fully and physically restored on the so- called "Last Day." �
(Joseph P. Macchio)

The Wars of Cleansing

This is not the only example but probably the most terrible (unless you count the Inquisition as a whole) and most notable. The Cathar War.
en.wikipedia.org...

The Nag Hammadi

These are untouched since circa 450 ad. Enjoy!
www.gnosis.org...

Books Removed from the canon

www.geocities.com...

This should keep you busy for awhile I hope you enjoy the links.


[Edited on 4-5-2004 by radiant]

this seems like a lot of misquoting and twisting of the scriptures.
that guy seems to think Martin Luther rebelled because he was a heretic.
he rebelled because he saw all the wrongs of the Catholic Church (i.e. indulgances)
how can you base your arguments on biased information and half-truths?

[Edited on 15/5/2004 by aldsar]

The Old and New Testaments are a collection of many writings from many mystics whose teachings often conflicted with one another. Over the centuries, various passages and chapters have been omitted by church leaders who had their own agendas to promote.

Many if not most early Christians believed in the doctrine of reincarnation.

In 533 AD, Roman Emperor Justinian decided to order all references to a belief in reincarnation erased from the Bible. Henceforth, anyone who espoused reincarnation faced governmental persecution. That is why the doctrine of reincarnation is not part of current Christendom as it was among many if not most early Christians. Despite church censorship, some groups continued to believe in it and teach it secretly.

Centuries later an ascetic group of Christians, called the Cathars or Cathari, openly espoused the doctrine of reincarnation in Languedoc (now the south of France). The Cathari were eventually wiped out in the Thirteenth Century from the Albigensian Crusade that was initiated by Pope Innocent the Third.

In light of these omissions, inconsistencies and the overall incompleteness of the Old and New Testaments, they cannot be considered the final word of God, only a fragmented perspective that has been distorted and controlled by unprincipled leaders through the centuries. The omitted doctrine of reincarnation within Christianity is a prime example of how people in power can distort and censure ideas in order to control the masses.