Word: sects
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There is an account of the two religious sects of the Utopians; one of these sects abstains from meat and also from marriage, the other sect "love the flesh of four-footed beastes, bicause they beleve that by that meat they be made hardier and stronger to woorke. The Utopians counte this secte the wiser, but the other the holier...
Long before the New Testament was collected and canonized, the Communion was the core and center of the faith of the tiny Christian sect. They met to celebrate it in private houses. Outsiders were exeluded; even "catechumens" (those not yet baptized) were permitted to be present only for part of the rite. And for centuries they met as outlaws in danger of death...
Once again, as they had for 700 years, the chosen priests of Japan's Nichiren Buddhist sect trouped to the temple of Hokkekyo to undergo 100 days of purification and study. At the temple gateway stood Chief Priest Nissei Nakakita, asking the novices for six times last year's entrance fee. For three months of contemplation and 700 duckings in the ice-cold waters of the temple pump, 58 novices paid the inflated rate. Outside "the door that is not opened" devoted followers waited eagerly for their cries as freezing water coursed down their naked bodies...
Like anybody else, the New York Times makes mistakes. A fortnight ago, it reported from Warsaw that the Mariavite Sect (a Polish offshoot of the Roman Catholic Church) "does not recognize the authority of the Pope and [its] clergy are not obliged to practice chastity." Last week the chaste Times coughed discreetly and admitted that "chastity" was not the right word: it should have been "celibacy...
Soul & Body. High point of The Apostolic Fathers is the "Letter to Diognetus." Written in the form of a letter to a pagan to describe "this new group or institute" which calls itself "Christian," its moving characterization of the sect is still a counsel of perfection. Excerpt: "Christians are not different from the rest of men in nationality, speech or customs; they do not live in states of their own, nor do they use a special language, nor adopt a peculiar way of life. Their teaching is not the kind of thing that could be discovered by the wisdom...