the problem with religions/cults

Yesterday in a stupor of boredom sprinkled wth slight interest, I did some web-based research on Rosecrucianism and Anthroposophism. Now, I know these may sound like made-up names, but I assure you, they are real sects which are alive and well today. I was set onto this little hunt because of two writers whose work I adore, namely Charles Williams and Owen Barfield, both of whom belonged to these fun little religious sects.

It turns out that Rosecrucianism is a mystery sect (you could place it in the general category of Gnosticism) which is derivitive from Christianity, as well as having ties to the Freemasons (who are, incidently, derivitive from Judaism). On the whole, I found my research to be unfruitful. Apparently the Rosecrucians' name is based on the word "Rose" and the word "cross"(crux in latin). So they like crosses with roses on them. I decided to dig a bit deeper. Apparently, the sect began in the 15th crentury with a monk who taught his ways to others, but then was killed, his teachings lost, and his short lived religious order demolished. But in the 17th century, it sprang back up again in Europe, and had many famous and devoted followers. including Leonardo Da Vinci (how unsurprising is this?) What did it teach? I found the information sparse and unfulfilling. The main tenants of teaching were something like this: a member of the Rosecrucian order has special knowledge, light and power to heal and help mankind. And that's about all. What is this knowledge? I'm not really sure they even knew. And so ended my search for Rosecrucianism.

On to Anthroposophism (anthropos: man; sophos: wisdom) I went, finding even less information there. Appearently A. was invented in the late 19th/early 20th centruty as a branch of theosophy. Its main tenants were something like this: an Anthroposophist has special knowledge, light and power to heal and help mankind. Futher, it develops out of theosophy, which encourages its followers to find and embrace the divine within them. How disappointing is this? Here, in the disappointement, I made a discovery:

All secret sects, cults, and religions may dabbl ein proclaimation of mysteries, unspeakable names and words, secret powers and illuminations, but in the end, they all proclaim this: that man is not only material, that there is something within him that bespeaks of divine things. Can we even say that at the bottom of all these mystery shrouded -isms we find one truth and one truth alone? Man has a soul. This, perhaps is what the hooded eliteare still stunned with, still conjure up alchemical fomulas and magic incantations to proclaim.

But I find that this fact is elementary to Christianity. In some strange leap in time and history,the first 2 chapters of genesis have overstepped, have outpaced, the lagging findings of all other religious orders for thousands of years. What one may learn only through criptic ceremony and dark declaration in the masonic lodge or the Kabbalan gathering, one may find plainly on the first few pages of the Bible, and even more deeply and really on the first page of the Gospel of John.

Oh that we may cease to conform to the elementary things of the world, the prinicples which long have reigned and goverened mens minds. For in one fell swoop a deeper mystery that even the inner divine light is proclaimed in genesis three: the great mystery of the fall. It is a dark thing too deep for most men to see, yet it is also bare and plain. And beyond it still, there is a Man whose glory once was revealed, and though they killed him, he proclaimed the greatest mystery of them all. Just read Collossians.