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To take just one example, think of Arius. This was the man whose teaching that Jesus Christ is less than fully divine (for a modern version, talk to a Jehovah's Witness) rocked the early church and led to the first ecumenical council. He and his followers were far from a weak, oppressed minority beset by power-hungry orthodox leaders. As Tom Oden puts it in his Rebirth of Orthodoxy, they "lived by collusion with political oppressors. They had plenty of intellectuals and power manipulators on their side, while orthodoxy had to be defended largely by nonscholars and laypeople, by modest men and women of no means, by lowly persons who had no training or special expertise but understood their lives in Christ."

On the other hand, Arius's opponent Athanasius, the bold Christian thinker whose leadership helped move the Council of Nicea to condemn Arius, was no triumphant political manipulator. He was "exiled a half-dozen times and chased all over the Mediterranean world during the Arian times." The example can be multiplied on both sides.

To be sure, the inquisitorial practices of some past heresy hunts have left a permanent stain on the church—although the scale of what we might dub "heresy abuse" is often overblown. (Contrary to popular fiction, being charged before one of the Spanish Inquisitions was not a guarantee of an auto-da-fé. Statistical studies show that fewer than 2 percent of those charged were condemned to death.) Still, we must not deny or defend travesties that did occur. At the same time, we must recognize the depth of the problem heresy trials have attempted to address. In most cases, not political but pastoral concerns have driven the church to prosecute teachers of aberrant doctrines.

The problem is that the preached word has power—one way or the other. Every Sunday, unsuspecting people enter churches shepherded by those whose theological openness leads them to teach things we used to call heresies. What they hear in such teachings is not just divergent opinion. It is potent misdirection, capable of turning the sheep away from salvation.

And this is the nub. As a teacher of mine once put it, if Jack the Ripper is abroad in your town, killing people and mutilating their bodies, the city's leaders must track him down and render him unable to inflict further harm. And if, as the historic church has always—until today—agreed, a person insists on teaching beliefs that threaten the eternal lives of all who hear them, that person must be disciplined and his harmful teaching rendered null within the church.

It is easy for a comfortable "Christian" society to demonize the mechanisms the historic church has developed to deal with heresy. But to wink at heresy is to suck the life from faith.

Heresies are worth fighting against, through the same kinds of mechanisms that the church has always used. Yes, these mechanisms are tainted by politics and pride. But somehow still, we must believe, they have been used and will continue to be used by the Holy Spirit for the health of his church. In Appleby's words, "What we hold devoutly to be true, what we identify as the very core of our Christian identity, has come to us through the imperfect channel of human history."

Chris Armstrong is managing editor of Christian History magazine.

Copyright © 2004 Christianity Today. Click for reprint information.

This article is adapted from a Christian History Corner by Chris Armstrong titled "Heresy, Salvation, and Jack the Ripper."

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August 2003, Vol. 47, No. 8