Finally, it must be remembered that the Albigenses claimed to be purifying, not destroying, Christianity. Just so, the Humanitarians of to-day reduce Christianity to “Social Service” and throw over supernatural teaching altogether. In most cases the Albigensian system had certain outward likenesses to the Catholic. Their distinction between “Perfect” and “Believers” was somewhat like the Catholic distinction between clergy and laity, or that between monastic people and people “living in the world.” The form of their promise to renounce “Satan” (i.e., the Catholic Church), by which one became an Albigensian believer, was a little like baptism, and their “Consolamentum” was like Communion and Extreme Unction combined. They claimed to be true followers of Christ, they particularly reverenced the Lord’s Prayer, and they even went through a form of Lord’s Supper. The fasts of the “Perfect,” except when prolonged into the “Endura,” were not altogether unlike the Catholic fasts. As to the points in which they differed from the Church, they made the usual heretical claim of following “purer” traditions. Certain modern scholars see reason for believing that they possessed apocryphal writings dating from the apostolic or post-apostolic age.[16] In their propaganda they laid stress upon the negative side, that is, of their opposition to the “corruptions” of Catholicism, and thus secured for themselves the support of much of the prevailing dissatisfaction with the Church. Why their practice of fasting themselves to death, in what they called the “Endura,” did not drive away converts is the hardest question to answer concerning them. That the “Perfect” voluntarily practised it was bad enough. What was worse was their treatment of believers who had received the “Consolamentum” when thought to be on death-beds and had then been so unlucky as to begin to get well. The “Perfect” had probably learned by experience that “Believers” who had been “consoled” on their death-bed and had then recovered, were not likely to follow the extraordinarily strict rules for the “Perfect” as all “consoled” persons were bound to do. For them, the relapse of a “consoled person” was the greatest conceivable horror. Therefore, when a “consoled” sick person showed signs of recovery the “Perfect” forbade the family to give the patient food, and, if the family showed signs of weakening, they stationed themselves by the bedside or took away the sufferer to some place of safety where they might starve him or her to death in peace!