If you have seen my recent work here at Apprising Ministries you will have noticed me using the term semi-pelagian in relation to leaders in the neo-liberal cult of the Emergent Church. In this in-depth piece Outlines of Theology: Pelagianism, Semi-Pelagianism & Augustinianism by A.A. Hodge you’ll see why seeker sensitive new evangelicalism, which is heavily Arminian, is:

Semipelagian [because] views as to sin and grace are also irresistibly attracted by, and in turn attract Arminian views as to the divine attributes, the nature of the Atonement, and the work of the Spirit.

There are, in fact, as we might have anticipated, but two complete self-consistent systems of Christian theology possible.
1st. On the right hand, Augustinianism completed in Calvinism. 2nd. On the left hand, Pelagianism completed in Socinianism. And 3rd. Arminianism comes between these as the system of compromises and is developed Semipelagianism. (emphasis his)

If you’d like a better understanding of the wrong view of the Gospel of Jesus Christ–not to mention a rather shallow understanding of the theological ramifications involved–I refer you to this short hit piece by Nathan Neighbor, a devoted disciple of emerging church Cultural Architect Erwin McManus, called Who you callin’ what? This really shouldn’t surprise us what with McManus’ disdain for growing up his flock doctrinally. By the way, I find it rather ironic that one who regularly criticizes me for “name-calling” refers to me as “watch doggie writer.” *Gotcha*

Now granted there are many who do not like the result, but I’ve done my homework. Let me also point out I happen to be one who has spent the better part of the last two years studying the contemplative spirituality currently infecting $evangelicalism$ largely through the neo-Gnostic revival in the emerging church where it is a core doctrine. So the following by Hodge immediately caught my eye:

6. What was the origin of the Middle or Semipelagian system?

In the meantime, while the Pelagian controversy was at its height, John Cassian, of Syrian extraction and educated in the Eastern Church, having removed to Marseilles, in France, for the purpose of advancing the interests of monkery in that region, began to give publicity to a scheme of doctrine occupying a middle position between the systems of Augustine and Pelagius.

This system, whose advocates were called Massilians from the residence of their chief, and afterward Semipelagians by the Schoolmen, is in its essential principles one with that system which is now denominated Arminianism,.. Cassianism would be the proper historical designation of that Middle or Semipelagian Scheme now commonly styled Arminianism. (emphasis mine)

You might recall an earlier article on AM about Emergent anti-theologian Tony Jones called Tony Jones Says: “Semi-Pelagianism Surely Afflicts the Vast Majority of American Christians.” Filed under: “It takes one to know one,” because Jones is semi-pelagian (at best), I said jokingly, “the End might really be near after all…Tony Jones and I agree.” Here’s how the Emergent Church and Tony Jones fit into this fact. It’s through the core doctrine of so-called “Christian” mysticism inherent within the EC from its very insideous inception.

And not only is Tony Jones a practitioner of these stupid “spiritual disciplines,” but he is also an emerging expert on the subject. In my recent piece Close Encounters of the Wrong Kind: Tony Jones and the Emergent Church with Divine Intervention I quoted Jones’ “scholarly” overview on the origin of Contemplative/Centering Prayer, which is one of these alleged recently rediscovered disciplines:

Like the Jesus Prayer, Centering Prayer grew out of the reflections and writings of the Desert Fathers. John Cassian (c.360-c.430) came from the West and made a pilgrimage to the desert to learn the ways of contemplative prayer. (073, emphasis mine)

Note the source for this doctrine of demons which would later flower in the antibiblical monastic traditions of apostate Roman Catholicism. One seducing spirit named John Cassian. Those who have been instrumental in the foundation and spread of this Emergent rebellion against Bible such as Doug Pagitt and Guru Brian McLaren, along with his friends and “key mentors” Living Spiritual Teacher Richard Foster and Dallas Willard, are also practitioners of this neo-Gnostic contemplative spirituality. So it really shouldn’t come as any wonder then that, like one of their ancient mentors John Cassian, they are also (at best) semi-pelagians themselves.

But know this in the Lord: The Body of Christ embraces these spiritually infected men and the deadly demonic deceptions of their cancerous contemplative spirituality at her own peril…