CONCORREZZESI. – They formed one of the principal currents into which the Cathars (v.) in Italy were divided: they taught a mitigated or monarchian dualism, in opposition to the absolute dualism represented by the Albanenses (v.). The name Concorrezzesi (found in many variant spellings in the sources) or that of Ecclesia de Concorrezze derives, according to the most reliable of the various hypotheses, from the Lombard town of Concorrezze, where the sect had a dogmatic and hierarchical centre. The Concorrezzesi are also called gara(c)t(h)inesi, from the name of their bishop Gara(c)t(h)us, who lived around the turn of the 12th and 13th centuries. At the Cathar Council of Saint-Félix-de-Caraman in 1167, the Italian Cathars led by Bishop Marco adopted absolute dualism (v. ALBANESI); later, a certain Petracus brought back to the mitigated dualism of the Bulgarian Cathar Church some of the defectors, who formed the sect of the Concorrezzesi. On account of these Eastern influences, various sources note that the Church of Concorrezze received its beliefs from the Bulgarian Church or order. In the last decade of the 12th century, Bishop Nazzaro (or Nazario) returned from a journey to Bulgaria with the docetic doctrine regarding Jesus Christ and the Virgin Mary, dividing the Concorrezzesi on this point. Among those who denied the corporeal reality of Jesus Christ, together with the Bagnolenses (v.), was the faction of the so-called Sclavi or Sclavini, since they were doctrinally dependent on the ecclesia Sclavoniae.
The Concorrezzesi were widespread in Lombardy, and by c. 1250 their numbers were reckoned by R. Sacconi at more than 1,500; however, their proselytism did not succeed among the followers of the other Cathar Churches.
Their doctrine is characterized by the admission of a single eternal principle, the good God, superior to the principle of evil, Lucifer, and creator *ex nihilo* of the angels and the four material elements that formed chaos. The angel Lucifer, having become the author of evil through sin, seduced other angels, united with a monstrous spirit—which, according to some, had no beginning but was confused in the chaos—and with the aid of another angel, by God’s permission, composed the material world and the body of Adam, in which he enclosed the cooperating angel; through Eve he caused the sin of the generative act. From the first couple both human bodies and souls proceed (we translate this literally), differing in this from the Bagnolenses (v.). It is the devil who operates in the Old Testament, save for a few exceptions; the Concorrezzesi debated the goodness or otherwise of certain ancient figures. Their teaching on the divinity of the Holy Spirit and of the Son is discordant; the latter, however, would be inferior to the Father. Jesus Christ did not have a human soul, and regarding his corporeal nature they opposed the Docetists by admitting the material reality of his body and his actions upon material elements, in addition to his spiritual operations; yet they denied the glorification of this body, which he laid aside before the Ascension; the same fate awaits the bodies of men. Souls will be saved in part and damned in part; yet no gradation is admitted either of guilt and punishment for sinners, or of goodness and glory for the just. Some Concorrezzesi taught that of the fallen spirits only those who sinned under compulsion would be saved, while those who transgressed of their own free will would be damned.
A detailed and comparative examination of the sources would determine other doctrinal aspects of the Concorrezzesi, as well as their fluctuations of thought; for the general part V. CATARI.