From Sacred to Secular Heresy

From Sacred to Secular Heresy

The transformation of healing from a sacred art to biomedical science has paralleled the secularization of Western society, yet the mechanisms by which medical orthodoxy maintains dominance bear striking resemblance to those employed by religious institutions throughout history.

This paper examines the thesis that medical heresy represents merely a secularized form of religious heresy, with state and professional institutions employing similar punitive mechanisms to those historically used by ecclesiastical authorities.