The modern arian heresy does not stem from ancestral roots in the gnostic gospels nor does it have anything at all to do with protestantism. Rather it comes from from the secular scientific revolution begun by Descartes in the early 1600’s. (ie man is the measure of all things...including God.)
>>Unitarianism began in the 16th century and arose from the Anabaptist movement and its radical interpretation of Sola Scriptura.
It predated Decartes by over a century.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Unitarianism
http://www.ewtn.com/library/answers/surviv.htm
>>Unitarianism began in the 16th century and arose from the Anabaptist movement and its radical interpretation of Sola Scriptura.
............
This is one tenth right. Yes unitarianism branched from Poland into england.
However, it gained legitimacy in the english speaking world through Issac Newton. Who was a fervid believer in the arian heresy...why? because it was the logical outcome of cartesian logic. He was a prolific writer on the subject. Because Newton was considered to be something of a demigod in the English speaking world—the brightest minds for nearly two hundred year figured if the master believed that Jesus was just a man — it must be so. Heck you can find Newton referred to in theological tracts of the 19th century.
However, that’s just the English speaking world. Descartes made his way to the continental religious thinking through the higher criticism school. This school treated the bible as a myth like greek myths or norse myths. If you examine all miracles including those of Moses and Jesus as myths then of course mana from heaven are perhaps quail. And of course Jesus is just a man.
The higher criticism school took over the protestant seminaries in Europe in the 1850’s (at the same time the atheists took over the philosophy departments there.) The higher criticism school made the crossing to American liberal seminaries as early as the 1890’s but didn’t fully take them over until the 1940’s.
In the catholic church, Arianism shows up among progressive catholics in the guise of Liberation theology which both Pope John Paul II and Benedict have strongly opposed