The Church fathers such as John Chrysostom who lived at the time of Gnostics, the Marcionites, the Encratites, the Manicheans—who rejected Christian marriage and the eating of because they believed that all flesh was from an evil principle—asserted this text referred to such sects and that they were therefore "in the latter times". The Protestant theologian John Gill believed that this refers to the Canon Law of the Catholic Church, particularly priestly celibacy and Lent as promulgated by the medieval church. (see Great Apostasy)