Adeptus Ministorum - Origins: During the Great Crusade, many different religious cults, drawing on the book written by Primarch Lorgar known as the Lectitio Divinitatus that first proclaimed that the Emperor of Mankind was actually the incarnate god of Humanity, first appeared throughout the Imperium of Man, though each had its own subtle variations and differences in basic theology.These forms of worship appeared first on those primitive planets of the Imperium that had regressed technologically during the long, terror-filled years of the Age of Strife. The number of these cults multiplied exponentially following the Emperor's ultimate sacrifice to save Mankind from the rule of the Warmaster Horus and the Dark Gods at the end of the Horus Heresy and His subsequent internment within the Golden Throne.This event was hailed by believers as the Emperor's "ascension" back to full divinity within the Immaterium. Most of these cults would gradually fade away, while others prospered, eventually absorbing the weaker ones. The more successful cults of Emperor-worship spread their forms of worship to other planets.The strongest of all the early Imperial cults of the Lectitio Divinitatus was called the Temple of the Saviour Emperor. This cult had the advantage over the others in that it was based on Terra and that its leader had been a successful and respected officer of the Imperial Army who had fought at the Siege of Terra, defending the heart of the Imperium in its darkest hour.This holy man had re-named himself Fatidicus and had begun to preach his teachings concerning the divinity of the Emperor to anyone who would listen. This faith spread among the members of the reformed Astra Militarum and the Navis Imperialis during the Time of Rebirth who had seen at first hand the horrors of Chaos, but also to lowly scribes and minor adepts of the Adeptus Terra.The faith was then spread by these individuals to other planets. When Fatidicus died at the age of 120 standard Terran years, the Temple had more than a billion followers on Terra and untold faithful throughout the Imperium's Segmentum Solar.In the wake of the chaos and anarchy of the Horus Heresy, the Temple of the Saviour Emperor provided a message of hope and reunification through a common faith. Cults who rejected being absorbed, or who couldn't be absorbed because a wildly different theology, saw themselves being persecuted by fanatical mobs who preferred the Saviour Emperor's increasingly "orthodox" belief system. Officially, the Temple rejected this violence performed in its name, though in fact it unofficially welcomed the elimination of those rival sects it saw as heretical and threats to its own growing political power.This development culminated in the 32nd Millennium by which time almost two-thirds of the Imperium's population followed the teachings of the Temple of the Saviour Emperor, the exceptions being the Adeptus Astartes, as the Space Marines have never formally acknowledged the divinity of the Emperor in a nod to His wishes and the lost Imperial Truth and the Adeptus Mechanicus of Mars, who had their own form of worship in the Cult Mechanicus.The Temple's importance, influence, and power rapidly outmatched that of any other Lectitio Divinitatus cult dedicated to Emperor-worship, including its closest rival, the Confederation of Light.