Mystery Religion

A group of religions in ancient Greece and Rome that existed in competition with the official state religions.

They offered personal salvation through initiation into an enlightened group bound by some special secret, often involving the promise of an afterlife, a recompense for present miseries.

Some consider the primitive Christian movement to have been a mystery religion. Contemporary faith groups, such as Gnosticism, Mormonism, Wicca, other Neopagan groups, etc., are sometimes called mystery religions today.