Religious organisations - cults, sects, denominations, etc...

Question 1

Troeltsch - churches

Answer 1

• Large organisations
• Bureaucratic hierarchy of professional priests
• Claim a monopoly on the truth

Question 2

Troeltsch - sects

Answer 2

• Small, exclusive groups, hostile to society
• Charismatic leader

Question 3

Neibuhr - denominations

Answer 3

• Membership is less exclusive
• Doesn’t appeal to everyone in society
• Impose some minor restrictions on members
• E.g. Methodists cannot drink tea, coffee or alcohol.

Question 4

How are cults defined? - Bruce

Answer 4

• Small, highly individualistic and close-knit.

Question 5

What criticisms can be made of these classical typologies?

Answer 5

• Not everything neatly fits into these categories.
• Particularly religious groups that have sprung up in the last fifty years or so.

Question 6

Roy Wallis - New Religious Movements

Answer 6

• We now need a different typology for religious organisations as there is a whole range of new religions that have sprung up from the 1960s onwards.

Question 7

Criticisms of Wallis’ typology of NRMs:

Answer 7

• Stark and Bainbridge:
• Typologies are not useful.
• They don’t worry about the complicated things of religion.
• We should be concerned with how it conflicts with wider society.

Question 8

Stark and Bainbridge: sects and cults

Answer 8

• Sect - breakaway from an existing religion.
• Cult - new religion, e.g. scientology.

Question 9

Different types of cult - Stark and Bainbridge:

Answer 9

• Cultic movement - more organised, meet all members religious needs. E.g. scientology now.
• Audience cult - the least organised, with no formal membership and little interaction between members.
• Client cults - a consultant/client relationship, with ‘therapies’ promising personal fulfilment.

Question 10

Troltsch

Answer 10

Sects largely recruit from the poor and oppressed.

Question 11

Weber

Answer 11

Sects attract the poor as they offer a ‘theodicy of disprivilege’

Question 12

Two examples of sects that recruit from the poor:

Answer 12

• People’s temple = most people were poor and black, Jim Jones taught society is wrong and racist.
• The Nation of Islam = sect in USA for black Americans, teach white men are the devil.

Question 13

Wallis - M/C people

Answer 13

• Some M/C people, well off but feel spiritually deprived.
• Religion offers something to fill in that gap.
• E.g. Russel Brand - transcendental meditation - he used to be poor and is now rich, he filled it with drugs and sex. He didn’t feel fulfilled until he found meditation.

Question 14

Neibuhr - the dynamics of sects and NRMs

Answer 14

Schism - sects break away from churches. Mostly die out within a generation, if not they mellow and turn into a denomination.
There are several reasons for this:
- The second generation
- The protestant ethic
- Death of the leader

Question 15

Wilson

Answer 15

• Argues that not all sects become denominations or die out:
• Conversionist
• Adventist

Question 16

Drane

Answer 16

• New Age is caused by postmodernity.
• Loss of faith in metanarratives, New Age offers a truth that isn’t a metanarrative.

Question 17

Heelas - electric hotch potch of beliefs

Answer 17

Caused by modernity - New Age offers:
- A source of identity
- Consumer culture
- Rapid social change
- Decline of organised religion

Question 18

O’Beirne

Answer 18

• Found that White British people put religion 10th for importance, Black Britons put it 3rd and British Asians put it 2nd.

Question 19

2011 census - age

Answer 19

• Christians had the oldest age profile of all religious groups. Over 22% were 65 and over.
• Muslims had the youngest age profile of all religious groups. 48% were aged 25 and under.

Question 20

2013 report by the charity TearFund

Answer 20

• A 2013 report by the charity TearFund found that UK churches are attended by 65% women and 35% men.