Short existence of sects Flashcards
Sect members are unable to keep up with the strict rules of the sect
Over a long period of time, some sects struggle with the problem of maintaining the commitment and enthusiasm of members. Barker suggested that, particularly in world-rejecting sects, the heavy commitment required is hard to maintain, especially when the sect adopts a confrontational stance with the outside world and places personal restrictions on the lives of members.
For example, members of the Unification Church (Moonie sect) are sometimes denied regular contact with their own families and so a person may leave a sect after finding it difficult to keep to the rules of the sect over a long period of time.
Niebuhr thought the enthusiastic fervour and commitment of sect members is hard to sustain after the first generation — the commitment of parents who converted to the sect is hard to keep going in their children. Either the sect will then gradually wither away, or it will need to become less of a protest movement and modify its beliefs and practices to accommodate, and be more tolerant of, mainstream society and other beliefs. This would then allow its members to live more normal lives, and give it a better chance of retaining members, but this entails the sect becoming more settled and denomination-like.
After death of a charismatic leader
Sects that are founded and led by a single charismatic leader, whose inspirational personal magnetism and leadership attracted people into the sect, may lose support and disappear once the leader dies.
The leader may have set out the beliefs of the sect and laid down the rules for members to follow. They may even have been seen as a ‘messiah’, (saviour) who possessed supernatural powers. When the leader dies, members may feel the sect lacks appeal and direction.
For example, the death of Rev Moon in 2011, founder of the Unification Church, and seen by members as a ‘messiah’, has caused some members to leave the sect. The disappearance of a sect also happens when the death of a leader coincides with the mass suicide of members as in the case of the Jim Jones People’s Temple.
