Cults

[ardillacid]

What exaclty does it mean to you personally when someone says cult? Today someone said I belong to the biggest cult in the world, and I wondered to myself why this was supposed to be an sinsult. According to dicitonary.com a cult is:

1. a particular system of religious worship, esp. with reference to its rites and ceremonies.

What the big deal?

Edited March 29, 2007 by notardillacid

[Laudate_Dominum]

The word has various shades of meaning and a few distinct definitions. The popular meaning of the word in our culture today carries connotations of fanaticism and controlling ideology. The archetypal "cult" based on this popular sense of the word would be the Branch Davidian type of group where a bunch of poor sheep are brainwashed into following some charismatic nut case.

In effect, when people say that you belong to a cult they mean this in the most derogatory sense and are basically trying to defame your religion and belittle you personally. You're a mindless sheep brainwashed into a sinister ideology. Charming eh?

Yeah, the funny part is that quite often these people consider themselves to be the antithesis of us crude, ignorant bigots.

[got2luvjc]

when I hear the word cult, I automatically think of the KKK, but I wish I didn't... and I don't even know why that happens...


but I guess "cult" as it appears to me (in light of my automated KKK reaction) is a group of people who negatively affect people, or who blindly follow something / someone (Nazis perhaps?)

I don't think that Catholicism is a cult, because except for the Caflics that only go to mass on sunday and don't take their faith any deeper than that, there's ample opportunity to find out why the Church believes what it does and where it gets it's ideas (Tradition, Bible, etc)



dang that KKK...... invading the minds of innocent Phatmassers....

[Luminessence]

[quote name='notardillacid' post='1221883' date='Mar 29 2007, 04:54 AM']According to dicitonary.com a cult is:

1. a particular system of religious worship, esp. with reference to its rites and ceremonies.

What the big deal?[/quote]

Technically that's what cult means, but it's more often used to mean a harmful religious organization, whose leaders have an ulterior motive of some sort.

[AccountDeleted]

from Wikipedia:

[i]According to Rodney Stark's the Theory of Religion, most religions start out their lives as cults or sects, i.e. groups in high tension with the surrounding society. Over time, they tend to either die out, or become more established, mainstream and in less tension with society. Cults are new groups with a novel theology, while sects are attempts to return mainstream religions to (what the sect views as) their original purity.[2]

Since this definition of "cult" is defined in part in terms of tension with the surrounding society, the same group may both be a cult and not a cult at different places and times. For example, Christianity was a cult by this definition in 1st and 2nd century Rome, but in fifth century Rome it is no longer a cult but rather an ecclesia (the state religion). Or similarly, very conservative Islam would (when adopted by Westerners) constitute a cult in the West, but the ecclesia in some conservative Muslim countries (e.g. Saudi Arabia, Iran, Afghanistan under the Taliban). Likewise, because novelty of beliefs as well as tension is an element in the definition: in India, the Hare Krishnas are not a cult, but rather a sect (since their beliefs are largely traditional to Hindu culture), but they are by this definition a cult in the Western world (since their beliefs are largely novel to Christian culture).[/i]

[N/A Gone]

CARM.org says catholics are...

Let me see if I can get a formal def from a good source.

[carrdero]

[color="#000080"]Cults do not have to be fads in order to apply. Here are some of the examples I have compiled that imply that a group is a cult.[/color]

cults may pressure a person to do things that the person didn’t really want to do.

cults may sexually harrass individuals within the group - for example, saying that a person has to sleep with the leader or trying to get him/her to do some practice that they do not feel comfortable with. in exreme cases, cults use rape. some cults do things outside of a country’s borders where laws about these practices are nonexistent or not enforced.

cults prey on vulnerable people - people who lack social networks, friends - people who desperately need a group for support. in fact, the cult group may provide some love, but it does more harm than good, i.e. has costs - monetary, social, physical, spiritual, mental that all end up hurting.

cults may brainwash a person by surrounding the person with a limited ideology (and prohibiting access to other points of view or requiring that those be put into the context of the cult’s doctrine). this cult ideology might contain some truth but would contain half-truths, half-baked ideas, weird notions, superstitions, falicies, etc. it some cases, limited ideas about race are included.

cults often require absolute devotion to one leader (who cannot really be questioned and is never wrong).

cults may be charging a person for “services”. this may end up devastating a person financially where these “services” are exorbitantly priced. the effects of those “services” may be enticing but end up being temporary.

cults may use threatening measures to ensure compliance, such as whispering campaigns, slandering one’s reputation, blacklisting, etc...

cults may drug individuals or give members a placebo that is supposed to ultimately enhance their connection to a spirituality.

[b]Here is a simple test to tell if a group is a cult or not. Ask yourself these questions about the group: [/b]

1. Does the group use tricks, lies or excuses to get members and to keep them?

2.Does the group say that it is "better than all other groups", and is it organised so that people can't complain, discuss, vote, criticize, or change the group?

3.Does the group claim that the founder knows all the answers, and tolerates no discussion or questioning of his or her teachings?

4.Does the group say that nothing is more important than to get more money, people or anything else into the group, and that this is more important than honesty or friendship or families, maybe because it is such an emergency that the world must be saved right away?

5.Is the money collected used only a few "special people instead of for the members or the general population?

Edited April 15, 2007 by carrdero

[toledo_jesus]

[quote name='notardillacid' post='1221883' date='Mar 29 2007, 04:54 AM']What exaclty does it mean to you personally when someone says cult? Today someone said I belong to the biggest cult in the world, and I wondered to myself why this was supposed to be an sinsult. According to dicitonary.com a cult is:

1. a particular system of religious worship, esp. with reference to its rites and ceremonies.

What the big deal?[/quote]
sociologically speaking, a cult is different from a Church. You have cult, sect, denomination, Church. I think. Christianity started as a cult but attained Church status.

[Thy Geekdom Come]

[quote name='toledo_jesus' post='1244469' date='Apr 15 2007, 01:02 PM']sociologically speaking, a cult is different from a Church. You have cult, sect, denomination, Church. I think. Christianity started as a cult but attained Church status.[/quote]
A Church is literally a body of those who are called. Since all Christians have always been called, the Church was always a Church. I think in the broad sense that a Church can be a cult, since a cult broadly only refers to a following...and we are a group of those called by Christ who follow Him.

[carrdero]

[quote name='Raphael' post='1244520' date='Apr 15 2007, 02:58 PM']A Church is literally a body of those who are called. Since all Christians have always been called, the Church was always a Church. I think in the broad sense that a Church can be a cult, since a cult broadly only refers to a following...and we are a group of those called by Christ who follow Him.[/quote]
What of the ones that convert or are "called away"?

[Thy Geekdom Come]

[quote name='carrdero' post='1244531' date='Apr 15 2007, 02:04 PM']What of the ones that convert or are "called away"?[/quote]
Called away from something to the Church or called away from the Church?

No one is called away from the Church, at least not by God.

[carrdero]

[quote name='Raphael' post='1244537' date='Apr 15 2007, 03:12 PM']Called away from something to the Church or called away from the Church?

No one is called away from the Church, at least not by God.[/quote]
I guess the question that I was trying to ask was what you thought of the people who have proclaimed to have left one church to join another. Having visited many religious forums it was always interesting to listen to the many stories how some people have left one Christian organization to join another. Though these other Christian organizations have sometimes been listed as “cults” many people have felt they were called or drawn to the other organizations.

[Paddington]

When I was a Prot-Christian (I'm nothing now btw) I took up the habit of not calling JW's and Mormons etc. "cults" even tho I thought of them as +/- non-Christian. I just called them 'sects' and expressed my disagreement with them.
All the Prots around me seemed to be calling them cults (I did at first), but one of my best friends was a JW and it hit me that I was using the same word for her sect that others (including her) would use for Branch Dividians, Jamestown, Heaven's Gate, etc. I couldn't do it anymore that way. Groups like JW's and Mormons at least are normal functioning people who can relate to non-members. (She is an awesome friend.)
So...to me a "cult" is only the crrrrrrrrazy groups like with that guy who calls himself the anti-Christ and had all of the members get a 666 tattoo.

[FullTruth]

[quote name='Paddington' post='1246917' date='Apr 17 2007, 02:38 AM']When I was a Prot-Christian (I'm nothing now btw) I took up the habit of not calling JW's and Mormons etc. "cults" even tho I thought of them as +/- non-Christian. I just called them 'sects' and expressed my disagreement with them.
All the Prots around me seemed to be calling them cults (I did at first), but one of my best friends was a JW and it hit me that I was using the same word for her sect that others (including her) would use for Branch Dividians, Jamestown, Heaven's Gate, etc. I couldn't do it anymore that way. Groups like JW's and Mormons at least are normal functioning people who can relate to non-members. (She is an awesome friend.)
So...to me a "cult" is only the crrrrrrrrazy groups like with that guy who calls himself the anti-Christ and had all of the members get a 666 tattoo.[/quote]
I feel the same way.

A church can be in error, but if the people are normal people - that's okay.

I was oneness, once upon a time, with Catholic friends, an Anglican Uncle, a Jehovah Witness friend, and others. Good people, who love God.

That is the big reason I stand up for oneness believers. They may be in error, but they believe Jesus Christ is God manifested in the flesh and died on the cross for our sins. Is that not the only thing we need to believe about Jesus Christ.

I only address Jesus Christ in prayer, because he is the only way to the Father.

I can't wait till the day I step up to the plate and act as one of the two witnesses - as according to scripture, to prove my Lord to be true, and righteous.

[carrdero]

[quote name='FullTruth' post='1247669' date='Apr 17 2007, 10:41 PM']I feel the same way.

A church can be in error, [color="#FF0000"]but if the people are normal people[/color]- that's okay.[/quote]
[color="#FF0000"]I may need you to clarify this for me.[/color]

Edited April 18, 2007 by carrdero