### belief | religion:

Cult
* All cults are based on some sort of faith in something being true, regardless of the evidence.
* Many cults are elitist groups
  - stress righteousness and morality
  - use traditional religion as a basis for their beliefs
* Most cults provide some means for charismatic power to be applied to the healing of mind and body.
* Some cults actively recruit young teens and children
  - explicitly deny central doctrines of the Christian faith
  - have living dynamic leaders who control every aspect of their followers lives
  - stress human potential
  - use religion as a hook to pull in unsuspecting people
* also harm society in important indirect ways
  - have a hierarchical structure for members from initiates to high priests
  - regard the body as a source of corruption
  - try to engender total faith in an unchallenged leader
* are a fact of life in our society
  - star-spangled part of the American tradition
  - almost by definition closed societies
  - authoritarian in nature
  - bands
  - created by ideology
  - far more nuclear than mainstream religions
* are groups of people
  - that trade a sense of salvation and belonging for the ability to think for oneself
  - inherently ephemeral and loosely organized
  - lead by people who make their followers believe that the leader has supernatural powers
  - like religions, only they want total control and usually permit no conflicting opinions
  - made of people
  - more strongly devoted to a leader, where as sects are splinters of established churches
  - of many varying and even opposite beliefs
  - part of the religious systems of the world
  - primarily a social and cultural rather than a psychiatric or legal problem
  - somewhat like guilds in that they provide a collection of powers for members
  - very small, they are lifeless and they tend to follow a person
* attract people on the fringe of society, people already on the edge.
* can give teens a sense of higher purpose and a feeling that there is order in the world
* come in a variety of shapes and sizes.
* destroy the ego authority of the individual and create a helpless feeling.
* do things to people.
* dominate all aspects of their member's lives, controlling their minds and bodies.
* educate their children to follow certain norms established by the leader.
* gather around charismatic individuals who are the sole source of truth to their followers.
* generally believe their group is the fulfillment of prophecy concerning end times.
* is religion
* make salvation to some degree dependent on the works of man.
* often twist religious texts, such as the Bible, tosuit their own agendas
  - urge their followers to live communally to avoid contamination by worldliness
* part of culture.
* prey on people who feel unable to say no.
* represent a force of religious innovation within a culture.
* rob a person of their own creativity and individuality
  - individuals of the ability to make moral and social decisions that govern their lives
* tend to be emotionally and, sometimes, physically and sexually abusive.
* typically manipulate sleep patterns, diet, sexuality, and the flow of information.
* use fear to control their members
  - mind control or pressure to keep their members
  - mind-control techniques and forms of hypnosis to indoctrinate followers
* usually center around the leader and often the cult dies when the leader dies
  - claim the Bible as authoritative
  - have some kind of authoritarian, totalistic leader or prophet
* vary in how much financial and political power they wield.

### belief | religion | cult:

Modern cult
* Most modern cults echo the errors of ancient heretics.
* have many different practices and many different ways of leadership.