Levels of belief-coercion within religious groups

Topics covered in this essay:

• Levels of belief-coercion within religious groups
• Actual mind-control groups
• Non-existent mind control group
• Role of discipline in religious groups
• Methods used by high-demand groups
• References

Levels of belief-coercion within religious groups

All religious groups require their members to conform to specific beliefs; they attempt to restrict members' behaviors to certain norms. But faith groups vary greatly in the level of demands and the degree of control that they maintain over their membership:

• Low level. At the "low control" end might be a congregation of the Unitarian Universalist Association where members are not required to believe in and follow a specific creed. They are encouraged to critically investigate all sources of spirituality for themselves. The role of the congregation is to help each member to develop his or her own ethical and belief systems.
  • The vast majority of the 1,200 or so religious organizations in North America place greater demands on their members than the Unitarian Universalist Association, but in no way can be considered high-demand, mind-control or brainwashing groups. In the more conservative denomination, pressure for the individual to belief is a natural outgrowth of some of their theological beliefs; they often teach that only a select few who trust Jesus as Lord and Savior will be saved; the vast majority of humans will spend eternity in Hell. This teaching places considerable pressure on the member to believe. Some denominations use the threat of excommunicating or disfellowshipping members in order to enforce conformity. Those members who obtain their entire spiritual, religious, and social support from the faith group frequently find exile to be very disruptive.
• Intermediate groups
  • At the higher end of the spectrum might be a Roman Catholic convent or monastery that requires its members to adhere to a strict schedule of sleep, work and prayer, a limited diet, poverty, celibacy, total acceptance of decisions by those in authority, etc.
  • Next would be actual mind-control groups. These are often small, local, new, Christian groups who make extremely high demands on their members, and are often led by a single charismatic individual. Their total membership is quite small.
•  "High demand/control" groups. This end of spectrum includes the destructive doomsday cults which so completely control their members that they have occasionally led many to their deaths through suicide and murder.

Actual "Mind-Control Groups"

One definition of a Mind-Control group is

"A religious group that engages in extreme spiritual, physical, mental, and emotional manipulation of its members in order to control closely their beliefs, thoughts, emotions and behavior"

The critical word here is "extreme".

There have existed (and continue to exist) many truly abusive mind-control groups in North America. Usually, these are headed by a single leader who uses manipulative techniques to control his/her followers. The group is tightly knit and often remains hidden unless some criminal act is discovered. Almost all are Christian (probably because 85% of the North American population is of this religion). The Anti-Cult and Counter-Cult Movements rarely target these groups, perhaps because their activities are not publicly known. Also, they are invariably to be local groups with a small membership. They are virtually undetectable unless some criminal activity brings them to the attention of the police and press.

Sometimes these mind-control groups become known because of their use of physical abuse, particularly of children. A massive study of child abuse funded by the US federal government did uncover a troubling level of what they called "religion-related abuse". Much of this abuse probably occurs within mind-control cults. The study identified three main forms of child abuse:

• psychological and physical abuse during exorcisms
• unreasonably harsh corporal punishment of children due to religiously influenced child raising beliefs
• withholding needed medical attention from children in favor of prayer

During 1995, two instances of unintentional deaths during exorcisms were widely publicized in North America. One occurred in California; the other in Ontario Canada. Similar deaths have been extensively published since, at the rate of about one per year. One can reasonably assume that there was much unreported abuse during exorcisms that did not lead to death of the victim. Accounts of children needlessly dying of treatable diseases surface from time to time in which the church group required that prayer be used in place of medical intervention.

A Non-existent Mind-Control Cult

There is one group that up to 90% of Americans believe exist: an inter-generational, underground, international Satanic conspiracy which kidnaps children, abuses them, ritually kills them, eats their flesh and drinks their blood. This is perhaps the longest lasting urban folk tale in existence, having been circulating since about the 2nd century CE. There are a whole range of myths that have arisen about these groups: they allegedly keep thousands of women in concentration camps to generate babies for sacrifice; they kill 50,000 infants in the United States every year; their rituals are inverted, sacrilegious parodies on Christian religious practices, etc. No hard evidence has ever been found to support any of these beliefs. Such groups either exist in very small numbers or don't exist at all. Many of the myths are traceable to the "burning times" during the late Middle Ages and Renaissance, when as many as a hundred thousands  people suspected of selling their souls to Satan were routinely rounded up, tortured and executed. In a sense, the burning times are still being promoted today, and the work of the burning times continues.

Role of Discipline in Religious Groups:

Much of the propaganda of the anti-cult movement is based on a misunderstanding of the role of discipline within religious groups. For centuries, such groups have required their members to submit to a restricted diet, work hard, spend hours in repetitive prayers, live a very simple life without luxuries, conform to the rules of the group, remain celibate, abandon smoking and drinking, etc. Such requirements within convents and monasteries have been long accepted in society. Some within the Anti-Cult Movement attacked sincere religious faith groups for these same practices, and concluded that the groups are profoundly evil, dangerous and manipulative.

The reality is that most people join these groups and stay as long as membership remains a positive experience. Some leave after a few days; others stay only for a few weeks; still others stay for years, but later leave for a variety of reasons._4,5 People are almost always physically free to leave religious groups. If organizations attempted to restrict freedom of movement, they would be vulnerable to a charge of kidnapping or forcible confinement. There have been rare instances reported where destructive cults have prevented members from leaving. The People's Temple case in Jonestown is one of the few examples. During their last days, when the situation was quickly degenerating into mass suicide and mass murder, armed guards kept people from leaving. The Students of the Seven Seals (Branch Davidian) in Waco TX is a more typical example. Members were allowed to leave even during the midst of the armed standoff with government agencies.

There can be a potential negative side to membership in high demand religious organizations. Some require their core, dedicated members to accept strong discipline; this can develop a deep commitment to the church. In the case of Unificationists, for example, such members must remain celibate before marriage, abstain from tobacco and alcohol and work long hours. The group can become their whole life, the source of their religious, cultural, social, and other support systems. If they become disillusioned by some aspect of the church, they can find it difficult to leave the organization and abandon these support networks. When they do leave, they sometimes become angry with themselves and the church, believing that they have wasted perhaps years of their life within the group.

Methods used by "high-demand" groups

They use all of the techniques as "low demand" faith groups use: requiring members to accept a system of beliefs, conforming to certain behavioral norms; expecting them to involve themselves in the life of the congregation, etc. However, mind-control groups add many additional methods, and take them all to a much higher level. Some are:

• Members' access to outside information is severely restricted
• Their thoughts, beliefs and emotions are tightly controlled by:
  • stress; e.g. long hours of work; little or no free time
  • restricting sleep
  • requiring endless repetition of prayers
  • auto-hypnotic exercises
  • generation of fear and paranoia; viewing the outside world as threatening
  • restricting criticism of the leadership or group policies
• Their behavior may be controlled by:
  • public shaming and humiliation
  • requiring personal confessions
  • isolation from outside contacts, including their family of origin

Members are not physically restrained from leaving the group. They are not held prisoner. They can walk away at any time. But there are strong pressures to remain. If they left, all social and emotional support would disappear; they will often be shunned. Some groups teach that God will abandon or punish them if they leave. They may be told that they will die in the imminent war of Armageddon if they leave the protection of the group.

These high-demand groups tend to have a rapid turnover of membership. Members are initially attracted  because they feel loved and supported. In time, many find the group experience to be less positive. They may leave after days, weeks, months or years.

The total membership of high demand/mind-control groups is miniscule, compared to the total number of people involved in new religious movements generally.

References:

1. D.B. Bromley, A.D. Shupe, "Strange Gods: The Great American Cult Scare," Beacon Press, Boston, (1981). This book describes the anti-cult movement that had its origins in the 1970's. It explodes the "brainwashing" scare.
2. D.G. Hill, "Study of Mind Development Groups, Sects and Cults,", Toronto (1980)
3. "Study of Mind Development Groups, Sects and Cults in Ontario", Ontario Government (1980)
4. S.J. Gelberg, "On Leaving the 'Hare Krishnas'", Communities, Issue 88, Fall 1995, Route 1, Box 155, Rutledge MO 63563. Cost is $4.50 in the US, US $4.50 elsewhere. This article describes a member's gradual disillusionment with the movement, which lead up to his departure from the group.
5. S.V. Levine, various articles, cited in: S.B. Ferguson et al, "New Dictionary of Theology", Inter-Varsity Press, Downers Grove, IL (1988), Page 460-461.
6. Eternity On-line Magazine has an essay: "How Cults Manipulate People" at http://www.ultra.net.au/~johnedmiston/eternity/cultconv.htm

Copyright © 1995 to 1999 incl.
Originally published: 1995-SEP-11
Latest update: 1999-DEC-14
Author: B.A. Robinson

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