Why Cults Succeed Where the Church Fails: Two of the Nation’s Leading Cult Experts Do Not Agree on Many Things. They Do Agree on This One

CHRISTIANITY TODAY’s editors recently met with Ronald M. Enroth of the sociology department of Westmont College in Santa Barbara, California, and J. Gordon Melton, director of the Institute for the Study of American Religion, Evanston, Illinois. The following is a summary of the interview.

What do you mean by the term “cult”?

Melton: I no longer break groups into cults, sects, and denominations. I find myself saying, “This is a New Thought religion,” “This is an occult religion,” and “These are Hindu-type religions.” In lumping them together, we assume that all cults have similar characteristics, and they don’t. There are some religious groups that deviate from the orthodox Christian norm so much that they are playing a different ballgame. But if you go to India, Methodists and Presbyterians are cult members and treated as false teachers who deserve to be outlawed and have their activities curtailed.

Enroth: The term “cult” is very ambiguous. Yet it has become part of our jargon. Jim Sire of InterVarsity Press asked whether we should stop using it. He answered by saying, “We should if we could, but we can’t; I think we’re stuck with it.” The person in the street identifies with it. For example, I teach a course at Westmont called “New Religious Movements.” But my students still refer to it as “the cult course.”

I distinguish between Eastern mystical and aberrational Christian groups. The latter are the ones I’ve specialized in recently. I also distinguish between the self-improvement or transformational cults, the occult, astrocults, and syncretistic cults.

There are many differences among cults. At the same time, however, there are characteristics that apply to most, if not all, such groups. As a sociologist I am interested in recurring patterns of behavior in, for example, leadership and cult life.

What are some of the patterns you see in such groups?

Enroth: Most such groups respect their leaders highly. The Moonies border on deification. They depart from revealed truth, false teaching. As a sociologist I see an adversarial stance vis-à-vis the social institutions of our society. There is also a degree of control at work, not only in the Eastern religions or more exotic cult groups, but also in some groups that claim to be evangelical. Most such groups believe, too, that they are in some way exclusively correct and superior to all other faiths.

Melton: I would agree with most of what Ron has said. The adversarial stance of the cult is almost a definition of what we are talking about, almost as much as false teachings.

Strong authority, however, I would see as characteristic not so much of cults as of all first-generation religions. John Wesley, Francis Asbury, Cotton Mather and the ministers of colonial New England, Brigham Young of the Mormons—all were hard-handed, authoritarian figures. After that leader is dead, the group he formed moves either into a strong bureaucracy (Christian Science) or into a much looser structure. The Methodists have followed the latter alternative, although they have retained a fairly strong conference system.

In terms of authority, Wesley was seen as just as much of a cultist in his time as Moon is today. The established church called Wesley an “enthusiast.” The Anglican church was very upset with Wesley for assuming the title of bishop.

In terms of adversarial role, too, Wesley and Moon come off very close to each other. Wesley was considered by his cohorts as very much of a theological radical and outcast who was preaching all kinds of heresy—some evangelicals still think of him that way.

The Hare Krishna movement now has the characteristics of a second-generation movement. Bhaktivedanta is dead, and it has formed a 20-member international ruling authority.

Not all groups see themselves in an elitist way. Christian cult groups tend to do so, and so do the Soka Gakkai of Japan. But other groups tend to be inclusivistic. Cults influenced by Hinduism are most often like this. Everybody who is not actively involved in the group is “only partially Hindu.”

You can put groups on a scale from the most exclusive to the most inclusive, from Carl McIntire to the United Methodist Church. One group says, “We are it,” the other, “Let’s pull everybody in,” with no standards at all. Some cults are so exclusive that you learn about them only because the ten people who are the rulers of the world in secret do something that gets into the newspapers.

As evangelical Christians, of course, we think we are the “center of the universe.” I know God has chosen the church and I am playing a role in it. But a lot of people who don’t agree with me theologically think that way too. Many small groups think that, small as they are and unsuccessful as they have been, they are the religion of the future.

The Wiccans, or modern-day witches, for example, are a tiny group that worships deities that seem to have died 2,000 years ago. They really believe pagan religion is coming back. They expect to see it become a major religion.

So many Christians have lost this sense of destiny; perhaps our African Christian brethren will have to come over here as missionaries and give us that sense again!

Let’s talk about the “lure” of the cults, what attracts people to cults in the first place. Is there, for example, a vacuum of authority in our homes and churches, especially those that have relinquished the authority of Scripture, that attracts people to authoritative religious leaders?

Enroth: Very definitely. Lots of people need someone to tell them what to believe. Some young adults relate to masculine cult leaders as father figures. The group becomes a surrogate family for them. Frequently they have had problems with their parents. A woman on the West Coast did her doctoral dissertation on families with members who have become involved in a cult. She found that the father is frequently weak or absent. I have noticed that many ex-cult members have fathers whose occupations are technical and scientific—physicians and engineers, for example. A theory I would like to test scientifically sometime is that those who become cult members typically have a distant relationship to their fathers.

Authority has declined in part because our society has shifted away from its Judeo-Christian foundation. The intrusion of the “new religions,” especially the Eastern or alternative religions, is something new for American society. The common base that was accepted for years in our society is gone.

Young people no longer have that base by which to evaluate things. As a result, a religiously naïve public is open to any guru who comes down the pike. It can’t even ask the right questions. Into the vacuum come the new religious movements.

Melton: One of the things we found in a survey is that some 80–85 percent of the people who join cults come from nonreligious or nominally religious homes. Very few report ever having been active in a church, though 90 percent report that their parents were members of a church.

This was borne out dramatically in our survey of the witchcraft community in Georgia. After Rod Stark of the University of Washington got the computer printout, he called me and said, “Gordon, there’s only one surprise in the whole report: there are no Baptists!” Since Georgia is 50 percent Baptist, and witches were drawn equally from all of the other religious groups, that was surprising. Part of the answer, of course, is that the black community makes up about 50 percent of Georgia’s population, and the Wiccan community is white.

But there had been no religious authority in the homes in which members had been raised, as there is in the typical Baptist home. One of the things the new religions do is supply religion for people who never had it before—except as something other people talk about.

Enroth: I mention in The Lure of the Cults that a god in the flesh is easier for some people to believe in. I remember being at the Unification Theological Seminary in Barrytown, New York, for a day a couple of years ago, along with four other authors. Word had apparently gotten around that Moon was coming to campus. Everyone had disappeared to get ready for his arrival. My guide invited me to join the welcoming party outside the main entrance’s circular drive not far from the Hudson River. I wish I had a photograph to preserve the look of expectation on their faces.

Soon Moon’s car drove up, and his driver got out. But Moon wasn’t in the car. The driver explained, “Father decided to go fishing in the Hudson River, so he won’t be coming to the campus. He needs to be alone to meditate.”

You should have seen the look of disappointment that replaced the earlier look of expectancy as they scattered.

Do you feel, then, that the cults are meeting a need the churches don’t provide?

Enroth: Yes. Some people learn to be better persons as a result of experiences in these groups. An ex-member of Faith Tabernacle in Oxnard, California, told me she had been a quiet, withdrawn person when she joined the movement. Because the group expected members to give a public witness to their faith, she learned a measure of self-confidence.

Many cults also provide a sense of family. Late last year I heard a panel of ex-members of cults speak at the Citizens Freedom Foundation, an anticult organization. Most of them said they valued being part of a group that was doing something important. Moonies have told me they couldn’t care less about Moon’s doctrine and that they would probably have left if they hadn’t made such good friends.

Do you feel cult leaders actually believe what they teach?

Enroth: Yes. Reporters frequently ask me, “Are cult leaders sincere, or are they Elmer Gantry types, charlatans, con artists?” I believe most of them are sincere. I think Moon honestly believes he’s the Messiah of the Second Coming.

Most of these groups are very committed. At the same time, however, I think leaders consciously or unconsciously use techniques that are less than laudatory. They manipulate people and tap into questionable financial resources. But they do so in a sincere attempt to “save” young people.

We have to support the quest of young people for ideals. They want to change the world. I’d like to have the typical Moonie in my classes and in my church. They are very fine people. In Strange Gods: The Great American Cult Scare, Bromley and Shupe—and some would add Gordon Melton—have described us, the “anticultists,” as believing all cult members are brainwashed so they can’t communicate intelligently. That’s not true. There may be Moonies like that, but there may be evangelical Christians who are like that too.

For the most part, however, I sense a genuine feeling for spiritual issues. Some Moonie missionaries were given the job of trying to convert ministers and people like myself in Southern California. They spent hours with me. I shared my view of Scripture and the importance of a personal relationship with Christ. Halfway through they were both in tears. “You are a very spiritual person,” they said.

And yet, after four hours of discussion we came right back to point one. They agreed with me about some of my critique of Moon’s theology. They could see where I was coming from. But there was no way they could buy what I said. They had been indoctrinated, just as Mormons and Jehovah’s Witnesses have been. It is very frustrating not to be able to penetrate those fences.

I talked for two hours with one young woman. “You’ve destroyed everything I value and cherish in this world,” she said. Then, turning to her mother, she said, “I don’t want to spend any more time talking to this guy. He’s not helping me or anybody else.” She angrily stormed out of my office. About two-and-a-half weeks later I learned she had left The Way International.

She later told me that as a result of our discussion she started to think about things she had never thought about before. She left The Way on her own.

Melton: I try to form good relationships with members. I let them know I’m available if they need someone outside the group to talk to. I have attended many occult conferences, for example, as an observer, and I find myself doing a lot of counseling.

Alternative groups offer a place for a teenage expression of commitment. In my church (the United Methodist Church), one of the hardest things to deal with is a teenager who is really committed to Jesus. He wouldn’t fit into the typical youth group; he would want to do different things than the youth group is likely to be doing. If he walked into the pastor’s study and said, “I committed myself to Jesus last night; I’d like to tell the congregation about it on Sunday,” the pastor wouldn’t know what to do with him.

These groups do. They do best with people moving from adolescence to adulthood. That’s what the mainline churches do worst—that and providing a sense of community. Large and impersonal churches on the corner don’t give most teenagers a sense of belonging. I consider myself an evangelical. I move in liberal Protestant circles, and they provide an even stronger contrast to the cults than most evangelical churches do. It is much harder for the teenager to find commitment and community in the average mainline church. But that’s where church members are.

Enroth: These groups appear where people are hurting—on the campus, in the community, on the streets. Usually it’s the more fundamentalistic or charismatic-oriented groups in evangelicalism that are doing equivalent kinds of ministry.

I don’t think it is realistic to expect an adolescent to walk off the streets into the office of First Presbyterian Church or First Baptist Church to seek help. On campus he may run into a cult member and be invited to a seminar or dinner.

That can be a lesson to the church. We need to strengthen our campus ministry and penetrate the hurting society, not expect people to come to us.

You said the majority of those who join cults come from nominally religious homes. Do you have any further examples?

Enroth: Very few Jews who join cults have come from Orthodox Jewish homes. They tend to come from ethnic, cultural, or nominally Jewish families. I could cite similar examples from Catholic and Protestant groups.

The Children of God are told not to try to convert pious Catholics, Mormons, or evangelical Christians because it is a waste of time. Instead, they are told to spot those with a very nominal church background.

Melton: The aberrant Christian groups you’ve been studying do go after evangelicals, though—young Christians in particular. But most groups know they can’t convert dedicated Christians.

Enroth: Yes, the aberrational groups—The Way, and those heavily involved in “shepherding” ministries, for example—seek out evangelicals.

The Community Chapel and Bible Training Center in Seattle is one example. It is into “Oneness” or “Jesus only” Pentecostalism and a heavy form of shepherding. That kind of group is picking off Christians in the Northwest. Evangelicals aren’t very often attracted to Hare Krishna or the Moonies.

Melton: That’s because the deviancy level of the aberrant groups is lower. If you join The Way, you can continue to think of yourself as an evangelical. You don’t have to shave your head, change your name, wear weird clothing, read unusual books. Evangelicals know the ostracism that comes from being a bit different from the world, and aberrational Christian groups are like evangelicals.

Enroth: Members are often more intense, more subjective, and more emotional. Some Christians feel mainstream evangelicalism is too lax. They discover a degree of commitment sadly lacking in some of our churches.

But as Donald McKay, the former president of Princeton, said, “Commitment without reflection is fanaticism in action.” Some people go off the deep end. The local Baptist or Presbyterian church may not seem to have the kind of commitment they find in The Body of Christ or other exclusive groups. They get caught up in the supposedly higher degree of spirituality in these groups.

I try to tell parents of those who have joined a cult that their son or daughter had a spiritual lack of some kind and is searching for answers. In some of the Eastern groups, people go from group to group, from teacher to teacher, looking for that perfect guru.

Melton: I have also found that the person who had a bad experience in a traditional church as a teenager joins cults. Frequently a Roman Catholic priest has been insensitive. Couple an insensitive minister with the doctrine that yours is the only true church, and you get a young person likely to join a non-Christian cult. I’ve seen this especially with Roman Catholics, who make up 20 percent of the population, and young people from the Worldwide Church of God.

But half the people in the country have been raised in secular homes. When they go to college, they are faced with a smorgasbord of ideas. At Stanford University, for example, you can pick and choose from many alternative religions. To a seeker, the teaching of a group is not nearly as important as the fellowship. Anybody who has been in one of the Eastern groups knows how warm their friendship is. When you have been connected nominally to a church of 400 or more members where you don’t know half the people, the contrast is so strong that it can’t help but influence a person’s decision.

Enroth: Westmont students who are attracted to the Christian aberrational groups sense a lack of the experiential in their own faith and church life. Such a subjective experience is very important to them. They also miss a sense of drama and vitality about their Christian faith. We lost about two dozen students about ten years ago to the Church of the Living Word, headed by the late Apostle John Robert Stevens. He made things happen. He was exciting and dynamic. Students who came mostly from Baptist, Methodist, and Presbyterian churches saw their churches as well-intentioned, but not excited about their faith. In Stevens’s church, every service was different. When the Apostle laid his hands on people, the excitement was real.

I suppose the same thing can be seen in some of the more emotional charismatic churches, where services are a little different, perhaps more exciting. Young Christians and dissatisfied, disenchanted young adults don’t see the dynamic aspects of the Christian faith in mainline churches. They do see it in these groups. They don’t stop to ask the important questions about beliefs and are sucked in by the emotion of it all and what they perceive to be vital Christian faith.

Is the campus where these groups carry out most of their ministry?

Melton: There is a second place. Cults grow in urban areas; you’ll find them in a circle around campuses, and in the young adult, singles, high-school dropout communities. For example, in Chicago they are found in the singles community on the north side, around the University of Chicago on the south side, and in Evanston around Northwestern University.

How do you feel about deprogramming, “exit counseling,” and similar anticult practices?

Melton: The efforts of the anticult movement to move into active legislation against the cults and their attempts to use force against cult members disturb me. I am also bothered by efforts to meddle in the internal affairs of a cult group. This is a real borderland.

I feel about deprogrammers the same way I feel about rapists. I think they both ought to be tossed into jail. Anticultism can be as heretical as any cult. Deprogramming is a violation of individual freedom and human rights in this country. The whole business about mind controlling and brainwashing is intellectual hogwash. Just because someone belongs to an authoritarian cult, or an authoritarian Christian church or any kind of authoritarian group, doesn’t mean he has lost his ability to think or hasn’t chosen to be a part of the group.

I very much favor counseling that would assist people who are trying to decide whether to leave a cult, or that would help resolve conflicts between family members. I do it myself.

My main problem with Christian anticultists is the aura of hostility they often have toward these groups. They make unjustified value judgments, unfairly question a group’s integrity, and criticize group leaders without valid verification. That is not sharing the gospel with non-Christian groups, nor is it a valid expression of the love of Jesus Christ that should characterize a Christian’s life.

I prefer not to speak of Christian and secular anticultists; I would rather speak of militant and nonmilitant anticultists. By “militant” I mean those, Christian or secular, who support legislation against cults, and also deprogramming. I’ve been critical of the Spiritual Counterfeits Project because in one of their publications they favorably reviewed Snapping, an anti-Christian book that supports deprogramming. Yet, in several publications they say they don’t support deprogramming, so they’re on the border. I wrote their director, Brooks Alexander, about that review. Even the Religious Analysis Service in the April–June issue of The Discerner came out in favor of deprogramming.

I’ve also heard many Christian leaders who have identified themselves with the militant anticult movement say that the militant anticult movement is identical with the secular anticult movement. I see militant anticultism as dangerous. If it goes against cult groups today, it can go against evangelical Christian groups tomorrow.

Enroth: I have a lot of problems with deprogramming, too, though I have been criticized for supporting it and have almost been identified with it, especially as a result of my book Youth, Brainwashing, and the Extremist Cults. Gordon’s review of that book in CHRISTIANITY TODAY said I advocated kidnaping! That is not true, though a number of people interpreted it that way.

Melton: The secular deprogramming groups grew out of the Citizens Freedom Foundation and Ted Patrick’s work. They have gone after the cults more narrowly than the Christian anticult groups that grew out of the Plymouth Brethren, Reformed, and Baptist traditions and became established in a number of institutes and research centers after World War II. They have zeroed in on a small group of about 15 or 20 cults that have recruited white, middle- and upper-class young adults. Parents whose children have been recruited by these cults and dropped out of school and broken off relationships with their families have turned to secular deprogrammers.

Unfortunately, much of the material secular anticult publications print is a mixture of false rumors and unverified statements. I have spent considerable time tracking these rumors down; the facts often turn out to be much different. But once the statement is in print, especially in the New York Times, it’s almost impossible to refute.

For example, it was widely reported that a Hare Krishna leader had been caught with guns. I know the Hare Krishna people are pacifists, so I wondered what was going on. We found out that there was one Hare Krishna leader who had been a gun collector before he joined the movement. Told to get rid of his collection, he refused and was disciplined. When he was caught with his guns again later, he was disciplined and also stripped of his powers and eventually expelled from the group. The activities of that rebel were used to discredit the whole movement.

A second example concerns the so-called paramilitary teachings of The Way. When I tried to track this story down, I found that the state of Kansas paid The Way College to teach hunting safety in Emporia—the same as other religious colleges in Kansas were doing. But The Way was singled out and condemned for “paramilitary teaching.”

A third example has to do with allegedly deceptive recruiting practices, especially by the Unification Church. I found those stories all went back to one place—the Open Family branch of the Moonies in Oakland, California. This group was different from the other branches, and if Mose Durst had not become president of the Unification Church it would probably have splintered off.

Enroth: I see now what Gordon means when he distinguishes Christian from secular anticultists. But he doesn’t make that clear in his writings. Christian anticultists and secular anticultists are all tarred with the same brush. In Strange Gods, Bromley and Shupe attack anticultists. Lumped in with all the secular groups is the Spiritual Counterfeits Project, on whose board I serve. They call it “fundamentalistic.” There are big differences between SCP and secular deprogrammers.

I also understand what Gordon is saying about false rumors. At the same time, I would argue that he and his camp do not sufficiently stress facts that have been verified. Take the Sunburst Communities. Rumors about their gun running, arsenals, and so forth can be verified by anyone; the police discovered their arsenal. They weakly rationalized that they had to protect themselves from those who were persecuting them. The police removed their arsenal. Their leader, Norman Paulsen, was later arrested in Santa Barbara with a gun in his possession.

There is also evidence of child abuse in such cults as Dr. Hobart Freeman’s Faith Assembly in Indiana and the Northeast Kingdom Community Church in Vermont. There is clear evidence of cases of child abuse, neglect, and beatings in Faith Tabernacle, which is headed by Eleanor Daries. The Church of Bible Understanding made the papers when the elders beat a teenager so badly he had to be admitted to a hospital in Philadelphia.

There have been numerous examples of violence. The evidence can be verified by police and medical authorities. I insist that opponents of the anticult movement have not been completely honest. They emphasize the false rumors so much they fail to make clear that some cases are true.

Some verification, I admit, comes from ex-members. Melton and others criticize me and my colleagues for basing a great deal of our information on “horror stories” and argue that those who come out of cult groups exaggerate their experiences. The cult apologists say ex-members are embarrassed that they were taken in by the cult, convinced they were brainwashed, and tell stories of violence and manipulation to explain their mistake.

Ex-members have told me stories of what I have to consider very destructive behavior: being forced to eat pet food off the floor, being beaten, teenagers forced to give details in public about masturbatory practices. One group uses spitting in the face, slapping, and other forms of physical abuse to keep members in line.

Members of the Children of God regularly engage in prostitution—“flirty fishing.” They teach that incest is acceptable and even encourage sex between adults and children. I can document that—from ex-members, certainly, but there is no other way to get information. The Children of God are not going to demonstrate for a reporter.

Many ex-members are born-again Christians; I believe they are telling the truth. For example, some of my verification of the activities of the Children of God comes from Deborah Davis, the daughter of founder Moses (“Mo”) Berg. At my suggestion she met with the public and the press at a cult conference in Santa Barbara in 1982. She had been with the group since its inception in Huntington Beach, California, in 1968, and left voluntarily about four years ago. Contrary to what critics say, many who provide information were not deprogrammed but left of their own free will. Deborah Davis tells about experiences in the Children of God that can’t be questioned. Her brother committed suicide because of pressures his father put on him. Her father approached her and her sisters sexually. I have lots of material in my files to verify the claims. Her new book expands on these facts.

Luis Villerreal, a friend and former student, has personal experience with the “heavenly deception” of the Moonies. He was walking along a street in Denver. A very attractive young woman was soliciting funds for a group she identified as Youth Guidance, a Christian group she said was working with predelinquent teenagers. (Youth Guidance is a branch of Youth for Christ International.) When she came to my friend, he took out his card identifying him as the director of Youth Guidance. He said, “I’ve never seen you before. Can I see your I.D.?”

She turned all shades of red, and under further pressure finally admitted she was a member of the Unification Church.

When I mentioned this incident to the president of the Unification Church, he said, “That’s an isolated incident. We don’t condone that sort of thing. It was probably an overzealous Asian.…” I interrupted and said, “This was no ‘overzealous Asian’; this was a white, middle-class American, girl-next-door type, and she was a member of your church.”

I agree that some people have exaggerated because they have an ax to grind. But what do those who are opposed to the anticult movement do with the cases that are verifiable? They have been largely ignored by them, and I think that’s unfair.

Melton: I distinguish between ex-members who have been deprogrammed and those who have not. In fact, ex-members who have not been deprogrammed are one of my main sources of verification. And if an ex-member who has been deprogrammed tells me the same story as one who has not been deprogrammed, I tend to accept that as evidence. We need to highlight the technique of verification. Deprogramming is a distortion; it affects an ex-member’s story, especially during the first year or two following the process. It encourages the ex-member to justify his actions.

As far as physical abuse is concerned, it is characteristic of aberrational Christian groups rather than Eastern or occult groups. We also need to differentiate between a member who abuses his children and the condoning of abuse by the group. The House of Judah, for example, clearly condones such abuse, and that’s wrong.

Enroth: I’d like to know which mainstream evangelical Christian leaders condone deprogramming. I know of none. There are, of course, certain individual evangelical Christian parents who have had their children deprogrammed. And some of them get upset with me when I tell them I don’t think deprogramming is the way to go. I warn them it can backfire and there can be negative results.

But sometimes I feel I almost have to come to the defense of the deprogrammers because of the inflammatory rhetoric of anti-anticultists like Bromley and Shupe. Much of what has been written about deprogramming has been grossly exaggerated. For personal reasons, I’ve never witnessed a deprogramming and I never will. I admit there are violent episodes, sometimes even sexual abuse, that nobody can condone.

But many who have gone through deprogramming insist that they have not been subjected to violence; the lights have not been on 24 hours a day. Some have told me they slept more during deprogramming than during their whole cult experience. They have been fed and treated rather well. The process was admittedly very intense, but I think anti-anticultists have blown the negative side out of proportion.

Gordon has written that many who have gone through deprogramming “do not or cannot return to a normal existence.” I would insist that many return to normal existence. My own research and experience indicate they have jobs as teachers and computer programmers. Anti-anticultists imply they all end up in mental hospitals. That’s ridiculous.

The rhetoric on both sides, unfortunately, but perhaps understandably, gets very strong. I believe that if people who have been deprogrammed end up in mental hospitals it is more likely because of their bad cult experiences. In some cases they took their problems with them into the cult. I’m not a psychiatrist, though, so I can’t prove it.

People who have been part of groups such as the Church of the Living Word or Faith Tabernacle have told me their experience has been so negative that it has taken them months and even years to go near a church or talk to a pastor. When I was on a talk show in Los Angeles, a woman who had been in one of these groups called and broke into tears as she said, “I can’t go near a church anymore. I distrust authority so much. I don’t want to be burned again.”

If you reject deprogramming as the way to get people out of cult groups, what do you see as the best way for Christians to relate to cult members?

Enroth: First, we need to have basic, accurate information about these groups. I say in my seminars that every large evangelical church should have a member who is a cult specialist to keep up on all the information that is available on the cults. Our educational ministry should start at the junior high level to help young people ask the right questions and develop the gift of “discernment.”

Second, I think we need to be models of spiritual life and vitality. Cult members need to see in us a positive, vital, alternative faith, grounded in God’s truth as it is revealed in his Word, and a personal relationship with Jesus Christ. That will do far more than all our arguing with them over biblical interpretation. So I differ from some of the traditional cult watchers who are very critical of cult leaders. I don’t think an aggressive, confrontational approach is the way to go. We need to be patient and loving; we need to be warm and caring.

Melton: Amen! I’m in complete agreement with everything Ron has said. But I would add that we need to change our focus. We have spent a lot of time on a very few groups, and they are not even the most successful in gaining members. The Zen Buddhists have received a lot of publicity, but when you put all the Zen Buddhists in the country together, there aren’t many of them. If you try to get a Christian evaluation of Swami Muktananda, however, it is very hard to do. Yet here’s a group that has 140 centers in the United States and three or four times as many followers as Moon has. The Hare Krishnas have only about 2,500 members, whereas Tibetan Buddhism has been growing by leaps and bounds. Some of the most significant groups are the Sufi Order of Pir Vilayat Khan, Swami Muktananada’s group, Da Free John of the Free Communion Church, Swami Vishnu Devananda of the Sivananda Yoga Vedanta Centres, the Himalayan Institute of Swami Rama, ECKANKAR, the Church Universal and Triumphant, and the Neopagan groups.

Second, we need to be more sophisticated about money. It takes money to run any kind of establishment. We need to adopt the same standards for our churches and synagogues that we do for the new religions. It takes money for a group to grow. And it doesn’t take many people putting their money together to create a big budget. For example, a lot of money flows through Moon’s group, but they’re only 30 days away from bankruptcy at any moment. The court case against the Hare Krishnas in California lost them ten years of assets. From my study, it is power rather than money that motivates most religious leaders. Bhaktivedanta, for example, lived the austere life of a Hindu sunyasan, but he was worshiped and revered as a god and had a tremendous amount of power over people. Moon was a multimillionaire before he ever came to this country. Yet he traveled around the country anonymously with only two suits.

Enroth: I would like to add that we need to be careful not to be so tolerant that we compromise our convictions that God has revealed religious truth to us in the Bible. We need to share our Christian imperatives in love.

Also, there is a tremendous need for additional resources in the Christian community. When people come out of cults, for example, there is no place for them to go; there are no halfway houses other than the questionable “rehabs” of the deprogrammers. The evangelical church has done a great deal for unwed mothers and drug addicts, but it has done nothing for the person coming out of one of the extremist cults.

It appears that the Love Israel Family or Church of Armageddon in Seattle is falling apart. Their guru has at long last been discovered to have feet of clay. Several hundred people belong to the group. Some of them have belonged for years; that is the only life they know. Who is going to be around to pick up the pieces?

The Tony and Susan Alamo Foundation is likewise undergoing transition; its members have been involved in a group that teaches total dependency on the leader. I know of no place in the United States today to which I could refer people, even if they had the money to pay for counseling. We need a center where ex-members of cults could meet with sincere, concerned, sensitive counselors. That is the biggest need we have today; it is the best way I can think of to meet the needs of cult members at the most sensitive time of their lives.

Have something to add about this? See something we missed? Share your feedback here.