Citation

Stark R, Bainbridge WS, Kent L. Sociol. Relig. 1981; 42(2): 137-161.

Copyright

(Copyright © 1981, Association for the Sociology of Religion)

DOI

10.2307/3710591

PMID

unavailable

Abstract

This paper extends our recent quantitative research on cults by examining data on cult membership and on client cult practitioners in the United States during the 1920s. In so doing we demonstrate the great utility of a series of strangely neglected nation-wide census studies of religion conducted by the U.S. Census Bureau during the first four decades of this century. These data permit examination of some rather remarkable aspects of the specific historical development of a number of important American cult movements. They also permit for the first time an analysis of cult membership rather than use of more inferential measures of cult activity and strength. Analysis of the data suggests which of these sets of membership statistics will serve as valid measures of the receptivity of local environments to cult recruitment. Use of these measures to test elements of our theory of religious movements is deferred to other papers. Here our major concern is to discover some interesting historical generalizations about American cult movements. Finally, we find amazing stability in cult activity over the 40 years between the 1920s and the 1970s. This suggests the need for more basic theories of cult formation than those suggested by scholars who regard the rise of new religions as a new phenomenon.