Is the Organization of Jehovah’s Witnesses a Sect?

Definition of a Sect and Characteristics of Destructive Sects

Part I 

On some occasions, people who have seen that I have referred to the organization of Jehovah’s Witnesses as a sect have shown some degree of greater or lesser disagreement.

“I do not know why you treat them that way,” “they preach as Jesus did,” “they strive to follow his commandments,” “why do you not give them the same treatment you give other Protestants?”, “aren’t they just another Christian church?”, “Shouldn’t we recognize them as the religious organization that some countries recognize them to be?”

A commenter even wrote to me recently that describing them in that way should make me ashamed because it was “treating one’s neighbor like trash.”

Someone might think that I have something personal against Jehovah’s Witnesses, that I harbor some kind of resentment toward them, or that I imagine them as evil and ill-intentioned people. The truth is that nothing could be further from reality. I know many Jehovah’s Witnesses, some of whom are part of my family (my mother-in-law, for example), and therefore I hold them in great esteem. I know that among them there are very honest and well-intentioned people, as well as others who are not so much so.

But people are people, and the organization is the organization; and precisely because I know it, I can affirm that the organization of the Witnesses has characteristics that identify it unequivocally not only as a sect, but as a dangerous and destructive one.
If anyone thinks this sounds harsh, I invite him to take the time to read this series of articles in which I intend to substantiate it.

On this occasion I do not intend to try to refute the various doctrines professed by Jehovah’s Witnesses, whom I do not consider Christians because they deny doctrines such as the divinity of Christ and the Trinity. To analyze their various doctrines (ranging from such curious ones as believing that the coming of Christ already occurred, but invisibly, in 1914, to others as ancient as the old error of Arius), there are already several articles dedicated to them on our website; and in any case, the fact that they hold heretical doctrines would not necessarily make them a sect.

We say that they are a sect not because we think they are wrong on this or that point of doctrine, but because of the sectarian characteristics embedded in the deepest levels of their doctrine and organization. What makes them a destructive sect lies in the negative effects that these elements of sectarian drift produce in their adherents, which can include deep psychological trauma, irreparable physical harm including death itself, alienation, and limitation of personal development.

In this first installment I will limit myself to presenting some definitions of the word sect and the characteristics of those groups that are considered destructive sects.

What is a sect?

Presenting a definition of sect that is accepted by everyone is not simple. This is because the same term can have different readings, even when studied from a religious or sociological point of view.

The etymological root of the term sect is found in the Latin verb secare, which means “to cut, separate, break away from, etc.” If we approach the meaning of sect from traditional religious language, we can cite the following definitions:

“A sect in traditional religious language has clearly pejorative overtones. In opposition to ‘Church,’ ‘sect’ designates a small secessionist group that gathers the disciples of a heretical master”[1]

“In religion it is customary to distinguish between sect and Church. The Church is universal, open to all; the sect is only for the ‘pure,’ the ‘saved.’ The Church has various degrees of belonging: there are the fervent and the not fervent. The sect is only for initiates and militants. The Church accepts being enriched and evolving; the sect does not. The Church acts through evangelization and dialogue; the sect, through proselytism. The Church accepts human realities (politics, culture, society, recreation, etc.); the sect is negative toward human realities…”[2]

“The sect is characterized as a closed religious group that arises in opposition to the established institutional Churches and in opposition to the world.”[3]

“Without any dogmatism, we could define the sect as that human group in which each and every one (not merely some) of the following characteristics is present: pyramidal organization; unconditional submission to the leader, whether personal or collective; suppression of internal criticism; pursuit of political and/or economic objectives masked under an ideology of a spiritual type, whether religious or philosophical; use of adherents as instruments for the sect’s own purposes; absence of control or oversight of the sect by another religious or philosophical authority”[4]

“A sect is a group of religious and philosophical tendency that unites its adherents around a venerated master. It currently attempts to assume a parascientific and often therapeutic appearance. It is likewise characterized by elitist, highly particularist, and closed behavior. Finally, it manifests a more or less marked intolerance and vigorous proselytism that uses propagandistic methods and procedures”[5]

“Sects are religious groups, generally small, full of enthusiasm, made up of men and women voluntarily associated after a conversion, who believe they have detected truth and salvation, radically exclude others, set themselves against the Churches and against the world, and blindly obey their founders”[6]

“Sects are voluntary associations…, with a strong sense of identity…, that demand from their members a full and conscious submission which, if it does not eliminate all other commitments, must at least be placed above them, whether they refer to the State, the tribe, the class, or the family group… They regard themselves as an elite… as a group apart, arrogating to themselves, if not always an absolutely exclusive salvation, at least the greatest goods. They also show a certain inclination toward exclusivism… The fact of belonging to a particular sect therefore implies a distancing, and perhaps hostility, toward other sects and religious groups… They expel those who prove unworthy of them… Self-control, conscience, and rectitude are important characteristics of sectarianism… They resort to some principle of authority different from that which is inherent in the orthodox tradition… The authority defended by a sect may be the supposed revelation of a charismatic leader, may consist in a reinterpretation of sacred writings, or may be the idea that true believers will obtain a revelation for themselves”[7]

“Destructive sects are pseudo-religious, pseudo-philosophical, or pseudo-cultural organizations, with a pyramidal and totalitarian structure, dedicated to recruiting adherents in order to exploit them through false promises and techniques of psychological coercion, always for the benefit of their leaders’ desire for power and profit”[8]

Characteristics of destructive sects

Among the fundamental characteristics of a destructive sect are:

1. A group held together by a demagogic doctrine (religious or socio-religious) and headed by a charismatic leader who is the divinity itself or one chosen by it, or else the possessor of the “absolute truth” in some social sphere.

2. A theocratic, vertical, and totalitarian structure in which the word of the leaders is a dogma of faith. The leaders intervene even in the most intimate and personal details of their adherents and demand that their orders be carried out without the slightest criticism.

3. They demand total adherence to the group and force members (under psychological pressure) to break all previous social ties upon entering the cult: parents, spouse, friends, work, studies, etc.

4. They live in closed communities or in total dependence on the group.

5. They suppress individual liberties and the right to privacy.

6. They control the information that reaches their adherents, manipulating it for their own convenience.

7. They use sophisticated neurophysiological techniques, masked under the “meditation” or “spiritual rebirth” of the adherents, causing them in many cases serious psychological injuries.

8. They promote a total rejection of society and its institutions. Outside the cult, everyone is an enemy (polarization between the good-sect and the evil-society); society is trash, and the people who live in it matter only insofar as they can serve the group.

9. Their primary activities are proselytism (obtaining new adherents) and the collection of money (street collections, courses, commercial and industrial activities, and even clearly criminal ones). In the case of multinational sects, much of the money is sent to each group’s headquarters.

10. Under psychological coercion, they obtain the handing over of the personal assets of new adherents to the sect, or large sums of money as payment for “courses” or “audits.” Members who work outside the group hand over all or a large part of their salary to the sect. And those who work in cult-owned companies do not receive wages (the payrolls of those companies are only an illegal cover, since they are never actually paid, or the money is returned, for their members, labor)”

These and other definitions can be found in the book Para conocer las sectas, by Juan Bosch.

In the next installments I will specify which of these characteristics are unequivocally present in the organization of Jehovah’s Witnesses.

(Part 2 – Part 3– Part 4 – Part 5– Part 6– Conclusions)

Author: José Miguel Arráiz

NOTES

________________________________________________________________

Note: . This series of articles is available in parts in each post in PDF format. I have also gathered it complete in a small pocket book available both as a physical book and as a digital book. All are available in the ApologeticaCatólica.org Store.