Sects & Stats - Overturning the Conventional Wisdom about Cult Members - James R. Lewis
3 Increasing Complexity versus Prior Generalizations: Census Data and Longitudinal Approaches
Sects & Stats - Overturning the Conventional Wisdom about Cult Members - James R. Lewis
James R. Lewis [+]
Wuhan University
James R. Lewis is Professor of Philosophy in the School of Philosophy at Wuhan University. He is well-published in the field of new religious movements. His publications and edited volumes include The Oxford Handbook of New Religious Movements, Controversial New Religions (with Jesper Petersen), Scientology, Children of Jesus and Mary (with Nicholas Levine), and, most recently, Violence and New Religious Movements.
Description
In the third chapter, I underline the point about the greater diversity of members of new religions by examining data from the New Zealand and Australian censuses – both of which, in contrast to Canada and the United Kingdom, hold censuses every five years instead of every ten years – though I will also periodically refer to census data from the latter two nations. Not only has the earlier profile of members of non-traditional religions reached in the 1970s and 1980s been superseded, but, further, it has become increasingly difficult to discuss NRM members “in general,” as a class demographically distinct from members of other religious organizations.