The New Holy Clubs: Testing Church-to-Sect Propositions
The familiar sect-to-church theory holds that successful sects will gradually become more church-like over time, reducing the level of tension they hold with their environment. H. Richard Niebuhr (1929), the originator of sect-to-church theory, took it for granted that transformation was possible on...
Authors: | ; |
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Format: | Electronic Article |
Language: | English |
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Published: |
Oxford Univ. Press
2001
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In: |
Sociology of religion
Year: 2001, Volume: 62, Issue: 2, Pages: 175-189 |
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Summary: | The familiar sect-to-church theory holds that successful sects will gradually become more church-like over time, reducing the level of tension they hold with their environment. H. Richard Niebuhr (1929), the originator of sect-to-church theory, took it for granted that transformation was possible only in the church-like direction — that churches could not reverse the process and become more sectlike. Recent theoretical developments, however, suggest that under certain conditions, and where groups are market-dependent, religious organizations will shift in the direction of higher tension with their environment (Stark and Finke 2000). Using recent data from Methodist congregations, we test selected propositions from these new theoretical developments. |
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ISSN: | 1759-8818 |
Contains: | Enthalten in: Sociology of religion
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Persistent identifiers: | DOI: 10.2307/3712454 |