Understanding New Religious Movements

Discussions of any religion can easily raise passions but arguments tend to become even more heated when the religion under discussion is characterized as new. Divisions around the study of new religious movements (NRMs) or cults, or nontraditional or alternative or emergent religions are so acute that there is even controversy over how to refer to them. This text strives to bring objectivity to this contested terrain by offering perspectives on new religions from different academic perspectives: history, psychology, sociology, law, theology and counselling. This approach provides descriptions of a broad range of movements while demonstrating how differing aims of the disciplines can create much of the controversy around NRMs.