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were connected with the social values of a given group, either to the point of

identification (as in tribal religion) or as a vehicle to reinforce social ideals (as in American “civil religion”). But other forms of religious societies seem to be at

loggerheads with the majority culture. Either such groups may stand apart from the

common values of a society as a respected, though minority, alternative or their

values may seem antagonistic to the majority, and the group may become the object

of discrimination and/or active persecution. One way of understanding the relation

of religion to culture is to look at those religious groups that seem to be in tension with a society.

At this point, we introduce a famous distinction between church and sect,

formulated by the German scholar Ernst Troeltsch in his now classic study, The Social Teachings of the Christian Churches (1912). By church, in terms of sociology, we mean to indicate a religious community of some social standing that invites all members of a society to take part in its activities, has a stake in the well-being of the larger social community, and claims to be the custodian of religious truth. A sect, by contrast, tends to demand more conformity in its members, is exclusive in its membership, distances

itself from the concerns of the larger society, and also claims to be the bearer of

religious truth.

Troeltsch, as a German, had the European scene in mind when he made this

distinction. For him, the primary examples of churches were the state-supported

churches of Europe (e.g., the Church of England or the Evangelical Church in

Germany), and the sects were those dissident groups that, because of their religious beliefs, were somewhat cut off from the larger cultural life of the country (e.g., the Nonconformists or the Quakers in England).

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Chapter 6 • Sacred Communities

In the United States, those making use of the church/sect distinction usually

point to religious groups such as the Methodists and Presbyterians who seem

“comfortable” with the predominant culture and call them churches. These are distinct from groups such as the Amish who separate themselves from the larger culture in

order to be faithful to their religion. The Amish are pure sectarians.

The fact is that the church/sect distinction, at least in North America, is not always a neat one. Although it is clear that there are examples of church-type religion in the United States (one could add Anglicans and Reform Jews to the earlier examples) and

that the Amish (and probably Hasidic Jews) are sectarian, it is also true that many

American communities manifest characteristics of both church and sect. 1 Here are two very different examples that illustrate this point. Roman Catholicism is a church-type religious community. But within its tradition, Roman Catholicism allows for those who wish to experience a sectarian separation from the world to join a monastery.

Monasticism has all of the sociological characteristics of a sect. In a somewhat different manner, among some fundamentalist groups (such as Independent Baptists) one may

find a section of the group that is very comfortable with the culture and another part that is separatist and sectarian.

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