Excerpt from An Anthology of Texts of the Catholic Church 1986-1994, edited by the Working Group on New Religious Movements in the VATICAN. For full text, click here.
Note: New Religious Movements is abbreviated as NRMs.
The phenomenon of divisive groups within Christianity is far from new in the history of the Church. Such problems were present even when the New Testament was being written, as many scriptural quotations could illustrate. However, the focus of this anthology is the contemporary pastoral situation.
Concerning the sociocultural background of this phenomenon, most observers believe the extraordinary rate of change in modern times has given rise to impersonal lifestyles and anxieties about meaning and roots. They also emphasize the spiritual situation of culture today. A sometimes desperate search for religious experience is characteristic of so-called "postmodernity," countering the rationalist materialism of earlier modernity.
These cultural contexts differ considerably from continent to continent. In Europe the crisis of industrial and capitalist civilization is highlighted; in Latin America, the situation of poverty and social conflict; in Africa, the crisis of the post-colonial period, the impact of urbanization, and the lack of inculturation by Christianity. In these different settings basic aspirations are evident in different ways: the quest for physical or spiritual healing, for spiritual experience, for the meaning of life, and for relationships with God, with others, and with the cosmos.
DOCUMENTS AND DISCOURSES OF POPE JOHN PAUL
Our times are both momentous and fascinating. While on the one hand people seem to be pursuing material prosperity and to be sinking ever deeper into consumerism and materialism, on the other hand we are witnessing a desperate search for meaning, the need for an inner life, and a desire to learn new forms and methods of meditation and prayer. Not only in cultures with strong religious elements, but also in secularized societies, the spiritual dimension of life is being sought after as an antidote to dehumanization. This phenomenon—the so-called "religious revival"—is not without ambiguity, but it also represents an opportunity. The Church has an immense spiritual patrimony to offer mankind, a heritage in Christ, who called himself "the way, and the truth, and the life" (Jn 14:6): it is the Christian path to meeting God, to prayer, to asceticism, and to the search for life's meaning. Here too there is an Areopagus to be evangelized.
Redemptoris missio, no. 38, Doc. 6
It is not an exaggeration to say that man's relationship to God and the demand for a religious "experience" are the crux of a profound crisis affecting the human spirit. While the secularization of many aspects of life continues, there is a new quest for "spirituality" as evidenced in the appearance of many religious and healing movements that look to respond to the crisis of values in Western society. This stirring of the homo religiosus produces some positive and constructive results, such as the search for new meaning in life, a new ecological sensitivity, and the desire to go beyond a cold, rationalistic religiosity. On the other hand, this religious reawakening includes some very ambiguous elements that are incompatible with the Christian faith.
To the Bishops of Iowa, Kansas, Missouri, and Nebraska (United States), Doc. 13
In the extraordinary consistory of the cardinals that I convoked last week, quite a few of the fathers, in analyzing the attraction of the sects, observed that the basis of their spread is often a certain doctrinal confusion about the need for faith in Christ and membership in the Church that he founded. There is a tendency to present religions and the various spiritual expressions pared down to a least common denominator, which renders them practically equivalent, with the result that every person would be free to choose indifferently one of the many ways offered to achieve salvation.
To the Bishops of Abruzzi and Molise (Italy), Doc.
The other great challenge . . . is the phenomenon of the proliferation and constant expansion of sects, in all of Latin America.... Its causes are still in part the object of study and analysis by researchers and experts. One of them is certainly the sociocultural uprooting of great segments of the population: in having migrated from the country to the city, or from one region to another within your immense country, these people are losing the reference points for their religious practice, which many times is tied to places, customs and traditional practices proper to the way in which they have been living.
To the Bishops of the North-2 Region of Brazil, Doc.4
The ideological pluralism, proper to the "secular city," exposes Romans also to a multiplicity offalse offers of salvation, which creates bewilderment and confusion and throw many people into an attitude of religious indifference. A sign of this is the proliferation of sects, which find fertile soil in ignorance and in the fear of tomorrow.... Faced with the phenomena of violence and of war and with the occurrence of disasters and misfortunes, one fairly frequently meets people, even those who call themselves Christians, who look for comfort in new religious fellowships or who question the goodness and the fatherhood of God....
Homily During the Visit to a Roman Parish, Doc. 3
Cause of NRMs in Latin America: Strong Economic Support and Preaching That Offers "False Dreams" I am well aware that the spread of these cults and groups depends on strong economic support and that their preaching tempts people with deceptive illusions, misleads them with distorted simplifications and sows confusion, especially among the simplest and those most lacking in religious instruction.
To the Episcopal Conference of Brazil, Doc. 9
OTHER DOCUMENTS OF THE CHURCH
The phenomenon seems to be symptomatic of the depersonalizing structures of contemporary society, largely produced in the West and widely exported to the rest of the world, which create multiple crisis situations on the individual as well as on the social level. These crisis situations reveal various needs, aspirations, and questions that, in turn, call for Psvcholocical and spiritual responses. The sects claim to have, and to give, these responses. They do this on both the affective and the cognitive level, often responding to the affective needs in a way that deadens the cognitive faculties.
These basic needs and aspirations can be described as so many expressions of the human search for wholeness and harmony, participation and realization, on all the levels of human existence and experience; as so many attempts to meet the human quest for truth and meaning, for those constitutive values which at certain times in collective as well as individual history seem to be hidden, broken, or lost, especially in the case of people who are upset by rapid change, acute stress' fear, etc.
Secretariat for Promoting Christian Unity, Secretariat for Non-Christians, Secretariat for Non-Believers, and Pontifical Council for Culture, Doc. 23
The NRMs indicate that there are spiritual needs that have not been identified, or that the Church and other religious institutions have either not perceived or not succeeded in meeting.
The NRMs can arise or attract because people are searching for meaning when they are feeling lost in a period of cultural change.
Many Christians join the sects or NRMs because they feel that m them there is an answer to their thirst for Scripture reading, singing, dancing, emotional satisfaction, and concrete and clear answers.
There are people . . . who seek in religion an answer to, and a protection against . . . suffering, sickness and death. The NRMs seem to them to confront these existential problems openly and to promise instant remedies, especially physical and psychological healing.
Cardinal Francis Arinze, Doc.25
Among the psychological causes we should mention the following: the insecurity, anguish and fear of the people of today, which is caused by the crisis of values and the rapid, profound changes that they are causing in contemporary society, and the tenacious, ruthless struggle for survival.... Among the social factors that cause or affect this phenomenon we should highlight the family crisis. The emptiness and loneliness caused in members of broken families or those lacking warmth offers these religious groups an extremely receptive medium for their direct and effective work in the field of the family, a field which today has been neglected by some and mistreated by others.
Cardinal Angel Suquia Goicoechea, Doc. 29
If we look closely, we observe that many adepts of "sects" and "new religious movements" are people seeking and questioning themselves. They are searching for a meaning to their life, attempting to satisfy their religious needs, to be recognized for what they are, to fill a void in their existence. They are wondering about the "how" and "why" of suffering and death; they want clear, precise, concrete and definitive answers to their questions....
Furthermore, in the "global" society in which we live, where information and exchanges now circulate rapidly and freely, we discover the range of different religions. We observe that there is a wide variety of religious products available on "the great market of symbolism," that Christianity has "competitors" and that there are real opportunities to change religion or to give up for good the creed one has professed and practiced until now.
Most Rev. Pierre Raffin, Doc. 59
Before the question of meaning, the inhabitants of Europe find themselves facing a dilemma today. Marxism, violently imposed in Central and Eastern Europe, has collapsed and left many people with a void of meaning. On the other hand, practical materialism is widespread throughout Europe. In our cultural context many people conceive of their life, think and act as if God did not exist. At the same time, there is a lingering nostalgia for religious experience; nevertheless this often distances people from the authentic Christian faith. Young people in particular are easily drawn to new forms of religiosity and sects of various origins.
Episcopal Conference of Germany,Commission for Faith, Doc. 51
The different expressions of the new religiosity are not a fringe phenomenon. They mainly affect precisely the centers of Western culture and thrive in the largest, richest cities of the northern hemisphere, often making use of considerable funds to spread also to the poorest regions in the South of the world. However, although this phenomenon demonstrates individual features, those, that is, of a society of images and communications, it must not be considered entirely unheard of since it already exists in the history of religions and in that of Christianity.
Episcopal Copnference of Italy, Secretariat for Ecumenism and Dialogue, Doc. 52
The change that has affected human societies has interrupted life's traditional rhythm. It has separated members of a single family from one another. Many people have the feeling they have lost their roots. It is this change that has caused the sects to flourish and spread. They claim to offer uprooted people what they need, such as human warmth and help to achieve their ambitions.... They are presented with a fresh view of themselves, of human beings, of history and of the cosmos, and they are promised the birth of a new world where their worries will come to an end.
Cardinal Nasrallah Pierre Sfeir, Doc. 61
Our world is in a situation of real and deep crisis in every sphere. The result is the widespread vulnerability of the people of today in the form of cultural, social, moral, spiritual and financial crises.
Cultural crisis: This is in fact the most serious and the most important: it influences the whole of life. The world of today, because of the sophisticated means of transport and the mass media (radio, television, newspapers) is more and more a crossroads where the different cultures are obliged to meet.... We know that those who have the most efficient means to communicate their civilizations impose their own concepts of life upon the weakest, which bring a new form of slavery. The consequences are revolt, rejection and protection mechanisms.
Social crisis: our current society is lacerated. Even its basic structures are unsettled, for example, the family. Yesterday the lineage or clan was spoken of. Marriage considered as an institution was protected by laws, rules.... The custodians of the laws and the conduct prescribed for social harmony were the elders, the old. Today . . . the order and harmony of the village are turned upside down. Some religious movements would seem to be a protest in face of this disturbance and social harmony.
Moral and spiritual crisis: certain moral and spiritual criteria that regulate life in society and the relations between people are disintegrating, because of the introduction of new religions nn`1 n new moral code whose demands are not the same....
Financial crisis: . . . The sects, offering a place where solidarity is truly practiced, become for the abandoned and the frustrated a protest against present day society that condemns some to poverty or undeserved suffering.
Episcopal Conference of Congo, Doc. 36
The explanations offered for why the new religious movements arouse interest in some people are numerous and varied. Among them we should note:
· The ongoing and deepening social crisis, which arouses a certain collective anxiety and loss of identity and causes people to lose their roots.
· The ability these movements have to adapt to social circumstances and momentarily satisfy some needs of people. A taste for novelty certainly plays a role.
· The fact that the Church has become distant from some groups— whether poor or rich—who are seeking new channels of religious expression, but who also may be evading the commitments entailed in faith.
· Their ability to provide an apparent solution to the desires for "healing" on the part of people who are suffering.
IV General Conference of Latin American Bishops, Doc. 39
Causes that encourage the penetration of the sects in Venezuela:
a) their work methodology, which involves personal contact and continuous visits to homes as well as their presence in the most out-of-the-way places and sectors;
b) their concern for new members who discover that they are important, that they have a lead role and are members of a fraternal community;
c) their perseverance in the aggressive task of proselytism;
d) the emotional, participatory, carefree and personalized cult;
e) easy access to the Bible and biblical formation; conviction based on a biblical and doctrinal formation, which ends by influencing its members;
f) an abundance of aid from the United States and other countries.
Episcopal Conference of Venezuela, Doc. 43
The sponsorship of groups and institutions, foreign and national, sometimes motivated by financial, political or ideological aims; the legislation we are governed by that originated in the liberalism and positivism of the past century; and the lay school for the education of our children and young people.
Episcopal Conference of Mexico, Doc. 40
We observed in biblical fundamentalism an effort to try to find in the Bible all the direct answers for living—though the Bible itself nowhere claims such authority. The appeal of such an approach is understandable.... People of all ages yearn for answers. They look for sure, definite rules for living. And they are given answers— simplistic answers to complex issues—in a confident and enthusiastic way in fundamentalist Bible groups.
National Conference of Catholic Bishops {United States), Doc. 41
From Sects and New Religious Movements
An Anthology of Texts from the Catholic Church 1986-1994
edited by The Working Group on New Religious Movements in the VATICAN.
Last updated August 19, 2000 23:56