Watchman Fellowship has files on over 4000 cults, cult leaders, doctrines, and spiritual “winds of doctrine.” The Cults and Alternative Religions page will carry those articles not belonging the major cult sections.
The Cults and Money
Have you ever wondered how cults, aberrant groups, and charlatans get their money? They all claim to follow what the Bible teaches, but do they?
Ancient Heresies: Marcionism
Marcion, born in Pontus about 100 AD was one of the more significant of the Gnostic heretics. The impact of his teachings and movement are largely unknown today.
Ancient Heresies: Docetism
Most of the earliest heresies in Christianity originated from the Gnostic influence on the Church that was so prevalent at the time.
Theosophy
As a philosophical and theological system based on direct experience with the divine, Theosophy teaches that it is the universal thread running throughout all religions, binding them together.
Witnessing to the Cults
Every week hundreds of thousands of Christians encounter hundreds of thousands of Jehovah’s Witnesses, Mormons, and other cultists. The Christian witness given to these people is frequently uninformed or misinformed.
Positive Confession
Positive Confession is the belief that if a believer speaks “spiritual” or “faith-filled” words then he can have what he says.
Why The Cults Are Growing
Could it be that the cults are providing something vital to human beings that Christianity cannot provide?
The Use of Mind Control in Religious Cults, Part 2
Lifton’s Criteria Milieu Control - the control of the environment including information, associations, time, and energy work to exclude any opportunity for opposition while also promoting the ‘party line’. Mystical Manipulation - this is the ‘higher calling’ for the...
The Use of Mind Control in Religious Cults
Any emotionally traumatic experience can create a vulnerability to deception.
Brainwashing
There is a psychological term for this gradual acceptance of something that would not otherwise be believed. It is cognitive dissonance theory. Leon Festinger described it in his book When Prophecy Fails. Festinger described three elements of social psychology, and...
Patterns In The Cults
In every religious group there are certain doctrines or practices that define the public’s knowledge of them. However, when discerning whether any group is orthodox or heterodox there are certain criteria that must be considered because they touch on the very...
British-Israelism: Old Theories Never Die – Or Do They?
Herbert W. Armstrong, founder of the Worldwide Church of God, had a fascination with Bible prophecy. That served his needs for a hook to engross the masses for forty years.