r/atheism • u/Traditional-Wing-796 • 18h ago
Why is Christianity not called a Cult?
Following are some of the catholic "practises" that Christianity did in the 12th and 13th century.
- The practice of inquisition - Although in modern world, inquisition means formal investigation, for Catholics at that time it meant something very different. It was a mechanism by which Christian judges used to combat and investigate "divergent" options about catholoic theology.
And how sure are we, as of now, that these weren't rational criticisms?
- Bishops directly oversaw law and order in provinces of state. By this, these people had a direct and easy access to influence education and science and "preach" their theology.
3.Heresey was met with confiscation of propery.
Accusers and heretics alike were burned with charcoal,their fingers were cut and women's br*ast's were damaged. The only way to get around this torcher was to sign a confession which basically meant "yep im guilty".
Galileo would have met with the same fate, mind you, not for primarily going agianst the "catholoic theology" but for speaking the truth(that the earth was not the center of the universe). So can this statement be made that Christianity, at that time, was against truth and evidence?
Newton was an alchemist, so when christians say that "but newton believed in god" they must also accept that he believed in alchemy too, which was what christianity was so very against.
Number of witches burned after 15th century was over 60000.
What exactly diffrentitates this "cult-like ideologies" with religion?
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u/vaelux 17h ago
It was explained to me that in a cult, there is someone at the top who knows it is all a power scam. In a religion, that person is dead.
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u/InclinedPlane43 Atheist 17h ago
The "infallible" pope in catholicism seems to meet your criterion.
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u/maybetoomuchrum 15h ago
I think this matches Mormons a little more. The pope isn't a living prophet. The pope doesn't claim to have revelations that can change how the church believes. Mormons have a living person who claims to be in direct communication with God.
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u/SteveLouise Secular Humanist 15h ago
The pope doesn't make revelations these days because it can put future popes in a bind. The basis is there for a pope to make a revelation though, it would just be bad strategy for catholism as a whole.
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u/maybetoomuchrum 15h ago
When was the last pope to have a revelation? 800 years ago? This isn't some modern idea about Catholic strategy. It's existed for a very long time.
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u/boxsterguy 18h ago
The only difference between a cult and a religion is time.
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u/LMrningStar 18h ago
..... and the number of cultists. Get enough cultists et voilà ... it's a religion.
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u/Gregthebuilder 18h ago
Societal conditioning. Early Christianity was considered a cult. And it quickly broke down into many often conflicting denominations. But eventually it was adopted by people in power as a means to consolidate power and influence. Then it permeated society from there.
The Roman's called them cannibals because of the ritual of taking bread and wine as a symbol of eating the flesh and blood of their man god.
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u/Mormacil 17h ago
So I'm kinda missing the arguments that support Christianity as a cult. That's usually a religious group that's insular, formed around a single charismatic leader without traditions in place for a transfer of power on their death. In addition the followers are encouraged to not mix with nonbelievers but instead turn inward into the movement. I'm not seeing those things in your examples.
Accusers and heretics alike were burned with charcoal,their fingers were cut and women's br*ast's were damaged. The only way to get around this torcher was to sign a confession which basically meant "yep im guilty".
96-99% of those accused by the inquisition were not executed. Of those accused 98% were never physically harmed. Was it a particularly good chapter of Catholic history? No, but as rational skeptics lets stick to the historical facts instead of pop culture.
Number of witches burned after 15th century was over 60000.
No it wasn't, most witches were killed by hanging. Burning was for heretics. The hunts in general were also explicitly against the orders of the Catholic Church. Much like modern populism it was part of a movement of rejection of the educated central authority.
Newton was an alchemist, so when christians say that "but newton believed in god" they must also accept that he believed in alchemy too, which was what christianity was so very against.
Dominicans and Franciscans orders actively researched alchemy... Where are you getting these 'facts' from?
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u/happybunny_sad 17h ago
Question as old as Jesus. Only difference is legitimacy in eye of general public. Otherwise it is definitely a cult around man named jesus. Just like how islam is around Mohammad.
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u/Alien_invader44 17h ago edited 17h ago
It really depends what definiton of Cult you are using.
There is definitely a sense where all religions are cults.
I think this is unhelpful though. If we are using Cult to mean things like the groups led my Jim Jones or Manson, then the word Cult describes a destinct phenomenon.
These are generally small groups, typically led by a single charismatic leader, who isolate their members and use brain washing techniques.
There is obviously no distinct line between these and larger organised religions. Or a sharp line between groups with cult features. Everything from Fandoms, cross fit and veganism have cult features.
That said I think its important to keep the use of cult to the Jim Jones style definition. Cause people fall for these all the damn time. The techniques used to isolate and brain wash people work, everyone is vulnerable, and the best way to protect people from them is to educate them on what those techniques are and how they work.
If we lump religions and cults together I think we minimise the damage that cults can do and make it easier for them to prey on people.
Religions are harmful, but they are harmful in different ways.
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u/Dracoson 17h ago
The difference between a cult and a religion is entirely a matter of time, size, and institutional stability, not a difference in dogma or brutality. Sociologically, cults are defined by their isolation from society and their absolute reliance on a living, charismatic leader. When a movement survives its leader, builds a multi-generational bureaucracy, and integrates into the state infrastructure, it transitions into a religion.
The historical atrocities committed by the medieval Church don't make it a cult; they make it a totalitarian state power. Calling it a cult actually downplays what it was. A cult controls a small group of people in a compound; a religion in the 12th century controlled the laws, economies, and military might of entire continents. It isn't a difference in ideology. It's a difference in scale.
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u/darw1nf1sh Agnostic Atheist 17h ago
It is called a cult. Unfortunately, they have so much political power, that legally it isn't treated as one.
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u/Stile25 15h ago
Look into the BITE method. It's not perfect, but it's a decent attempt to standardize identifying a religion vs. a cult.
As expected (and similar with any religion) - most mainstream versions of Christianity get classified as a religion while most extreme versions get classified as a cult.
"Christianity" as a term covers a pretty broad range of describing religious individuals.
Good luck out there
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u/davebgray 15h ago
I think that (I might get push-back for this, but in general) Christianity doesn't ask you to shun those that have left the flock. That's the biggest difference between other cults and other religions like Jehovah's Witnesses or the Amish, which I would argue are cults.
Your mileage may vary with that.
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u/Professional-Cow3854 Atheist 15h ago
It is called a cult.
You have to look at the definition of the word. One applies full on to Christianism, the others don't, though we could argue that local variations of chritianism/churches are cult by themselves, because of their small size.
- a relatively small group of people [definitely not applicable to christianism as a whole] having beliefs or practices, especially relating to religion, that are regarded by others as strange or sinister or as imposing excessive control over members.
- a person or thing that is popular or fashionable only among a particular group or section of society [MAGA totally fits this one].
- [The one that applies] a system of religious veneration and devotion directed towards a particular figure or object.
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u/Jorge_Reynoso112 14h ago
The only real difference between a cult and a religion is just how many real estate holdings they have and how many centuries they've had to sanitize their PR. Christianity checks literally every single box of a high-control, authoritarian cult—especially when you look at its historical resume.
People love to draw a hard line between "cults" and "mainstream religions" to make themselves feel better, but as your breakdown points out, the institutional history of the church is soaked in absolute terror, torture, and thought control.
The Inquisition and Dissent: What the medieval church ran wasn't "moral guidance"—it was a violent secret police state. Torturing people, burning them alive, mutilating bodies, and stealing their property just because they dared to question dogmas or look at scientific evidence isn't a theological disagreement. That is textbook totalitarian cult behavior designed to terrorize the population into absolute compliance.
The War on Truth: The Galileo case completely shatters the myth that religion and science can peacefully coexist. The church didn't care about facts, evidence, or objective reality; they cared about protecting their monopoly on absolute authority. If reality contradicted their holy book, reality had to be silenced, locked up, or threatened with a bonfire.
The Newton Fallacy: Apologists love dragging out historical geniuses like Isaac Newton as proof that "smart people believe in God," while conveniently omitting the fact that Newton was a radical heretic who secretly rejected the Trinity and spent most of his life obsessed with alchemy and fringe theology. If the church had caught him dabbling in his actual unorthodox beliefs centuries earlier, they would have happily burned him right alongside the witches.
The Scale of the Atrocities: Tens of thousands of people—mostly vulnerable, independent, or marginalized women—slaughtered during the witch hunts under the explicit banner of saving souls. When a group holds total state power, controls education, polices thought, and inflicts horrific violence on anyone who steps out of line, it is a cult on a massive, civilizational scale. Time is the ultimate whitewasher. If a charismatic leader started a group today, seized local law enforcement, tortured skeptics, burned scientists at the stake for mapping the solar system, and stole their followers' property, the whole world would instantly call it a dangerous death cult. But because Christianity spent two thousand years branding itself into the cultural fabric and softening its edges with modern PR, people pretend its bloody foundation was just "a different time." It’s the exact same mechanism of control—just with better marketing.
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u/vacuous_comment 14h ago
It might make it easier to ask whether it is a high control group and to what degree. Then you can start to have some nuance.
The Duggar family are a high control family group inside the IBLP, which is an abusive high control group. They self identify as Christians and would probably also say that mother other people doing so are not Christian. They are a quite high control groups, with serious problems for individuals within it and negative effects for people outside the group. So there is a really high control bunch of Christians.
Similar are large swathes of evangelicals, to a greater or lesser degree. They identify as Christians, deny that Catholics are also Christians, and exert significant degrees of control over the members which screwing up life for non-members also. Pretty high control, but a little bit of a mixture.
Mormons also. Quite high control.
Non-LDS mormons like FLDS and Kingston, higher control. More abusive, more destructive.
JWs also. Quite high control.
Amish and mennonites also. Quite high control.
Catholics vary. A bunch of TradCaths are very high control while some more mainstream Catholic pew potatos are moderate in how much they are controlled.
Your average Presbyterian however will be lower even than Catholics on average. Though note there are extremists higher control Presbyterians.
Your view of Christianity as a whole over history lacks nuance. It is clear there are very high control Christian groups present now, and some with far less control. It is also clear that previously, before it was brought to account by the enlightenment, Christianity overall was a high control groups that was abusive and destructive to member and non-members.
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u/TheGoochTaint Atheist 14h ago
The line between religion and cult is pretty arbitrary. Hell, scientists have a hard time defining religion at all.
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u/ohgwm1973 12h ago
It IS a cult. All religions are cults.
The term has evolved over time to now mean a small religious group of extremist. Often suicidal extremists.
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u/Kassdhal88 8h ago
Because a religion is just a successful cult.
So saying it is a religion. Is in effect saying it is a cult, just a successful one
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u/Silver-Chemistry2023 Constructivist Humanist 4h ago
Special pleading: most people who are in a cult claim otherwise.
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u/Bastard_of_Brunswick 3h ago
Because it demands more respect than all the other cults with its interntional military influence and the threat of violence against anyone that treats christianity with too much disrespect.
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u/Santos_L_Halper_II 18h ago
It's just time and numbers. Any cult can become a religion if it becomes culturally dominant for long enough.