General Overview of the “Cult Scene” in Great Britain

Abstract

Since 1559, the Church of England has been “by law established.” There is also an established (Presbyterian) Church in Scotland; the Church of Ireland was disestablished in 1869; and the Church in Wales was disestablished in 1920. The sovereign of Britain is called “Defender of the Faith” and must promise on his or her accession to uphold the Church of England. Although Catholics and nonconformist Protestants have existed within a general tradition of dissent throughout the centuries, it was not until the second half of the nineteenth century that full civil and political rights were extended to all religions— in 1871 Parliament passed the Universities Test Act that opened Oxford and Cambridge to members of all religions, and in 1890 all government posts became open to members of the Jewish faith. Around the turn of the century a number of alternative religions, such as Theosophy, Spiritualism, Deism, Comtean positivism, and the Salvation Army began to make their presence known. During the first half of the twentieth century, other new religions, most notably those of Eastern origin such as SUBUD, Vedanta, and the followers of Krishnamurti gained popularity among a small but significant group of middle-class intellectuals. In the late 1960s, protests against the Vietnam War, and bourgeois imperialism in general, broke out among the student population. This merged into the hippie period with “flower power” and the embracing of all manner of new kinds of religiosity and spirituality. Internationally operating movements came to Britain from the East and the West. The Church of Scientology had been one of the earliest movements on the scene, but it was soon followed by Krishna devotees chanting and dancing in the streets and the increased visibility of other new religions such as the Unification Church, the Rajneesh movement, the Children of God (later The Family), and the Divine Light Mission (later Elan Vital). Erhard Seminars Training (est) and other examples of the human potential movement joined indigenous new religions, such as the Emin, Exegesis, the Aetherius Society, the School of Economic Science, and the Findhorn community in the north of Scotland. In addition, a num