Demographic Change and Secularization in an Asian New Religious Movement: The Brahma Kumaris in the Western World, Part II
This paper examines the interaction between demographic change, social structural change, and ideological change in a New Religious Movement, the Brahma Kumaris, which in the last three decades has spread from its home in India to the West and other parts of the world. Focusing on the Australian bra...
| Published in: | Research in the social scientific study of religion |
|---|---|
| Authors: | ; |
| Format: | Electronic Article |
| Language: | English |
| Check availability: | HBZ Gateway |
| Fernleihe: | Fernleihe für die Fachinformationsdienste |
| Published: |
Brill
2000
|
| In: |
Research in the social scientific study of religion
Year: 2000, Volume: 11, Pages: 225-239 |
| Further subjects: | B
History of religion studies
B Social sciences B Religionswissenschaften B Religion & Gesellschaft |
| Online Access: |
Volltext (lizenzpflichtig) Volltext (lizenzpflichtig) |
| Summary: | This paper examines the interaction between demographic change, social structural change, and ideological change in a New Religious Movement, the Brahma Kumaris, which in the last three decades has spread from its home in India to the West and other parts of the world. Focusing on the Australian branches that have supplied much of the impetus for the spread of the movement beyond India, the paper documents the gradual normalization of the age profile from a prototypically youthful base and the increasing incorporation of career people into its membership. Mobilization of Western members’ professional skills to design culturally-appropriate outreach activities has lessened the tendency of certain institutional adaptations to isolate the organization from potential new recruits. The growing proportion of mature and professionally engaged members has also facilitated a softening of the organization’s "world rejecting" (Wallis 1979; 1984) stance in Western branches. A sliding of the movement toward secularization is arrested, however, by differentiation of the core spiritual activities of fully committed members from their activities concerned with service to the wider society. |
|---|---|
| Contains: | Enthalten in: Research in the social scientific study of religion
|
| Persistent identifiers: | DOI: 10.1163/9789004493278_015 |