ABSTRACT
A religious movement is a relatively organized attempt by a number of people to cause or prevent change in a religious organization or in religious aspects of life. Religious movements have some similarities with political, cultural, and social movements, in that they are collective human attempts to create or to block change. This chapter begins with a true story that illustrates some of the chief features of religion and of the human needs that faith serves. The story is chiefly based on information taken from issues of the New York Times published immediately afterward. This introduction presents an overview of the key concepts discussed in the subsequent chapters of this book. The book examines the largest system of religious movements in American history, Methodism and the swarm of sects that erupted from it. It looks at the simplest form of religious innovation, the importation of movements from the alien religious traditions of Asia.
