Cultic Studies Journal, Volume 17, 2000, Page 92
dear colleague, but no less embarrassing has been the experience of
witnessing dear colleagues act as collaborators and shills for a variety of
masquarading organizations. This document reports on a series of meetings
and activities involving several NRM scholars, NRM attorneys, NRM leaders,
and some other scholars...What is striking is the clear sense in which the
leading members of the NRM research network regarded NRMs as allies, not
subjects of study. It seems that the scholars were more eager than the NRMs
to lead the fight for NRM legitimacy.22
Immediately after, Beit-Hallahmi, quotes a few lines from the email:
Our meetings with the members of the Unification Church confirmed our
earlier impressions that ...their response is very substantially confined to ad
hoc responses to crises. I pressed them on the question of whether it might
be possible for the UC in collaboration with several other NRMs to raise a
significant amount of money --no strings attached --to an independent
group, which in turn, would entertain proposals and fund research on NRMs.
NRMS were less than enthusiastic, the writer thought, and ―The cooperative
funding of the American Conference on Religious Freedom would appear to be
about as far as they are prepared to go at this time‖ (Confidential, 1989, p.
4). In addition to the idea of creating an NRM-funded research
organization...we spent a good deal of time considering whether the time
might be right to import ...INFORM or create a US organization that would
perform a similar function ...INFORM has taken a very significant step in
neutralizing anti-cult movements in the UK (Confidential, 1989, p. 5).23
Beit-Hallahmi then reminds his readers of the foundation in 1992, of AWARE, the
Association of World Academics for Religious Freedom, which includes among its founding
purposes the promotion of the defense of freedom of religion. After a few comments, the
author says: ―In light of what we have witnessed we are forced to re-read, our eyes fresh
with suspicion, the whole corpus of NRM literature.‖ [24]
Conclusion
We would like to finish with the words of our Pastors, who --in their sensitivity for the
spiritual health of their flock --are interested in the new challenge posed by cults, a
challenge typical of our times, and who on May 30, 1993, approved the Pastoral Note of the
Secretariat for Ecumenism and Dialogue of the Italian Bishops‘ Conference. The Bishops,
after listing certain reasons why people join cults and stay in them, say the following:
Other motivations are to be sought in a psychological context. Belonging to a
cult is an easy refuge for people who are psychologically disturbed, who need
a kind of safety which does not demand the price of a personal search.
Sometimes, members of cults are bound by forms of emotional and
psychological coercion, of control and vigilance, so much so that this can lead
to an actual limitation of personal freedom.25
This Pastoral Note also stresses what we believe to be an indisputable reality: that the right
attitude towards the phenomenon of cults must be based on dialogue, ―without falling into
eirenism or sectarianism.‖ The Note goes on to provide pastoral advice that is rich in
opportunities for dialogue, charity, and respect for individuals.
We fully embrace these pastoral instructions, trusting that they will be shared by all men
and women of good will, whatever their religious orientation.

Cultic Studies Journal, Volume 17, 2000, Page 93
Notes
1. Benjamin Zablocki, “The blacklisting of a concept. the strange history of the
brainwashing conjecture in the sociology of religion,” Nova Religio: The Journal of
Alternative and Emergent Religions, vol. 1, n. 1 (October, 1997), pp. 96-121 (p. 98).
This article was published in October 1997. The second article, a continuation of the
first, was published in April 1998 always in Nova Religio. A reply by D. Bromley and
Zablocki‘s reply to him were also published.
2. Ibid., p. 113.
3. Ibid., Note 17 -p. 117.
4. Ibid., p. 97-98.
5. Ibid., p. 99.
6. Ibid., p. 101.
7. Benjamin Beit Hallahmi, “Dear collegaues: integrity and suspicion in NRM research,”
paper presented at the 1997 annual meeting of the Society for the Scientific Study of
Religion, p. 1.
8. cfr. Ibid.
9. ―American Aum Apologists Not Believed.” Cult Observer, July/August, 1995, p. 10.
(Based on T. R. Reid, “U.S. Visitors Boost Cause of Japanese Cult.” The Washington
Post, May 9, 1995, A8.)
10. M. Introvigne, “Movimenti anti-sette e ricerca scientifica,” in Giovanni Cantoni e M.
Introvigne, Libertà religiosa, “sette” e “diritto di persecuzione, Cristianità, Piacenza
1996, p. 142.
11. Benjamin Zablocki, Ibid., p103.
12. Ibid., p. 103.
13. M. Introvigne, ―Il ritorno dei giacobini: il rapporto della commissione parlamentare belga
d‟inchiesta sulle sette,” 2. Il metodo, CESNUR, 1997. Le retour des Jacobins, Massimo
Introvigne et CESNUR, www.cesnur.org/testi/Belgique.htm.
14. Julien Ries, “Sette e nuovi movimenti religiosi davanti alla Commissione Parlamentare
Belga,” Religioni e Sette nel mondo: Rivista Trimestrale di Cultura Religiosa, Anno 3, n.
2 (giugno 1997), pp. 175-193 (p. 183)
15. Ibid., p. 185-186.
16. Cfr. Ibid., p. 187.
17. cfr. Benjamin Zablocki, Ibid.
18. Ibid., p. 116.
19. Ibid., p. 121. -nota 70.
20.Ibid., p. 118. -nota 29. Ibid., p. 107. This is the well-kown episode of the Amicus brief
(a statement by some scholars who claimed there was no reason to claim that physical
coercion could be replaced by another form of coercion in the process of
―brainwashing‖), first signed and then withdrawn by ASA. An executive officer of ASA
appears to have simply signed the brief, arbitrarily taking the place of the entire ASA,
and delivered it to the Supreme Court (as if ASA had approved it officially) before
discussing it with the Council. He later admitted having made a mistake in good faith,
believing the discussion had already taken place. However there is no trace of this
assumed discussion in his documents. The hurried and secretive nature of these
operations shows something of the atmosphere in the late ‗80s. (Benjamin Zablocki,
personal e-mail communication also asserted in documents submitted to ASA at the
time by Richard Ofshe).
22.Benjamin Beit Hallahmi, Ibid., p. 4.
23.Ibid., p. 4.
24.Ibid., p. 5.