What is the fundamental difference between cult and religion?

If the speaker approves of them, they're a religion. If the speaker doesn't approve of them, they're a cult. There is no actual distinction between the two words beyond that.

A cult centers around a human where a religion centers around a god...

The contrast is sect-church. The Catholic Church is the only true church. Everything that has separated from her is more or less Sect. St. Paul has determined these terms. For the religious sociologist Max Weber and Ernst Trölsch "church" and "sect" are two different "institutional hierocratic respectively. Club farms" are. They apply these concepts to other religions also. Both differ sociologically very well what church is and what sect. Maybe you better ask the question in the sociology section.

Is a truly "fundamental" difference does not exist. A religious community is all the more sect, the less she tries to talk with other religious communities, and the more they close themselves off from other religious communities.

Much nonsense that I've read. There are plenty of cults that in- are detected. That's not the point. A sect is a mainly supposedly Christian community, strongly dependent on the Bible softened and she describes the new part, dazutut own, or the Bible totally different interpretation, as it says God. Unfortunately, some Free Churches and the reputation (for non-Christians) to be a sect. But free churches are looking for contacts with other churches. are only they do not agree with everything that relates to the change. Only God forgives debt anyway, just blessings . give So it is a confessional, like one does not know it needed. One need not satisfy the curiosity of the priest during confession. To clean up debt forgiveness, it is sufficient to pray and when one person was involved go (as victim) to him and there also to be clarified. The only trouble is that real cults of course not be seen as a sect. A rich man sees himself, too not as rich, says the most: There are still richer. Sects are, in addition, there are also books: Jehovah's Witnesses (Watchtower) The New Apostolic Church, the Mormons, Adventists, Scientology. There are unfortunately always add more.

TO ME and in my head all cults are bad. you have to follow the leader and devote your life to, and you can't leave. A religion is a free group and you walk away whenever you feel like it.

The fundamantal difference between a cult and a religion is the number of followers and how widespread it is. Many cults have "graduated" to the status of "religions" and many religions are now considered to be "cults" or they are just lumped into the category of "pagan".

there seems to be a lot of negative connotations associated with the word "cult" whearas I get the impression that the word itself just applies to smaller religions, or those just starting out. most larger religions could easily have been referred to as cults in their early days. in the modern usage, it seems to be taken to mean any group that mis-uses religion to exert control over others.

There is no fundamental difference. They are both based on a myth of some sort. I would suggest that a cult is usually a small group of people with a different belief from the general population. They are often an offshoot of an established religion and follow the teachings of an individual.

it is not easy to define the term cult, an encyclopedia defined it as "any form of worship or ritual observance", now many applied that term to groups that follow a living leader who promotes new unorthodox practices and teachings. cults are usually small groups that follow one charismatic leader. They isolate themselves and use unethical or deceptive techniques to make converts. religion on the other hand is defined by one dictionary as " the belief in and reverence for a superhuman power recognized as the creator and governor of the universe".

Sects arise, develop within a larger religious community where small groups of special teachings that deviate markedly from the beliefs and teachings of the religious community that they are no longer compatible with this, and therefore separates as a separate group. These special lessons can exist in the one-sided emphasis on the absolute or marginal aspects of the teachings of the faith community such as former wanted to revitalize the New Apostolic Church, to live in the 19th century in the belief that in the last days before the imminent return of Christ, the Apostles order of the early Christian community. These special lessons can also consist in a completely alien, completely taken over from the outside, or "to-invented" doctrines such as the Mormons who make the Bible the Book of Mormon to the side and say, Jesus was then published by his ministry in Israel on the American continent. The term "sect" is relative in two respects: 1st Sects are small compared to the religious community from which they split off, first of all small groups. They may grow but may be even greater than the community of which they have separated themselves; of a certain size to but at some point no one speak of a sect. Even Christianity is initially created as a Jewish sect! 2nd The term "cult" always puts a subjective rating, more precisely, a depreciation. Therefore, no religious group called themselves as a sect, but is always called by others. Sects are characterized by a strong use of its members (which can go from extreme sects to totalitarian control and brainwashing), from a tendency to fanaticism and strong black and white paintings with which one sect more than the main lines of the respective religions both from other religious communities as well as the "evil world" separates. This means that it now time to formulate the example of Christian churches: a sect rejects ecumenical cooperation with other churches and denominations, at least one co-at eye level between equal partners, it is from their self-understanding is not willing and able to to see itself as only one of several equally legitimate versions of the Christian faith, which together form the Christian church, but regards itself as the only true church. According to the latter criterion, however, you do, Gerhard E @ - this remark, I can not help me now, really - even the Catholic Church a sect. That you write for yourself, we have all read it: ". The Catholic Church is the only true church" Those are your words. And it's not just your private opinion but which has taught the Catholic Church from time immemorial and it also revoked until today is definitely not (it is as well not a member of the World Council of Churches); just the current Pope has one year ago even in an official statement reiterated again: if only the Catholic Church really, all others are merely "ecclesial communities." This, however, he has caused not only in the Protestant church, but also in many parts of the Catholic Church outrage. Many, in fact: the majority of Catholic Christians follow this as the hard-core Catholics by Gerhard E by the pope, a Catholic priest in my city has designated the Papal pronouncement as "a terrible document," and he is not an isolated case. So I'm far from my part to keep the Catholic Church a sect. Incidentally, gradually, I sometimes wonder whether Gerhard E is even Catholic - the image of the Catholic Church, which he in his partly represents untold contributions corresponding to such extreme distortions, and the enemy anti-Catholic polemics, that one would think he would be someone who wants to bring the Catholic Church into disrepute

Cult is a subjective word. It is usually used to describe small groups of people that believe something that isn't "normal". But all religions, at least have started off as cults. So I think a better questions might be when do they stop being cults and start becoming religions.