What is the difference between a religion, sect, and cult?

Religion is common to humans across the world, even with extensive differences in culture and geography. A sect and a cult are different forms of religion that developed with social change and due to social stratification.

Religion - A religion has a mass following and is accepted by the wider society. It tends to have a single deity and scripture, and a well-defined structure and rules. Example: Islam (scripture - Quran), Christianity (scripture - Bible). 

There are many definitions of religion. In the Concise Dictionary of Religion, Irving Hexham says religion is bound together by an explicit or implicit belief in the reality of an unseen world, whether this belief be expressed in super naturalistic or idealistic terms.

Sect - A sect is a small religious group which often rejects many of the norms and values of the wider society and replaces them with other strict beliefs and practices. Example: The Black Muslim sect founded in Detroit in the early 1930s.

Sects develop when a section of people in society are unhappy with the existent religion and want a way to exit it. Jainism and Buddhism in India were a result of rejection of Hinduism. They later became religions because of their mass followings.

A cult involves a belief in a particular person or a thing. It has unconventional ideologies and the members do as their leader commands. People who feel disconnected from the world and lost in life are susceptible to cults as they give a sense of belonging.

A sect is a branch that arises out of religion while a cult is an organization of people who aren’t associated with religion. Sects have been accepted by governments but many cults aren’t. Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh (aka Osho, 1931–1990), Rajneeshpuram is an example of a famous cult.

Rodney Stark and William Sims Bainbridge (A Theory of Religion, 1987) use the work of sociologist Benton Johnson (1963) to construct a more reliable guide to religious organizations.

They define church, sect, and cult as follows:

1. A church is a conventional religious organization.

2. A sect is a deviant religious organization with traditional beliefs and practices.

3. A cult is a deviant religious organization with novel beliefs and practices.

Final Note: Sects and cults are often revitalization movements that develop out of changes in society. There’s a corresponding call for religious renewal and change. Sometimes, what begins as a sect (e.g. early Protestantism) can become the dominant faith in a country (e.g. Engla