What is the difference between a church and a sect?

A sect deviates from its founding church base sufficiently enough to be recognised as so different, it cannot represent the founding church.

That is why Christianity became a sect that broke away from Judaism. It started out with almost entirely Jewish members who were following Jesus of Nazareth, who himself went to the synagogue and was a Rabbi. But with his crucifixion and resurrection, a great gulf quickly developed between the Jewish faith and the Christian faith. At first, Christians tried to stay within the Jewish community and explain Christ to them, but soon the synagogues were closed to them and they were viewed as a cult or sect of Judaism that broke away before the end of the first century.

In Christianity, various little groups have always been identified as "on the fringes" of orthodox Christian religion. If they do not hold to the basic tenets of Christianity, they are called a sect, especially if they say that "Christendom" is accursed by God and they try to gain converts from Christendom into their own little group. That is the difference between the Christian church and sects; the sects want to claim divine authority to be God's sole agent of truth today. The Jehovah's Witnesses and the Mormons fit that category.

But sometimes a fringe group will think twice and then accept orthodox Christian doctrine / practice that it once condemned. This happened in the 1970s with the World Wide Church of God (led previously by Armstrong - The Plain Truth magazine). After he died, the new leaders had second thoughts and realised that doctrines such as the Trinity were, indeed, biblical, and they stopped various practices that drew people away into their ranks. They were then embraced into the Christian fold.

"actual"? as antagonistic to what, the imaginary Catholic Church? once you're asking what distinguishes Catholicism from the different sects of Christianity, i'd say it is a million) the clergical hierarchy and custom (which they have faith strains all a thank you to Jesus educating Peter to construct the church; Peter is termed being the 1st Pope), and 2) possibly a sprint greater emphasis on ritualized expression than different sects (with the sacraments and all). i locate it humorous whilst non-Catholic Christians use the Bible to bash Catholics, whilst it replaced into the Catholic Church who positioned the Bible mutually interior the 1st place (identifying which of countless works have been seen "inspired" or not).

Sects can be fun IF and only IF there are orgies, christian churches are never fun

The distinctions between 'Church', 'Religion', 'Denomination', 'Sect', and 'Cult' are fairly arbitrary, and depend mostly on who is using the word. Most members of a church or religion will call other churches or religions sects or cults as a way to make their own beliefs sound superior.

The difference is who they say "JESUS" is.

Thanks.

A church is some recognized denomination, or an individual church within that denomination.

A sect is a branch of a religion such as Pentecostals, or Fundamentalists. A sect is generally smaller than a denomination.

Fred Hoehn, www.livingwater.bugs3.com

Reference: The Holy Bible, King James Version

A church...A Circle...Research Circe, From Where The Word Comes...

Sect...A Group Of Or From A church...

QUITE PAGAN...

PURE EPIC...

Very little.

About 500 years.

Generally the opinions of the person talking about them.