What is a High-Control Religion?

Characteristics of a High-Control Religion

Now that we’ve established that high-control groups exist along a continuum, it’s helpful to understand what specifically makes a religious group land anywhere along this continuum.

The three criteria below can help you assess whether the religious environment you grew up in or recently left meets the threshold for a harmful, “high-control religion.”

While not every group will exhibit every characteristic with equal intensity, the presence of these three elements—authoritarian leadership, coercive control over members, and a rigid belief system—indicates a group that has the capacity to cause real harm.

1. Authoritarian Leadership

High-control religious groups always have an authoritarian leadership structure that enforces strict obedience and allows limited input from members in decision-making processes.

Power flows from the top down, with leaders holding ultimate control over doctrine, group policies, and interpretations of scripture.

Authoritarian leadership takes different forms across high-control groups.

In some traditions, power comes from treating scripture as inerrant and the leader as god’s chosen interpreter.

In others, it flows through rigid organizational hierarchies—like the Catholic Church’s papal structure, the Mormon prophet and apostles, or the Jehovah’s Witness Governing Body.

Some groups elevate a single charismatic leader who demands unquestioning loyalty.

Regardless of the specific structure, the result is the same: members have little to no voice in how the group operates or what they’re required to believe.

What About Leaders Who Appear Humble?

It can be confusing when some church leaders seem kind and humble, portraying themselves as “god’s servant” or “god’s messenger.”

I encountered this dynamic in the fundamentalist evangelical churches I once attended.

While these leaders did not overtly claim absolute power, they placed god in that position, and then positioned themselves as his representatives.

Churches that treat the Bible as the inerrant word of god establish god as the ultimate authoritarian leader, with the pastor or priest serving as the conduit for divine guidance.

If you attended a church like this, you were likely encouraged to trust your pastor’s or priest’s interpretation of scripture, since they were “chosen by god” to guide the congregation.

This dynamic discourages questioning the leader’s teachings because to question them is often viewed as challenging god himself.

Even when a church appears non-authoritarian on the surface, a closer look at how it treats the Bible and applies its teachings may reveal a hidden layer of control that isn’t immediately apparent.

The Influence of Authoritarian Religious Leaders

Authoritarian leadership extends beyond abstract doctrine and into members’ everyday decisions and relationships.

Leaders may dictate or heavily influence major life choices, such as who you should marry, what career path is acceptable, whether you can pursue higher education, or where you should live.

Some groups require members to seek approval from church leadership before making significant decisions.

Members may also be required to participate in regular confessions or “accountability” structures where they disclose personal information to leaders, creating a power imbalance that can be exploited.

And when members do question leadership or step out of line, they often face consequences ranging from public rebuke to being shunned by the entire community.

How Authoritarianism Trickles Down into the Family

Authoritarian leadership in high-control religions becomes the blueprint for how families are structured and how children are raised.

Many groups teach complementarianism, a framework that designates men as divinely appointed leaders of their homes and women as submissive helpers, with fathers expected to enforce doctrine and behavior within their households.

In these families, children are often taught that obedience to parental authority is equivalent to obedience to god, and that remaining under the “spiritual covering” of male leadership is necessary to receive divine protection and blessing.

Parents are often taught that corporal punishment is biblical discipline, and they are encouraged to “break a child’s will” early to establish proper authority structures.

Children’s natural expressions of autonomy, curiosity, or emotional needs may be labeled as rebellion or manifestations of a sinful nature that must be corrected through strict discipline.

These authoritarian family structures create environments where children’s developmental needs for secure attachment, emotional expression, and age-appropriate independence are viewed as threats to godly order rather than healthy parts of growing up.

When religious authoritarianism dictates family life in these ways, children often experience significant attachment wounds and developmental harm.

You can learn more about this here:

2. Control Over Members

We’ve looked at how authoritarian leadership functions in high-control religions, from church hierarchies down to family structures.

But that authoritarian structure is only effective when it’s backed by mechanisms that keep members compliant and dependent on the group.

This is where Steven Hassan’s BITE Model becomes particularly useful.

The BITE Model identifies four key areas where high-control groups exert coercive influence: Behavior, Information, Thought, and Emotion.

These aren’t always obvious, especially when you’re still inside the group. But looking back, many people can recognize how these control mechanisms influenced nearly every aspect of their lives.

Behavior Control

High-control religions regulate what you do, who you spend time with, and how you present yourself to the world.

Some rules address more obvious moral issues like prohibitions on murder or stealing, but many extend into deeply personal territory.

You might have been told what clothing was modest enough, which careers were acceptable, what media you could consume, or even who you could date or marry.

Members are often required to tithe a specific percentage of income, attend services multiple times per week, or participate in door-to-door evangelism.

In some groups, communal living arrangements limit personal privacy, and financial obligations can make it difficult to leave even if you want to.

When you step out of line, consequences range from public rebuke to complete social isolation through shunning or excommunication.

The goal of all these rules is to prevent you from developing autonomy outside the group’s watchful eye.

Information Control

If you grew up in a high-control religion, there’s a good chance you were discouraged from engaging with “worldly” information or “secular” media.

Books, TV shows, music, news outlets, and even friendships with non-members may have been restricted or forbidden.

Many groups create their own literature, homeschooling curricula, and media to reinforce the group’s worldview while keeping members away from outside perspectives that might raise questions.

Leaders often demonize external sources of information, labeling them as corrupted by Satan or tainted by secular values.

Internet use may be monitored, and in some groups, members are encouraged to report each other for consuming unapproved content.

This isolation keeps members dependent on the group for their understanding of reality, making it much harder to recognize coercive dynamics or imagine life outside the group.

Thought Control

Beyond controlling what information you can access, high-control religions also regulate how you think about that information.

Doubts are viewed as spiritual weakness or evidence of Satan’s influence.

And critical thinking is discouraged in favor of “childlike faith,” which is presented as a virtue rather than a way to keep you from questioning harmful teachings.

If you ever felt confused about whether something was wrong, leaders may have convinced you that your own understanding was warped by sin, and that you needed their guidance to see things clearly.

This is a form of gaslighting, and it keeps members from trusting their own perceptions and judgment.

Emotion Control

High-control religions are skilled at manipulating emotional states to maintain compliance, and fear is a particularly effective tool, often deployed through phobia indoctrination.

You may have been taught that leaving the group would result in eternal damnation, that you’d be abandoned during the rapture, or that terrible consequences would befall you or your loved ones.

On the other end of the spectrum, groups also manufacture positive emotional experiences through music, prayer sessions, and testimonies.

These heightened emotional states are attributed to the Holy Spirit or divine presence, when they’re actually predictable, neurochemical responses to the environment.

Over time, members learn to associate these feelings with spiritual truth, making it difficult to trust emotions that arise outside of group settings.

3. A Rigid Belief System

Authoritarian leadership and coercive control mechanisms work together to maintain power in high-control religions.

But what gives these groups their particular intensity is the rigid belief system that underlies everything else—a belief system that is often rooted in deeply held convictions about the nature of reality, truth, morality, and salvation.

Inside a high-control religion, there is no room for doubt, questioning, or alternative perspectives when it comes to these convictions or beliefs.

Basically, they’re etched in stone.

When you’re taught that your group holds the only valid interpretation of divine truth, and that deviation from that truth has eternal consequences, the stakes feel impossibly high.

This is what keeps members compliant even when the control mechanisms outlined above aren’t actively being enforced.

Essentially, the belief system becomes internalized, creating a kind of self-surveillance where you police your own thoughts and behaviors to stay aligned with the group’s teachings.

Let’s go over some of the foundational components of this rigid belief system.

The Claim to Exclusive Truth

High-control religions typically claim that they alone possess the correct interpretation of scripture or divine revelation.

This isn’t presented as one valid perspective among many, but as the singular path to salvation, enlightenment, or divine favor.

Other religious groups, even those within the same broader tradition, are viewed as deceived, corrupted, or led astray.

In the evangelical churches I attended, we were taught that Catholics weren’t “real” Christians, that Mormons were a dangerous cult, and that anyone who didn’t believe exactly as we did was at risk of eternal damnation.

The irony of calling other groups cults while exhibiting cult-like behavior ourselves was completely lost on us.

This is strategic in a way, though, because the claim to exclusive truth (even though it is clearly cult-like) makes it nearly impossible to consider that your own group might be wrong about anything significant.

If questioning one teaching opens the door to questioning others, and questioning leads to doubt, and doubt leads to eternal consequences, then the safest option is to never question at all.

Black-and-White Thinking

When your religious group claims exclusive access to truth, everything gets filtered through a binary framework.

Things are either godly or sinful, righteous or worldly, obedient or rebellious.

There’s no room for nuance, context, or complexity.

This kind of thinking makes it difficult to navigate real-world situations that don’t fit neatly into predetermined categories.

You might have struggled to make decisions about relationships, career paths, or even entertainment choices because you were trying to determine which option was “godly” rather than considering what actually aligned with your values and needs.

Black-and-white thinking also impacts how you view yourself.

If you’re either walking with god or backsliding, either pure or defiled, either saved or lost, then any perceived failure feels catastrophic.

There’s no room for being human, making mistakes, or growing through trial and error.

Us vs. Them Mentality

High-control religions create a sharp division between insiders and outsiders.

The group is portrayed as a refuge from a corrupt and dangerous world, and members are encouraged to view outsiders with suspicion or pity.

Outsiders might be seen as lost souls who need saving, or as threats to your spiritual wellbeing who should be avoided.

Either way, maintaining close relationships with people outside the group becomes difficult or impossible.

This mentality serves multiple purposes for the group:

For many people, the fear of being on the outside looking in is more powerful than any single doctrine or rule.

The Consequences of Deviation

In high-control religions, straying from accepted beliefs carries serious spiritual consequences.

Depending on the group, members who deviate from doctrine may face loss of salvation, threat of demonic possession, or divine punishment.

While these consequences may not always be explicitly stated, they’re often communicated through cautionary stories about former members who experienced tragedy after leaving, or through warnings about the spiritual dangers of prideful or independent thinking.

The message is clear even when it’s implied.

Social consequences will often accompany the spiritual ones.

Members who question core teachings may be labeled as rebellious, deceived, or under spiritual attack.

Leaders might subject them to intense “correction” sessions, other members might begin isolating them, and if they don’t recant their doubts, the group may shun them entirely.

When your entire social network exists within the group, these social consequences can be devastating.

The Impact to Identity

When you grow up in a high-control religion, the belief system becomes inseparable from your sense of self because your identity is constructed around the group’s teachings about who god is, what he requires, and what your role is in his plan.

This makes it incredibly difficult to question beliefs without feeling like you’re questioning your entire identity.

If being a good Christian, a faithful Mormon, or a devoted Catholic is central to how you understand yourself, then stepping away from those beliefs can feel like losing yourself entirely.

Many people describe the experience of leaving high-control religion as a kind of death and rebirth.

The person you were within the group no longer exists, and you have to figure out who you are without those rigid frameworks to define you.

This process can be disorienting and painful, but it also opens up the possibility of discovering an authentic self that isn’t constrained by someone else’s narrow definitions of righteousness.