THE application of the concepts of failure and success to religion is
a problematic exercise. Since religion is a matter of faith, its goals
might be expressed in transcendental or metaphysical terms. Such
goals are regularly represented as supramundane. What, it might be
asked, does it profit a religious movement if it 'shall gain the whole
world and lose [its] own soul'? The attainment of Nirvana by all
the world's Theravada Buddhists, and hence the extinction of
Buddhism, could be seen as success. Just as the Christian Church
exists for men in this world, so does Buddhism, its doctrines and
organization. In Buddhism, as in Christianity, ultimate success
comes when the world passes away. Christian religion is for man
under the relative natural law, in the period between the fall and the
resurrection: it is a social phenomenon with transcendent goals.
When those goals are attained, that phenomenon--the church, its
material structures, social organization, creeds, and catechisms will
all pass away. The sociologist, however, has no brief to deal with
metaphysical ultimates: his concern is with the limited goals of
social organizations, even though he may not totally ignore the
speculative end and final expectations of religious believers.

Those expectations are sometimes expressed in terms that do
admit empirical appraisal, however. Does a religious movement fail
when the prophecies it endorses fail? Have the Shakers--to take
one example--who are now reduced to a mere handful of believers,
failed, since Christ has not come, sickness has not been eliminated,
and the sin of sexuality is perhaps even more rampant than when
Mother Ann Lee first pronounced against it? Or has the world, in
some way, become a better place for their having been?--which is
the way that they themselves are disposed to explain away apparent
failure. To take religious groups seriously, we must take their
prophecies, their own criteria of self-appraisal, and even their
rationalizations into account. Nor can we simply assume that
growth means success and that decline means failure. Not all

-226-