See:
Are you sure that by "Europe" you do mean English-speaking Europe (which is the part of Europe whose usage we care about...)?
In any case, we do want to have more info than just about the usage of the word. I mean, jeez...cargo cults, the practices of cults to get new members, brainwashing, etc. There's lots to write about there!
--LMS
Interestingly, English-speaking Europe, to me, is the British Isles which I don't actually count as part of Europe at all. Religious associations of all approved churches in France are referred to as "associations cultuelles." So, if you wanted to talk about fringe or questionable groups in Europe, you would use the word in each language which corresponds to "sect," and in North America, you would say "cult."
So my point was to make it clear that when a European newspaper is translated into English for our benefit and the word "sect" appears, it is pejorative. Not so, the word "cult."
As far as a treatment of the subject in-toto, that is a maze I do not care to enter at the moment. Factually, the modern North-American usage of "cult" is itself a politico-cultural phenomenon fraught with hate, ignorance and intolerance. Those who claim the authority to write on "cults" are outside the mainstream of religion, sociology and psychology, (except fundmentalist Christians, many of whom have jumped onto the "cult" bandwagon with both feet) and are coining and redefining their terms all the time. They speak of phenomena of mental persuasion which appear only in their own books ("snapping," "milleu control," etc.), and everything from the American Socialist Party to the Old Catholic Church qualifies as a "cult." One man's cult is another's religion, and vice-versa. There are a couple of very well-researched and accurately written sites on the web which touch on this phenomenon, and it takes them page after page just to cover the basics of the arguments on both sides (religioustolerance.org and beliefnet) I could never hope to condense that quality of work into a readily digestible article.
Also, on the reversal of the meaning of the words in contintental Europe (the UK uses the normal English meanings) -- a lot of continental Europeans will use the reversed meanings even when writing in English. e.g. recently I was reading an information sheet put out by the French Embassy to Australia -- it talks about the danger "sects" (i.e. what in English is normally called "cults") to French society. Similarly, a lot of newspaper reports discussing continental Europe will use the English word "sect" with its continental meaning, although not without explaining its different meaning. So it is not just in non-English languages, but English as well. -- SJK
I'd say few. The anti-cult movement gets a lot of psychiatrists, but it gets very few people who come from religious studies or sociology departments. -- SJK