The scientific study of religion? You must be joking!

Those who aspire to engage in the scientific study of religion may, in the course of their research, affect the data that they are studying. The paper examines some ways the study of new religions can result in the researcher's "making a difference" for both methodological and ethical or political reasons. A comparison is drawn between the interests of the social scientist and those of the new religions, the anticult movement, the media, the law, and therapists. Finally, it discusses some potential effects on the meta-values of science that may arise out of involvement in the market of competing accounts of new religions.