Tracking the trajectory of schismatic groups and New Religious Movements (NRMs) is the closest thing to physics in the study of religion. There is a sense that scientific inquiry can answer the questions that arise: who assumes positions of leadership; who stays and who strays; and which group—the original or the various schismatic groups that emerge—are likely to survive, and why.

Barrett takes readers through all of these questions with the Worldwide Church of God, an America-based Adventist-related religious organization founded by Herbert W. Armstrong in the 1930s with roots that dig deep into the nineteenth century. The work is half history of the organization and half analysis of how that organization (and its adherents) experienced changes—doctrinal and organizational—as they were introduced in the last few decades of the twentieth-century. After a cursory history of the group and its main ideological positions, Barrett explores the results of his own (admittedly limited) survey conducted among members of the various splinter groups created when Armstrong began modifying church doctrine in the years before his death (in 1986), and after Armstrong's successor (Joseph Tkach) transformed the ideology (and affiliation) of the organization from Adventist to more traditional evangelical orientation in the years after.

There is no shortage of interesting detail in the history of this group, but doctrinal shifts, personality clashes, prodigal sons and treacherous friends, and sexual escapades provide only some of the energy fueling the shattering of the Worldwide Church of God, which incorporated more than most Adventist groups a strong self-identification with non-rabbinic Judaism and Old Testament practice, including observance of the “seven major annual festivals of Judaism: Passover, the Feast of Unleavened Bread [also part of the Jewish observance of Passover], the Feast of Pentecost [known in Judaism as Shavu'ot], the Feast of Trumpets [Rosh HaShanah], the Day of Atonement [Yom Kippur], the Feast of Tabernacles [known in Judaism as Sukkot], and the Last Great Day [possibly the Jewish holiday of Simhat Torah]” (Barrett, 33). It seems that, with a critical mass of what sociologists of religion would identify as Worldwide Church of God “tension” with the rest of American society—that is, the sense of being out of step with (or even opposed to) the dominant culture—it took very little of the other factors listed above not only to fuel the break-up of the organization, but as Barrett calls it in his title, to fragment it into almost countless bits.

While the historical portion of the work is not weak, it is clearly present in the service of the second, sociological section of the work. This is not meant as a critique; like many schismatic groups and NRMs, the Worldwide Church of God—and more so its various post-Armstrong splinter groups—was small, and remains generally unfamiliar to most readers. The history permits readers to gain a sense of the organization's foundations. Additionally, it nicely sets up the various elements of Barrett's investigation by telegraphing the dynamics of the various groups and their relationship to the original organization. Yet despite his commitment to the historical presentation, it is clear that Barrett is less invested in it as such, and more invested in how it informs the recent past and the present. As such, from beginning to end this volume is in conversation with scholars working in the sociology of religion—with primary rhetorical partners like Bryan Wilson, Rodney Stark, and others who have worked over the decades on methods of predicting the behaviors of NRMs as they operate in larger society—and draws heavily from that literature particularly in the second part.

Those less familiar with this literature may find tedious some of the data presentation, or the need to rebut other scholars with whose work the reader may be less familiar, but this should not dismiss the importance of Barrett's contribution to that conversation. Responding to theories related to why people stay with a religious group or decide to leave it, Barrett posits the importance of what he calls “moral” capital, defined as one's personal investment in the sense of moral leadership exerted by a religious leader. This is an addition to the literature by suggesting that the role of other forms of capital—“social” (which estimates one's investment in a personal network) and “religious” (which estimate's one's investment in the specific doctrines of a group)—may not always be sufficient to determine who will leave a group, and where that person will go once out.

This seems like a reasonable thing; particularly as religious affiliation is defined increasingly by personal choice (and not theology or family), it makes perfect sense that emotional “intangibles” like how much one feels drawn by a particular religious leader should be as much a part of the calculation for small, schismatic new religious groups as they are for parachurch and megachurch movements.

One drawback is that, for historians, the ability to measure this element of “moral capital” may be more difficult than it is for a sociologist of religion who can create, circulate, collect, and analyze a questionnaire given to living members. But Barrett's scholarship is sound and his use of theory well-informed (if not always subtle), and while this work may be of less interest to those interested in traditional “church history,” it is a great example of how history and sociology can partner in search of answers not only about the past of an organization, but also about its present, and may be useful particularly for those whose work is more often allied with the sociology of American religion, sectarian protestantism, schism, and even New Religious Movements.