the administration of grace," the sect for Weber is "a voluntary association of religiously qualified persons. It is voluntary as it is based on the willingness to adopt the standards of ethical conduct required for sect membership: membership is not ascribed at birth but results from the free acceptance of the sect's doctrine and discipline by the follower, and from the continuous acceptance of the follower by the sect. The sect does not express a claim at universal hierocratic domination, and therefore it is exclusive – as "aristocracy of the elect" – instead of inclusive like the church. It consists of individuals whose conduct and life style "proclaim the glory of God," religiously qualified persons who believe (or hope) to be "called to salvation." Being a free association of "religious virtuosos," the sect raises high demands towards its members and enforces the strictest discipline upon them. In contrast to the professional priesthood of the church, members of the sect can exercise hierocratic power only by virtue of personal charisma. Lay preaching and universal priesthood are the norm, as well as "direct democratic administration" by the congregation, which is jointly responsible for the celebration of the sacraments by a worthy minister in a state of grace. The ministerial position is not an "office" backed by ecclesiastical structures of authority but an appointment or "election" subject to the popular will of the congregation; the minister is a servant of the congregation, and no bureaucratic separation between persona and office, between individual and function, is ever admissible. The Catholic, Anglican and Orthodox churches are paradigmatic cases of church-like organisations; outside Christianity, good examples of so-defined churches can be found, according to Weber, in Islam, in the Lamaist form of Buddhism and, in a more limited sense, in Mahdism, Judaism and probably in the late Ancient Egyptian hierocracy. The official management of Confucianism stood against Buddhist, Taoist, and sectarian pursuits of salvation of all sorts. Calvinism is best characterized as a sect-like church; Baptists, Quakers and Methodists are paradigmatic cases of sects, as well as Christian Scientists, Adventists. In between these two poles, varying degrees of approximation to the church or to the sect are possible, according to Weber. Hinduism, for example, is a strictly birth-religion, to which one belongs merely by being born to Hindu parents, but is exclusive as a sect because for certain religious offences one can be forever excluded from