Thesis (Ph.D.)--Boston University / The purpose of the investigation was to determine how communicants of the religious body, Plymouth Brethren II, the Open Brethren, have perceived the meaning of membership. An assembly in Massachusetts and three assemblies in Missouri were chosen as examples. From these assemblies fifty-one individuals were chosen for personal interviews. They were selected in such a manner that the numbers of people in the cross-section reflected the observed proportion of age and sex differences in the assemblies studied. The Brethren are a religious body who originated in Dublin about 1827. They are called Plymouth Brethren by those outside the fellowship. Assemblies of the body were gathered in England at an early date, and the movement can be found in most of the English-speaking countries of the world. The assemblies are characterized by a dispensationalist theology, a strict social code of conduct, and an organization, or lack of it, patterned on their interpretation of the New Testament church. There are no clergy, no boards. Each missionary goes out on his own by faith. The movement has been riven by schism over the years. The Open Brethren is the largest of the Brethren groups [TRUNCATED]