Of course, the West and Catholicism mostly has its own heritage of "saintly visions". I am thinking of Lourdes, 'The Apparitions of Medjugorje' and others which have been duly turned into cults and profitable industries. How do we categorise these? Not all turn bad, most just turn mundane. Some might be easily explained away as internal projections of repressed individuals, or whatever, but all?
Cutting back to The Beautiful Side of Evil' by Johanna Michaelsen and other books, and this would be a position mirrored by some Buddhists and Yogic traditions as well as the PBKs, these would just be seen as distractions, delusions, not necessarily "evils" but of no great value. How does one account for all of them? The Vatican, for example, does have its own "due process" before separating the acceptable and authentic. The Brahma Kumaris have had their purges of "false prophets" from the early days (The Golden Circle) to recently, (stopping Bhog messages).
In the meanwhile, I am sticking with the anthropologist view ... that is to say, studying the groups, looking at trends and patterns.
Mexican spiritualism, for example, is a small movement largely confined to Mexico City which is thought to have arisen from the religious Roque Rojas Esparaza, a self-proclaimed as the true Mexican Messiah and the reincarnation of Elijah. His church's doctrine, again, was based on the Apocalypse. The Tromba mediums in Madagascar are, again similar to the Sindhis, disenfranchised women whose voices are generally worthless but seen as empowered by spirit possession.
Although a psychoanalysis of Lekhraj Kirpalani etc would be fair enough, it only goes part of the way. In my opinion, anyone seeking to understanding the Brahma Kumaris should look into the history of other spiritualist groups. There is an active component to spiritualism and, until it is properly understood not theorised about, it should be treated with caution.
Whether spirits are real or not, so many seem to play the same game with humanity, have it running around believing that they are the chosen ones and that the end of the world is about to come.
Just to add to this, there is the argument that the evidence of reincarnation given by individuals "remembering" past lives, identities or languages, is not always actually of reincarnation but actually further evidence of spirit possession ... hence accounting for the often failed or irregular nature of the accounts given.