Suicide Cults

1. Suicide Cults A topic for 148.110 Headlines in History

2. Strange Cults are always developing • New cults include 2 ‘French’ ones: • The Neo Phare group in Nantes expecting the end of the world on 24/10/02 • Compare the Order of the Solar Temple • based in Switzerland & French Canada • Founded by Luc Jouret • Suicides in 1994.

3. Heaven’s Gate • For information look it up on google, especially http://www.ascusc.org/jcmc/vol3/issue3/robinson.html • Led by ‘Ti’ and ‘Do’ (Marshall Applewhite) • They expected to exit the earth on the Hale Bopp Comet in 1997. • Mass suicide 26 March 1997

4. The Branch Davidians of Waco • Founder was David Koresh • Ex Seventh-dayAdventists • Based in Waco, Texas • Split from the Davidians • Besieged by the Federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms and then the FBI on 28 February 1993. Ended 19 April. • 2 key books: Armageddon in Waco ed. S A Wright & Why Waco? By J D Tabor & E V Gallagher

5. Jonestown • Pentecostal Sect in Redwoods Valley founded in 1968 • Pastor Jim Jones • Agricultural Project in Guyana • Massacre 18 November 1978, 914 died. • Key book: Salvation and Suicide by David Chidester

6. Asian Cults • Falun Gong in China • Tienamen Square Incident, 25 April 1999. • Government repression. • Cult responded with suicides. • http://www.let.leidenuniv.nl/bth/falun.htm • Aum Shinrikyo in Japan • Tried to gas Tokyo underground on 5 May 1995.

7. The Ten Commandments Church • A Ugandan cult • Expected the end of the world on 31/12/1999. • On 17 March 2000 mass murders and suicides took places in all their churches.

8. Some websites • http://www.religioustolerance.org/ • http://www.cesnur.org/default.htm • http://www.clas.ufl.edu/users/gthursby/rel/nanninga.htm [a bibliography]

9. The Cults and the Wold fear each other • What does ‘cult’ mean? • Widespread fear of cults and ideas of abuse • Is recruitment to cults ‘brainwashing’? • Popular ideas govern responses • Deprogramming • Issues in Religious Freedom • See Millennium, Messiahs and Mayhem ed. Thomas Robbins & Susan J. Palmer.

10. Digging into Waco • Victor Houteff (d 1955) • David Koresh (aka Vernon Howell) joined 1981 • Adventist background (William Miller, Ellen White) • The Fifth Seal , Messianic views • Marc Breault and betrayal. • http://www.shadeslanding.com/firearms/waco.massacre.html • http://www.public-action.com/SkyWriter/WacoMuseum/index.html

11. Death, Sex and Insanity • Christianity disapproves of suicide - Buddhism does not. • Death for a good cause is martyrdom • Free love is often part of sects (sexual experimentation) • Insanity is socially defined, and delusional religion is a classic form of it. • See J M Phayer, Sexual Liberation and Religion Croom Helm, 1977).

12. Prophecy, Magic, Witchcraft • A tradition of popular seers • Nostradamus (1503-1566) is still popular • Magic ideas incorporate pagan traditions • They are ‘thaumaturgical’ wanting to manipulate circumstances • Gnostic ideas are prevalent. • Rosecrucians and searchers for esoteric. • See B Taithe & T Thornton, Prophecy, (Sutton, 1997); K. Thomas, Religion and the Decline of Magic (Penguin, 1990)

13. Millennialism • Apocalypticism, fear of imminent world crisis. • Biblical apocalyptic language has affected western thinking • The Millennium as the happy end to human time - but preceded by crisis. • Post-millennial and Pre-millennial views. • See W H Oliver, Prophets and Millennialists, (Oxford, 1978); S D O’Leary, Arguing the Apocalypse, (Oxford, 1994).

14. Waiting for the End of the World • Early Christianity • The Year 1000 AD (Ralph Glaber) • Joachim of Fiore and medieval fears • Post-Reformation - Pope as AntiChrist. Munster, Fifth Monarchy Men, Muggleton. • French Revolution and Richard Brothers, Joanna Southcott • The Millerites in 1844. • See J F C Harrison, The Second Coming (Routledge1979), E Weber Apocalypses, (Harvard 1999)

15. Contemporary Sense of Crisis • Nuclear arms and cold war in 1970s • Global Islam and nuclear proliferation • Doomsday theories of some Greenies • Conspiracy theories from right wing • Year 2000 excitement • Movies reflect this. • See Robert G Clouse, Hasack & Pierard, The New Millennium Manual Baker, 1999)

16. Types of sects • Sects that defy Christendom • Conversionist sects • Extreme rigorist cults (Tertullian, Old Believers) • Restorationism (Mormons) • Messianism • See books by Brian Wilson The Sociology of Sectarianism (1972) etc.

17. Doomsday Cults • The idea of a millennial sect • Normon Cohn, The Pursuit of the Millennium • Robbins & Palmer, Millennium, Messiahs and Mayhem (Routledge, 1997) • Adventist aspect of Waco. • Right Wing Conspiracy groups • Nazis, Ku Klux Klan • See Paul Elliott, Brotherhoods of Fear (Blandford 1998)

18. NRMs in Contemporary Society • Pseudo and Popular Science - Spiritualism, Christian Science, TM, Anthroposophy, Steiner. • New Age Cults - neo-pagan, ecological, Wimin.

19. Anti-Cult Traditions • Strongest opposition from nearest neighbours • Families and deprogramming • State Opposition - the absolutist state. • French Law • Ex Members

20. Only in America • The Pilgrim Father tradition • Sense of manifest destiny and God’s blessing • Liberal Post-Millennialism • Popular democratic Protestantism and its apocalypticism • Huge market for fears and drama • See Nathan Hatch, The Democratisation of American Christianity (Yale, 1989)

21. More tentatively • Possible explanations within Buddhism • Possible reasons within China - Taiping Movement, Falun Gong. • Possible reasons in the African context, with African Independent Churches.

22. Suicide cults in New Zealand? • Many sects and cults in the 19th century from England and America • Twentieth Century Groups - Camp David (God Squad), Neville Cooper (Rangiora). • Maori Prophetic Movements • Secular Groups: Centrepoint, UFO believers. • See Robert Ellwood, Islands of the Dawn.