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CULTS

New Religions

In the open cultural climate of the 1960s and 1970s a variety of religions new to, or previously unnoticed in, the United States attracted attention from the press and the general public. Some of these organizations engaged their converts in beliefs and activities that seemed strange by traditional American standards, occupied all their time, and frequently tried to break their ties with their families. The detractors of these groups labeled them "cults" and warned of the danger, particularly to the young.

Hare Krishna

Some of these groups came from India, such as the International Movement for Krishna Consciousness, which incorporated itself in the United States in 1966. The organization attracted increasing numbers of young people, who were called Hare Krishnas by outsiders due to their chanting public worship. In cities with large numbers of hippies, passersby encountered Hare Krishnas, dressed in saffron robes and with strange haircuts, performing on the streets. Even more startling were the Hare Krishnas soliciting contributions in airport terminals and other public places. People suspected the leaders benefited from the money the young people raised.

Divine Light Mission

Another group with an Eastern-inspired background was the Divine Light Mission, which followed the teachings of the teenage Maharaj Ji, who attracted a large following in his personal mission to the United States in the early 1970s. He moved his world headquarters to Denver, Colorado, where about a thousand young people filled the group's communes. In 1973 the Divine Light Mission rented the Houston Astrodome for a meeting called "Millennium '73," in which Rennie Davis, one of those charged with disrupting the 1968 Democratic National Convention in Chicago, was a chief participant. The Houston rally was not as successful as anticipated, even though it brought in Maharaj Ji's followers from around the world. The movement gradually declined after Maharaj Ji married his secretary, over his mother's protests, and his family in India severed their connections with him.

TM

Another popular Indian guru was Maharishi Mahesh Yogi, who taught transcendental meditation. In the early 1970s large numbers of people, an estimated ten thousand a month by middecade, went to one of the 350 training centers, where they were each given a personal mantra, a word which they used for engaging in meditation. Initially there were questions whether TM, as it was sometimes called, was a religion or a drug-free means of attaining an altered consciousness. Inspired in part by TM, physicians and psychologists began investigating the psychic value of meditation. In 1974 the Yogi bought Parsons College in Fairfield, Iowa, and named it Maharishi International University. When the Maharishi Mahesh Yogi's followers began to claim that they were able to levitate and that their meditation could alter world affairs, the movement went into a decline, although meditation continued to gain in popularity.

The Unification Church

Among the most widely publicized and criticized of the new religions was the Unification church, founded and headed by the Reverend Sun Myung Moon in South Korea. As early as 1959 three of Moon's followers came to the United States to proselytize the series of revelations about Christianity that Moon called the Divine Principle, These revelations urged the unification of the Christian churches, presumably under Moon.

Vigorous Growth

Although Moon came to the United States for brief visits in 1965 and 1969, it was only when he came for an extended stay in 1971 that his church began its vigorous and controversial growth as it directed its attention toward college campuses and other centers where young people congregated.

Emphasis on the Young

The success of the Unification church in recruiting young people and the commitment of the new converts to the organization, often breaking their ties with their families, triggered wide-spread apprehension. In most cities "Moonies," as they were called, were seen selling roses or otherwise attempting to raise money for the church. Charges were made that converts were lured into the church by deceptive means and then brainwashed with Moon's teachings. Ted Patrick, who organized the Citizens' Freedom Foundation, attracted attention with his claims that he was able to deprogram converts who had been brainwashed.

Politics of Moon

The Unification church also acquired notoriety through its political and financial activities. The Unification church was militantly anti-Communist and aligned itself with conservative politics. During the Watergate crisis the church held mass demonstrations in Washington in support of President Nixon, and Moon took out advertisements saying that "at this moment God has chosen Richard Nixon to be President of the United States." More surreptitious political activity, including Moon's alleged ties to the South Korean intelligence forces, led to inconclusive congressional investigations.

Money Questions

The lavish spending of the Unification church for public and patriotic rallies, the purchase of expensive property, and Moon's expensive living costs aroused concern about the source of his funds. It was bad if those funds were from South Korean political groups, even worse if they were from the exploitation of his young American converts. In 1978 the New York Board of Regents refused to grant a charter to Moon's Unification Theological Seminary in Barrytown, New York, partly because of academic standards, partly because of financial questions, but also because of "deceptive claims." The Internal Revenue Service began an investigation into Moon's finances by the end of the decade.

Moses David

A group that started as a Christian mission to young people in the California counterculture in the late 1960s took on cultlike qualities when David Berg, the founder of Teens for Christ, began to see himself as the Messiah, and he changed his name to Moses David. While the group's name changed several times, it was best known as the Children of God. Berg and his followers established a variety of communes on the West Coast and in Texas. Berg himself went to Britain, and his movement began proselytizing around the world. Berg communicated with his followers in letters, called the Mo Letters, that spelled out the terms of his developing set of beliefs for his followers. In the course of the decade over nine hundred of the Mo Letters were published, delivering doctrines that departed increasingly from mainstream Christianity. The appearance of Children of God groups in various countries and some of the organization's tactics aroused intense local opposition from time to time, but the organization still functioned at the end of the decade.

Scientology

Another group that aroused concern due to its cultlike qualities was the Church of Scientology, founded by the science-fiction writer L. Ron Hubbard and based on his book Dianetics: The Modern Science of Mental Health (1950). By the 1960s Hubbard abandoned his science-fiction writing to concentrate on developing his ideas, which he now insisted was a new faith he called Scientology. His many detractors insisted that he took this guise to avoid government interference and taxation. He too left the United States for Britain and continued to develop the tenets of his faith. In 1977 the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) conducted a raid on the Scientology office in Washington, D.C., to uncover evidence that the church had attempted to infiltrate the FBI and other investigative agencies. The participants in the plan were tried and convicted in federal court.