Religious Cults

Told by a former high-level member of the Peoples Temple and Jonestown survivor, Seductive Poison is the "truly unforgettable" (Kirkus Reviews) story of how one woman was seduced by one of the most notorious cults in recent memory and how she found her way back to sanity.

An in-depth look into the creation of the post-WWII Healing Revival focusing on the historical perspective of William Marrion Branham, who has been credited by some as the evangelist who both initiated and led the movement. From his involvement with the Kardashian family in California to his politically-charged sermons supporting the revival of the Ku Klux Klan, William Branham lived a fascinating and unbelievable history connected to the collaboration, influence, and power of recognized public figures and events in American history.

An Everyday Cult follows the arc of Buglion's journey through young motherhood into a group that welcomed her but also captured her mind, her heart, and her money. She shows us how a mind and psyche can be compromised by a controlling leader, using techniques that fly under the radar of human awareness—and she implores listeners to wake up to these ever-present abuses of power. Gerette vividly describes a personal journey that became increasingly treacherous, culminating in tragedy. In the telling of her story, she exposes the impact of cultic manipulation on daily life.

The Twelve Tribes: Inside America’s Hidden Cult is a chilling, boots-on-the-ground exposé of one of the country’s most elusive religious movements. What began as a humble café in Chattanooga became a network of communal homes, businesses, and self-contained belief systems stretching across continents. Rooted in a theology of submission, purity, and divine order, the Twelve Tribes has quietly shaped the lives of thousands — often behind smiling deli counters and charming farmhouse aesthetics.

Are you in an abusive relationship? Are you being controlled by others who say they care about you? Do you feel you have no power to change your life? Toxic people can be found anywhere in everyday life. They can be found in intimate relationships, in the workplace and in places of worship. They are self-centred, abusive, manipulative, and lacking empathy. They may be referred to as narcissistic, selfish, or sociopathic. They often mask their negative traits by being charming or friendly.

While belief in religious supernatural claims is waning throughout the West, evidence suggests belief in nonreligious supernatural claims is on the rise. What explains this contradiction? How can a society with a falling belief in God have a rising belief in ghosts, psychic powers, ancient astronauts, and other supernatural or pseudo-scientific phenomena? Taking the same anthropological approach he employed in his notable studies of religion, atheist author and activist David G. McAfee turns his attention to nonreligious faith-based claims.

William Branham was an influential Pentecostal minister of the mid-20th century who began a cult following known as The Message. This ground breaking book examines the history of The Message movement in the years after Branham's death.

A moving, heartbreaking, and lyrical true story of the author’s escape from an apocalyptic cult—and the survival skills that led to her freedom. My family prepared me for the end of the world, but I know how to survive on what the earth yields. As a child, Michelle Dowd grew up on a...

In September 2010, at the beginning of the academic year at Sarah Lawrence College, a sophomore named Talia Ray asked her roommates if her father could stay with them for a while. No one objected. Her father, Larry Ray, was just released from prison, having spent three years behind bars after a conviction during a bitter custody dispute.

At age 14, Wendy Gossard was drawn by the tranquil blue eyes and personal magnetism of a man known as Yahowah, leader of a spiritual group called the Source Family. Fleeing her own family and becoming a fugitive from justice in the state of California, Wendy followed the 1970s cult group across settlements in California and Hawaii on a quest for spiritual direction, communal harmony, and basic survival. Growing up, the teenager, called Mushroom by Yahowah, had questions about her pregnancy, relationships, and place in the universe.

Grounded in investigative research and real survivor stories, Surviving Modern Yoga uncovers the physical and sexual abuse perpetrated by Ashtanga yoga leader Pattabhi Jois—and reckons with the culture, structures, and mythos that enabled it.

This audiobook compares Christianity with the false religions of the world today that are based on the accuracy of fulfilled Bible prophecy. No other religion has used prophecy fulfilled in our lifetime to prove its authority, except the Bible. With more than 50 prophecies fulfilled since AD 1948 and Jesus’ teaching that he is the only way to salvation, we can conclude that we must be a Christian to gain eternal life. Jesus declares you must follow his teachings in order to obtain eternal life.

In the Shadow of Enlightenment is the gripping story of Carroll’s childhood inside the Osho Rajneesh cult—one of the most controversial spiritual movements of the 20th century. While in the commune, Sarito was submerged in a world where devotion and freedom clashed with manipulation, sexual misconduct, and neglect. This was the life she knew until the movement collapsed amid scandal and criminal charges in 1985, when sixteen-year-old Sarito was thrust into a society she knew little about.

This is the story of a young man who was raised as a Jehovah's Witness, seemingly destined to spend the rest of his life following the instruction of God's "Spirit Directed Organization". He soon came to discover, however, that things were not as they had first seemed. Following a patch of doubt and subsequent in-depth investigation into the religion, the young man began to realize that the things he had previously accepted without question no longer made sense.

The Latter Rain Movement of the late 1940s and 1950s created a new breed of Pentecostalism that dramatically impacted Christianity in the United States, as well as many other countries around the world. Initially viewed as a movement by God, a number of well-respected men and women participated in the movement during its early years.

Something terrible has happened in the snowbound village of Kingdom Come, Wyoming, where 12 eerily identical houses stand dark and abandoned. Meals remain untouched on dining room tables, cars are still in garages, and the town's residents have vanished into thin air. This is the disturbing setting where vacationing medical examiner Maura Isles and her traveling companions find themselves trapped during a ferocious snowstorm.

Documenting the life of wandering spirits and their impact on vulnerable human targets, Susan Martinez offers a radical departure from the standard psychological explanations for a host of pathological behaviors - including multiple personality, autism, epilepsy, migraines, obsessive compulsive disorder, depression, schizophrenia, anxiety, PTSD, self-destructive urges, and strange outbursts - and reveals that hallucinations are often true impressions of spirit input.

Africa may have given rise to the first human beings, and Egypt probably gave rise to the first great civilizations, which continue to fascinate modern societies across the globe nearly 5,000 years later. From the Library and Lighthouse of Alexandria to the Great Pyramid at Giza, the Ancient Egyptians produced several wonders of the world, revolutionized architecture and construction, created some of the world’s first systems of mathematics and medicine, and established language and art that spread across the known world.

In 1981, ambitious young Ma Anand Sheela transported the Indian guru Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh to the United States to fulfill his dream of creating a utopia for his thousands of disciples. Four years later, the incendiary Rajneeshpuram commune in Oregon collapsed under the weight of audacious criminal conspiracies hatched in its inner sanctum, including the largest bioterrorism attack in US history, an unprecedented election fraud scheme, and multiple attempted murders. Rajneeshpuram explores how this extraordinary spiritual community went so wrong.

O que Paula Picarelli faz neste audiolivro é um prodígio. Tudo o que é narrado aconteceu de verdade. Para não ser processada, se viu obrigada a romancear os acontecimentos, mudou nomes, misturou uma cena verídica a outra e assim construiu um romance potente, com o equilíbrio e o controle de uma escritora talentosa e experiente. É um audiolivro sobre a manipulação psicológica que as seitas religiosas exercem sobre os fiéis, alguns deles tão brilhantes quanto a autora. Mas é sobretudo a história de como a inteligência pode nos salvar do fanatismo. Uma obra fundamental.