Episódios
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Shoko Asahara (born Chizuo Matsumoto) led a modest cultus that grew rapidly beyond the borders of its native Japan.
A blind acupuncturist, Asahara was convicted of selling pharmaceuticals illegally before he decided to sell people faith instead. Asahara studied many religious traditions before concocting one of his own that would appeal to the people around him, AUM Shinrikyo, and he got people to believe it so strongly that they would kill for him.
Among other things, Asahara taught that the end of the world was within reach, and only those who followed him would survive the devastation of the coming nuclear apocalypse. When the Third World War didn't start on schedule, Asahara encouraged his followers to do what they could to start the process. Sarin gas attacks and public violence became the modus operandi, and dozens of people were killed.
AUM Shinrikyo has since changed their name to Aleph, but they remain under vigilant government surveillance. Hikari no Wa has split away from Aleph, and they, too, are suspicious.
All this and more...
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Literature is full of doomsday cults, but the real world is much more chilling.
This week we explore the Great Green Arkleseizure, the Cthulhu mythos, and the many gods described in the works of Neil Gaiman and Terry Pratchett.
Douglas Adams' approach to popular culture brought us a fantastic new version of pious deism.
H. P. Lovecraft brought us a horrifying collection of chaotic gods that might not be as incompatible with your theology as you might hope.
Terry Pratchett and Neil Gaiman offer us the model that all the gods are just as real as we collectively think they are, and a vast collection of books explaining how that can be.
Our real-world history brings us a great collection of apocalyptic groups, too. the famed English Sir Isaac Newton had worked out dates for Jesus' eventual return, as did Americans William Miller and Harold Camping.
All this and more....
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Hoodoo is a terribly syncretic religion, developed as a sibling to Voodoo (and there are other siblings in this family, too).
Magickcrafts have been traded for as long as people have been trading spices and weapons, and Hoodoo Conjurers have collected a fantastic variety of tools from their neighbors. There's a lot to learn when you're genuinely interested in improving your craft.
Herbalism, including mojo bags (fetishes) and other talismans, are important to this tradition, and practitioners are often called "root workers."
Ancestor worship is a little more obvious in this tradition than in many others, but it's also terribly familiar to what you might already see in many forms of popular Christianity.
We also look at similarities with Santeria and Candomblé.
All this and more....
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Keith Raniere is the object of worship in the NXIVM cult, a god in the plainest sense of the word. The founder of a few MLMs, this guy knew how to make a fortune from people who turned out to be easy to manipulate.
From collecting voluntary celebrities and multi-millionaires to veritable human trafficking, NXIVM started out looking like a simple self-help group with a complicated oath and patent, but things got dark when you got too deep.
Faith-healing, hypnosis, and unsafe medical research should have been early clues, but hundreds of people are still committed to Raniere today.
All this and more....
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New Age religion is a lot more than a scheme to sell books and crystals, it's a belief that a new age of enlightenment is dawning--or did so centuries ago--or is centuries away. It might be something to fear, or something to celebrate.
Astrology is all trash, and we're happy to point out the best reasons why. But, it can also be wholesome entertainment.
The people who make your star charts don't care about what's actually happening in the sky, the signs haven't been adjusted to reflect the reality of our sky for thousands of years, and the even the best minds vary wildly on the meanings of things.
Most astrologers won't even admit that the constellation Ophiuchus is now a more relevant part of the sun's path than Scorpio.
Despite the Christian mainstream opinion that occultism and witchcraft are incompatible with their faith (a claim that is unreasonable, to say the least) a massive chunk of American Christians are into New Age ideas that come from these occult teachings. Even atheists buy into the New Age, approximately one in five in the United States of America.
In spite of ridiculous claims made by Paul le Cour and others, this movement has brought some interesting diversity to the global religious landscape, and influenced the world's secular culture in odd ways, too.
All this and more....
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Latin America has managed to preserve some of its pre-Columbian religious heritage, so we're going to explore the traditions of the Olmec, Maya, Aztec, and Inca nations.
We explore cocaine, purification rituals, human sacrifice, gods from throughout history, and Catholic syncretism.
All this and more....
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It's time to take another look at religion in popular culture, in particular, cults in film, and why we love telling these stories.
The Wicker Man (Either Christopher Lee's 1973 classic, or Nicolas Cage's 2006 remake) is a fantastic story about a man trying to save a girl who doesn't want to be saved from the cult of her little island town.
The Ritual (2017) takes some liberties with Norse paganism, but so do more popular franchises, telling us a great reason to be careful in the woods, and avoid unfamiliar shortcuts.
The Ninth Gate (1999) is a bold story of a book dealer who gets in deep with dangerous people, and brushes too close to hell.
Midsommar (2019) tells us how people are attracted to cults, and shows us how tricky it can be to see danger when distracted by grief.
The Village (2004) is a brilliant tale of authoritarian control, with a typical early M Night Shyamalan twist.
Rosemary's Baby (1868) and Apostle (2018) are horrors of what many Christians fear of their neighbors, and it makes good storytelling.
The Mist (2007) shows us how a cult can rapidly emerge when fear is the most powerful currency in the wake of disaster.
Marvel's Runaways (2017-19) was a fun exploration of how a powerful person comes to be the foundation of a cult.
All these stories help us to understand ourselves a little better, and explore the fear of losing control.
All this and more....
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Dr. Sean Hannan did his post-graduate studies at the University of Chicago before joining the faculty of MacEwan University in Edmonton Alberta. His studies revolve around St. Augustine of Hippo, and the medieval mystics like Meister Eckhart von Hochheim.
Augustine of Hippo was a profoundly significant character in the development of early Christian theology. It is said that (since Augustine was African), Catholicism is African. Augustine's ideas of salvation, and the nature of time are of particular interest.
Augustine occupied himself with some of the deepest and most important theological questions, all informed from a well travelled series of religious investigations and conversions. What is the cause of evil? Can a traitorous priest perform a valid sacrament? Does God exist within time and space? Is the veneration of martyrs and saints valid practice within Christianity?
Sean also teaches us about the women of mediaval mysticism, and the (maybe derivative) work of Meister Eckhart in that field.
Since Dr. Hannan teaches classes on Humanism, we had to connect all this to his use of Mary Shelley's Frankenstein, too.
All this and more....
You can WATCH this interview on YouTube.
Find the rest of the interview on Patreon.
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You can find Dr. Sean Hannan on Twitter (aka X), Humanities Commons, and Academia.
Sean is also an editor for Religious Studies and Theology, which has been running for 40+ years.
Sean's published works include:
On Time, Change, History, and Conversion (Bloomsbury)
Mysticism and Materialism in the Wake of German Idealism (Routledge)
The Camp of God: Reimagining Pilgrimage as Migrancy in Augustine’s City of God (Political Theology)---
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After ragging on people who surely don't deserve the veneration they receive from faithful Christians around the world, for their questionable morality, or even dubious historicity, it's time for us to look at a heptad of saints who are genuinely good role models--at least on the surface....
For these saints (as opposed to Teresa of Calcutta), poverty was an obstacle to be overcome, rather than a virtue to perpetuate. We preach power through education, and so did these seven reasonably good saints.
Angela Merici was a Venecian with no recorded miracles, but people insisted that she was a saint because of the work she did to support the public education of young people.
Elizabeth Seton was a big fan of public education, and used her great fortune to support young people in their pursuit to better their lives. Seton was the first American Saint.
Vincent de Paul has a wild story of slavery and alchemy, and he went on to do everything he could to raise people out of poverty, and support young people to get vocational training.
Father Damien (Jozef de Veuster) was a servant of the people in a Hawaiian leper colony, where he gave his life in service of his fellow men.
Katharine Drexel, the second American Saint, spent her fortune setting up schools for BIPOC students all over the United States of America.
Elizabeth of Hungary was a princess with some wild and dubious miracles, but she spent her short life in her own hospital where she cared for the poor and the sick.
John Bosco wrote an awful lot, but he also worked with young men to help get them reliable and profitable work.
All this and more....
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The Church of Rome doesn't represent all of Christianity, but it is a major portion of the global population, so it's time for us to look at their foundation, and what makes them distinct from other groups.
We explore the history of the Catholic Church, including the history of apostolic codenames, and the trouble with apostolic succession. The long history of Anti-Popes and "Lucky" Popes is fascinating.
We navigate the spreading chasm between early Christian-Judaism and the non-Christian Rabbinical tradition, coinciding with the development of new heresies with the influx of non-Jewish converts.
Councils with and without Imperial support helped to form the post-Messianic theology, and brought us, step-by-step to the Church of Rome we know today.
We also explore the tradition of imperialism, and the structure of the organization today.
All this and more....
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Gods of the underworld are not the same as gods of death, nor are the guides the same--not even the Grim Reaper.
Hades is the minder of the subterrestrial realm, just as Zeus and Poseidon are the minders of the Mountain (... and the sky) and the Sea (tough to argue for pluralizing those realms). Pluto is the same figure, adopted by the Romans AFTER he got his new stage-name.
Osiris is the keeper of the dead in Kemetic (Egyptian) lore, and one of the judges at the table.
Hel is the Norse keeper of the dead, though she was a giant, and not a typical god.
The Grim Reaper is a psychopomp: a guide for the recently deceased. The Valkyrie, and the Shinigami are old variants on this idea.
Yama was the first to meet death, and after finding heaven, has made it his mission to guide others.
Anubis, anciently a simple jackal, has morphed into the commanding protector of the dead in Egypt.
Xolotl is the Aztec guardian of the freshly entombed, symbolizing the dog to guide people into the afterlife.
Mercury is the Roman response to the Greek Hermes, and he is said to guide the dead to the docks where they should find Karon, the ferryman. The Etruscan version of Karon is perhaps a little less friendly. Vanth is a more benevolent guide to the Etruscans, though you might not guess it from her appearance.
Personifications of death--the true gods of death, if there can be any--are simply named "death" in the various tongues of the ancient world: Thanatos, Mors, Mot, etc. They may be among the most anciently feared gods in human history.
All this and more....
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Religious clothing is as varied as any other kind of fashion, but there are a few common themes that we will highlight:
Chastity is encouraged in modesty, and it's weird that covering your hair is more important that loose-fitting tops; weirder still when covering your hair with more hair has religious pressure on the cultural misstep.
Fancy hats are everywhere, in a wide variety of styles remind us to think of our gods, and tell others that we're focused on what's important to our grandparents.
Temples and priesthoods are also associated with specific clothing, including Hindu, Jain, Buddhist, Catholic, and Latter-day Saint (Brighamite Mormon) traditions.
All this and more....
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If sin were ugly, the world would be a paradise. Sin has a lot of faces in religious traditions around the world, some more consequential than others.
Hamartiology is the study of sin, and it looks like some folk only want to define the line so they know how close they can stand. Sin is simply the misstep or error that divides people. Some people are more interested in listing sins than in uniting people. Ther principle that defines sin even exists in atheist philosophy, when appropriately defined.
Buddhist thinkers differ on the value of discussing sin, some deny the principle altogether, others recognize that harm begets harm.
In Shinto doctrine, sin (or tsumi) is the idea that bad things have lingering effects, this even includes personal ugliness in cultural manifestation. Harae is the process of cleaning up those things that get in our way.
Thinking about karma too much is bad, but doing bad things gives you more bad karma, so that's even worse.
The Decalogue (Ten Commandments) is a terrible misnomer, built on the cultural obsession with round numbers. There are in fact 14 individual commandments in the decalogue, that's why different traditions give different lists. The Torah actually lists 613 commandments, but they don't have the weight of the decalogue, not being written by the finger of God.
The Seven Deadly Sins are great, but poorly understood by many, we'll give you the short version.
As the Doctor says, "Good men don't need rules. Today is not the day to find out why I have so many."
The sacrifice of Christ as taught by most Christians was a lot more than a rough weekend of not being alive, it included intense suffering beyond the comprehension of most, all to empower his demand that we orgive one another, just as we need forgiveness.
All this and more....
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What is a church? How does a religious society really differentiate itself from any other kind of society? What does it take to become a priest of the Holy Watermelon?
Some people join self-help groups without realizing they've been trapped in a cult. We'll be up front about it: this is a church.
How can we be a church while also being secular and academic? Easy, the rules that define religion are extremely soft. Emile Durkheim and Clifford Geertz weigh in with their definitions, which are variably useless; James Martineaux is just wrong about what counts as religion when we look beyond the walls of the Abrahamic tradition; Friedrich Schleiermacher makes some sense of the matter, but it's hard to agree with him, too, even to the point that we have to agree with Sigmund Freud in pointing out the obvious flaws in his reasoning....
Church, worship, piety, and reverence each get a little bit of attention in this pursuit of useful definitions, too.
Ultimately, the San Lanatus Fellowship stands for humanity, education, and critical curiosity, welcoming people of all spiritual inclinations under the banner of undefined agnosticism.
All this and more....
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Why are there no bear ghosts?
Nearly all the ghosts in the world seem to come from a specific period of time, long before any of us were born.
There is a universal obsession with death, so we're going to explore death from the perspective of those left behind. (Traditions about what lays beyond will be the subject of another episode.)
We talk about the Shiva tradition in Judaism, and the ghastly tradition of shades that dates back to at least as far as the monarch's encounter with the witch of Endor.
We explore some traditions common among Christian denominations, and also WAKES! Another strong ghostly tradition exists among Christians, but not universally shared.
We look at funerary and ghostly traditions among Muslims, Sikhs, Buddhists, Hindus, and Zoroastrians; and we take some time to ponder the Ghanaian Fantasy Coffins, and the New Orleans Jazz Funeral.
What really deserves attention is the phenomenon of near-death experiences, not that they teach us about the world beyond, but they teach us an awful lot about ourselves. Raymond Moody put a lot of work into that field of NDEs, too bad it's all completely subjective neural chaos. DMT has been reported to offer a similar experience.
All this and more....
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[00:00:11] Katie Dooley: Hello, Preston.
[00:00:12] Preston Meyer: Hi, Katie.
[00:00:14] Katie Dooley: Get off your phone.
[00:00:15] Preston Meyer: Okay.
[00:00:18] Katie Dooley: It'll rot your brain on today's episode of--
[00:00:21] Both Speakers: The Holy Watermelon Podcast!
[00:00:24] Katie Dooley: I don't know how to make a segue into this one.
[00:00:27] Preston Meyer: This is a bit of a bummer.
[00:00:28] Katie Dooley: It's... I feel like it's a more awkward conversation than even our sex talk.
[00:00:33] Preston Meyer: I don't feel like it's more awkward.
[00:00:34] Katie Dooley: People don't like talking about death. We're going to talk about some gross things today.
[00:00:38] Preston Meyer: A little bit. But yeah, death is around us all the time. Can't really avoid it. That's the deal.
[00:00:44] Katie Dooley: No, it's, uh, inevitable. Like Thanos.
[00:00:48] Preston Meyer: That's what they say. Yeah, so I was talking to. A person that I work with the other day about his concern with ghosts. He was actually really worried about, um, the Titanic 2 expedition and all that nonsense, but the conversation led very quickly to ghosts, and it boggles my mind that we haven't just agreed that everywhere on the planet is super haunted or nowhere is.
[00:01:21] Katie Dooley: I have had that thought as well. Um, I don't disagree with him because. My house alone has been around since the 50s. You can't tell me something hasn't died nearby,
[00:01:33] Preston Meyer: Right?
[00:01:34] Katie Dooley: Actually, I have heard that there is an unfortunate story with the next-door house, so, um,
[00:01:40] Preston Meyer: Tell me more.
[00:01:41] Katie Dooley: Uh, apparently someone killed themselves next door before the current people...
[00:01:44] Preston Meyer: Bummer. Lived there. Are there haunting stories?
[00:01:46] Katie Dooley: Not that I've heard of.
[00:01:48] Preston Meyer: Okay. Just the unfortunate circumstances of death.
[00:01:51] Katie Dooley: Yes, but that's typically.
[00:01:54] Preston Meyer: What leads to a...
[00:01:55] Katie Dooley: Haunting story. And I always think about how I'm like, you know, get haunted by your cat or your dog. How come ghosts are only humans? There's no bear ghosts.
[00:02:03] Preston Meyer: It's a great question. Cocaine bear has unfinished business.
[00:02:09] Katie Dooley: We should name this episode, "How come there are no ghosts?" Though I do really like your title, which we will probably stay with. Um. But I have often thought.
[00:02:21] Preston Meyer: Yeah, for sure.
[00:02:23] Katie Dooley: Or, like... I don't know...
[00:02:25] Preston Meyer: Dinosaur ghosts? Why are we not haunted by the soul of absolutely ravaged Triceratops?
[00:02:33] Katie Dooley: And also there's like, I don't know, ghosts feel like they're from a very specific time-period. Like, if you hear, like, how come we all have a ghost kicking around from the 1200s?
[00:02:42] Preston Meyer: Right? All ghosts are Dickensian.
[00:02:44] Katie Dooley: Yeah, or more modern but, uh, anyway.
[00:02:54] Preston Meyer: Death is great, and we have really weird ways of dealing with it.
[00:02:58] Katie Dooley: We really do. And I will sort of preface this before we break it down by religion is like we kind of think our way is the right way or the normal way. And reading some of these, some was like, that actually makes a lot of sense on how they handle death. And then some of them, I'm like, that's fucking weird, I won't...
[00:03:18] Preston Meyer: Well, if you see one thing often enough, even if you aren't behind it theologically, the habits are still your habits. Normal gets normal.
[00:03:27] Katie Dooley: Yeah. So that was, you know, eye opening to say the least.houldUm, anyway, so we kick it off with our good old Abrahamic buddies.
[00:03:39] Preston Meyer: Let's do it. Stick with what's most familiar, and then we'll dig into. Yeah, the good stuff. So in Judaism, respect for the dead is one of the most important mitzvot. I feel like we've used this word before. It's commandments. So really take care of the dead. Traditionally, Jewish people bury their dead intact. Some people mostly, you know, you're more reform, more liberal Jewish groups will do the cremation thing. I think that's generally the the theme we'll see moving forward is the more conservatives will not like cremation. We're going to run out of space real soon. An interesting thing that I have read about Judaism is that cremation is counted as destruction of property.
[00:04:31] Katie Dooley: Who's property?
[00:04:35] Preston Meyer: That's an interesting question.
[00:04:37] Katie Dooley: God's property.
[00:04:38] Preston Meyer: That makes sense. But there's also the strong family thing in Judaism where there's like you, you belong to your family in this way that you are. If you're not moving that body around yourself anymore, you're property.
[00:04:56] Katie Dooley: Oh. We'll, move you around. Oh, wait, that's a different tradition to talk about.
[00:05:05] Preston Meyer: Yeah. Uh, Jewish people tend to observe a strict week of mourning after a funeral. They call this the shiva. Uh, it's just the number seven. So seven days of mourning. And during this process, mirrors in the home are often covered. And it's good to keep candles burning. And mourners will sit on nice low stools, like low as your squatty potty.
[00:05:33] Katie Dooley: I'm too old for that. I'm not even that old.
[00:05:36] Preston Meyer: It's a little tough, but these are all indications of mourning. Black veil is good for that. Things like that. Yeah.
[00:05:43] Katie Dooley: Abrahamic and Western favour black for mourning.
[00:05:48] Preston Meyer: Yeah and traditionally. Uh, you don't want to hasten up a death. You don't want to speed things along, even if you know death is imminent. Our country has a pretty interesting relationship with assisted death.
[00:06:05] Katie Dooley: I think it's going to have to change anyway. That's not to digress too much. We could go on and chat about that, but I have my opinion.
[00:06:16] Preston Meyer: Yeah, having it available makes perfect sense. The reality of the government actually pressuring people into it. I'm not a big fan of.
[00:06:26] Katie Dooley: But I yeah, I mean it shouldn't be a government decision, but just like your pets, to let someone live in pain just so they can live as long as possible. And health care costs are only going to get more expensive, for whomever.
[00:06:42] Preston Meyer: If the only activity on your schedule of day-to-day for months on end is eating up resources, at some point you got to figure out maybe there's a better plan.
[00:06:54] Katie Dooley: Well, and I care less about resources as opposed to quality of life. Like we have family members that live every day in pain and then they're also paying. For fentanyl patches, which are very expensive to manage that pain that they're still in.
[00:07:10] Preston Meyer: Fentanyl is a wild thing.
[00:07:13] Katie Dooley: Anyway, wild.
[00:07:16] Preston Meyer: Yeah. But as you may have deduced, we're going to talk about some ghosts today.
[00:07:23] Katie Dooley: Really wants to talk about ghosts today. So.
[00:07:25] Preston Meyer: So the Tanakh does mention ghosts. Um, there's a lot of different kinds of ghosts I've been in unrelated studies, been trying to suss out how different people categorize ghosts.
[00:07:39] Katie Dooley: Like angels.
[00:07:40] Preston Meyer: with A little bit. Yeah. Okay, so you've got poltergeists who can legit interact with the physical world, and then you've got shades which are not so much.
[00:07:51] Katie Dooley: They're there, but they're they can't do anything.
[00:07:53] Preston Meyer: Right. Like maybe you can communicate them. Maybe not, but they just they may be barely visible. They might be more visible, but they're not going to interact physically with the world. So they're like a shadow. So that's a shade sort of thing. So what we have in the Tanakh usually talks about shades more than poltergeists that we have in ancient Israel, the belief that ghosts, the spirits of the departed, could be summoned and you could have conversations with them and learn things from them. The story of Saul and the Witch of Endor is an example.
[00:08:35] Katie Dooley: That's from Star Wars, right?
[00:08:38] Preston Meyer: George Lucas is not half as original as he likes to get credit for. And Endor was just an old place. No Ewoks, which is just Wookiee backwards. Almost not perfect.
[00:08:55] Katie Dooley: I see your theory. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
[00:08:57] Preston Meyer: No, the plan was that they were going to go to the Wookiee homeworld in Return of the Jedi. And then they couldn't figure out how to do it in a reasonable way. So they decided, okay, we'll make smaller costumes and just cast little people.
[00:09:15] Katie Dooley: Okay. Wow. Also, some Star Wars backstory from Preston today. Sorry, I interrupted, and I regret interrupting now.
[00:09:26] Preston Meyer: So the shades are a thing that is a matter of concern in Jewish folklore. And in their theology a little bit as well. There are explicit commandments. Do not mess with people who summon ghosts. Which makes sense. And they also talk about shades that can linger in the land and just stay near the place where they lived or where they died. Isaiah talks a little bit about those too. So I think it's kind of interesting. Ghosts, very solid, part of the religious tradition and there are in more recent than biblical texts, traditions of these shades actually possessing a body usually for a short time just to accomplish a specific task. We talked about this a little bit in our voodoo episode. Actually, it's the same sort of idea.
[00:10:22] Katie Dooley: Which makes, I was gonna say, makes a bit of sense knowing the origins of Voodoo, right?
[00:10:27] Preston Meyer: Well, especially the way it interacted with other religions on its way here. Yeah. So kind of interesting that this possession business is really interesting. And as we get into Christianity, there's stories of ghosts in the New Testament, in Jewish populations where the story feels a lot different, knowing that there's this belief locally that these would be things that dead people are coming back to accomplish, rather than demons like the Greek interpretation jumps onto it. Mhm. It's kind of weird. Kind of fun.
[00:11:06] Katie Dooley: Um, you know who loves death? Christian?
[00:11:09] Preston Meyer: Uh, I don't even remember where the quote came from originally, but I feel like I've quoted it a few times. Christians are just way too excited to die. '
[00:11:19] Katie Dooley: Yeah. Oh, man, they love it. Why is that Preston?
[00:11:23] Preston Meyer: That we talk so much about the promise that the next life is going to be better. And yeah, there's there's so much wrong with this world that it makes sense to hope for something better. But when it gets anywhere close to somebody else realizing that you're too excited to die, you have really screwed up where your focuses are.
[00:11:44] Katie Dooley: Yeah. And even like trying to try to make it all happen faster, trying to bring up the Second Coming. It's like.
[00:11:52] Preston Meyer: Well, there's there's a lot of different ideas of what is supposed to trigger the Second Coming.
[00:11:58] Katie Dooley: Humans aren't going to do it.
[00:12:00] Preston Meyer: It's outside our control. We can't control God.
[00:12:03] Katie Dooley: Doesn't mean people aren't trying because they can't wait. Yeah. Anyway, um, as I mentioned in Christians historically also don't like cremation because there would be no corpse when Jesus comes back and raises everyone from the dead, or he Christians believe in a physical resurrection.
[00:12:23] Preston Meyer: Yeah, your body's got to rise from the grave. And as you pivot at the waist, you got to be facing east.
[00:12:28] Katie Dooley: That sounds horrifying. It's all these and they all have to claw up six feet. Wow. Yeah.
[00:12:37] Preston Meyer: Imagine the horror that this event would be.
[00:12:39] Katie Dooley: Yeah. Anyway. But again, a lot of them are more relaxed now. I mean, I think it's just even people in my world, both of my grandparents were cremated and they were Christians. So. Anyway, I feel like they're the most relaxed now of any of the groups.
[00:12:59] Preston Meyer: Probably,yeah.
[00:13:02] Katie Dooley: I mean, Christian is a really big umbrella.
[00:13:06] Preston Meyer: It sure is
[00:13:07] But I'm sure there's groups within Christianity that still love a good burial, probably Catholic.
[00:13:13] Preston Meyer: So I went to my granddad's funeral last...
[00:13:17] Katie Dooley: We both did a bunch of funerals recently.
[00:13:18] Preston Meyer: Yeah. What a time.
[00:13:20] Katie Dooley: Yeah.
[00:13:21] Preston Meyer: And I mean it was interesting that I had never talked about religion at all with my granddad. I'd never thought that he identified as Christian. Found out at his funeral. This was an important detail to somebody. Yeah. So there was a little ash cross dropped on his coffin and was laid down on the ground, making sure that he was facing in a way that if you were to bend at the waist, he'd be facing east.
[00:13:52] Katie Dooley: In six feet of dirt.
[00:13:53] Preston Meyer: Yeah it was it was an interesting learning experience.
[00:13:59] Katie Dooley: Well, good.
[00:13:59] Preston Meyer: And now we're talking about death.
[00:14:01] Katie Dooley: Now we're talking about death in the terms of Christian wakes are a Christian thing.
[00:14:08] Preston Meyer: Yeah. I haven't heard the word wake used a lot outside of a Catholic context. Um, though I'm certainly can't say that that's not happening, but it's certainly an old tradition.
[00:14:20] Katie Dooley: Yeahand as someone who's involved with the Irish community, the Irish still love a good wake. I don't know too many other groups that do it. And I don't know if that's because it's Irish or because it's Catholic, like what that Venn diagram looks like. And how much is just the circles I run in. But the Irish love a good wake. The name comes from staying up long hours watching over the dead while reciting psalms.
[00:14:43] Preston Meyer: So we're not talking about the risk of the dead waking up. It's just that you got to stay awake to watch the body.
[00:14:50] Katie Dooley: To watch.
[00:14:51] Preston Meyer: In case it wakes up.
[00:14:53] Katie Dooley: in case it wakes up to make sure.
[00:14:55] Preston Meyer: I mean, there it does make sense because historically we we have had situations aplenty enough that we've taken precautions.
[00:15:05] Katie Dooley: Bells and...
[00:15:05] Preston Meyer: Where the bodies do occasionally get back up again after we thought they were dead. But we're just dumb.
[00:15:13] Katie Dooley: If you want to hear a great vaudeville song about exactly that, it's called Tim Finnegan's Wake and basically he's dead and everyone's sad. And then someone spills whiskey on him and he comes back to life because whiskey.
[00:15:27] Preston Meyer: It's like the plants in my office.
[00:15:31] Katie Dooley: Water. Oh. That's terrible. Preston.
[00:15:38] Preston Meyer: Uh, no one's perfect.
[00:15:41] Katie Dooley: You know, you don't need to keep plants if that's... If you're just gonna kill him.
[00:15:45] Preston Meyer: I'm gonna be honest. I don't keep plants in my office, and the person who generally takes care of them generally takes very good care of them. But there are occasionally exceptions.
[00:15:59] Katie Dooley: We're not going to do a full episode on Heaven or Hell. But Christians and even Muslims and Jews, depending on whether you're good or bad, good or bad, you get sent to heaven or hell. Dun dun dun. Yes, that definitely deserves its own episode.
[00:16:16] Preston Meyer: Yeah, for most of history, the majority of Christians and an awful lot of segments of the Jewish population as well, have believed in a tiered series of heavens. In our angels episode, we talked about the ninth heaven, where like, the greatest of the angels live forever with God. And, um, the seventh heaven is a thing that happens occasionally in the way. What's the word I'm looking for? It's a common enough English idiom. Um, there's a TV show.
[00:16:48] Katie Dooley: I know.
[00:16:49] Preston Meyer: Who is in that TV show. I watched it for a year.
[00:16:53] Katie Dooley: The most famous person out of Seventh Heaven was Jessica Biel. She was the second oldest daughter. Um, the guy who played the Christian pastor ended up being a pedophile in real life.
[00:17:03] Preston Meyer: Oh, no.
[00:17:04] Katie Dooley: Yeah, she was the most famous. I can't think of any of the other actors names now. Um, the older there was another.
[00:17:10] Preston Meyer: Singer who was, like, really popular for a really short time. That was from that show, wasn't there? I don't know. I've got nothing.
[00:17:17] Katie Dooley: Maybe as a side character, but of the family, only Jessica Biel made it anywhere significant. I mean, JT and all and actually having some decent movie roles afterwards,
[00:17:27] Preston Meyer: Right? Good for her.
[00:17:30] Katie Dooley: Yeah. I mean, considering no one else.
[00:17:33] Preston Meyer: Yeah. The phrase I'm on cloud nine. Yeah, I don't think you hear that a whole lot anymore either. But that was a thing.
[00:17:38] Katie Dooley: That Cloud Nine superstore.
[00:17:39] Preston Meyer: Your grandpappy, probably said... Man, Superstore was a good show.
[00:17:43] Katie Dooley: It was a good show. Better than better than Seventh Heaven.
[00:17:45] Preston Meyer: Yes. Um, yeah. So for a long time, we talked about these tiered heavens that. Yeah, salvation is universal, but because people suck to different degrees, some of us are going to achieve a better situation.
[00:18:04] Or hell yeah.
[00:18:05] Preston Meyer: Protestants, especially, like the evangelical movement, mostly believe in the simple dichotomy of black and white, no shades of gray. Everything that's wrong with you is going to be fixed or burn forever in hell. It's hard to say that I see the appeal to that. I don't really like it.
[00:18:23] Katie Dooley: I mean.
[00:18:24] Preston Meyer: It takes away your identity.
[00:18:25] Katie Dooley: Well, and if it's that black and white, then everyone's going to hell because nobody's.
[00:18:28] Preston Meyer: And that's absolutely contrary to the mission of Jesus. Oh, well.
[00:18:34] Katie Dooley: I guess we'll find out one day.
[00:18:36] Preston Meyer: Yeah. I think it's a lot more reasonable to accept this more classical idea of shades of gray. It just makes sense. Um, different types of people organized and divided based on the way they choose to live their lives would merit different levels of heaven, I think is really a really clean way of explaining it. There was a lady I used to visit for a while when I lived in New Jersey who hated the idea that God would separate people based on any judgment at all. It makes a lot more sense that we would separate ourselves, right? If you like stealing but hate violence, there's a community for you where you're safe from the violent. But the people who don't like being robbed are safe from you.
[00:19:32] Katie Dooley: That's good. So you just all rob each other for all time.
[00:19:35] Preston Meyer: Yeah,
[00:19:37] Katie Dooley: That's a pretty good punishment.
[00:19:38] Preston Meyer: Right?
[00:19:39] Katie Dooley: You steal something, then you turn around and your shit's got. Ah.
[00:19:41] Preston Meyer: Yeah.
[00:19:42] Katie Dooley: So you got to steal more.
[00:19:44] Preston Meyer: It feels a lot like the punishment fitting the crime. Yeah.
[00:19:49] Katie Dooley: Um, we didn't put in our notes, but I know, I mean, I went to a Catholic funeral recently. We were... I don't know if you want to touch on that.
[00:19:57] Preston Meyer: Sure, yeah. What is it that you experienced that you want to share?
[00:20:00] Katie Dooley: I mean i've been told 2 or 3 Catholic funerals, now? Obviously, this one, most recently Catholic funerals are long because they do a full mass. I will say the thing about Catholic funeral, there's a lot of talk about God and not nearly as much about the person.
[00:20:18] Preston Meyer: Sure. Now, is this a mass in addition to the daily mass, or is it just a not just a funeral attached to the daily mass?
[00:20:27] Katie Dooley: No, they do... My understanding is they do a separate funeral mass.
[00:20:31] Preston Meyer: I mean, nobody's accusing the Catholics of being efficient.
[00:20:35] Katie Dooley: No, because it also took a long time. And then of course, I was like looking for the reliquary, because now we know from our lovely guest, Frank McMahon, confirmed that there is a holy relic in every Catholic church. So I'm looking for bits of saints.
[00:20:49] Preston Meyer: Well, at the bare minimum, they'll have one locked away in the tabernacle, right? And you wouldn't get to see that. But yeah, if there's more about on on display.
[00:20:59] Katie Dooley: There was something pretty fancy in a corner. And I was like, I don't know what that is. Okay, I didn't get close enough because I left the front for the family, but, uh.
[00:21:07] Preston Meyer: No, no, you got to push your way through during a funeral.
[00:21:10] Katie Dooley: During it. I need a front row seat, please, because I just need a front row seat. Um, but that's the biggest thing. Like. I mean, the last funeral I went to was as secular as a funeral gets. And they talk a lot about the person that passed. Um, so it's just. Different. But yeah, you know, everyone, priests especially very hopeful that she's in a better place. And we're the ones who are the losers an I don't know, I mean, you know, I don't believe any of that. I was like, is she. I mean, it's nice to think, but. Why are there no bear ghosts?
[00:21:54] Preston Meyer: Because they don't have unfinished business. They got their honey. They're happy.
[00:22:01] Katie Dooley: But. Right. If there's no bear heaven and bear hell, why is there human heaven? Human hell? Why are there no bear ghosts? That's my thesis.
[00:22:14] Preston Meyer: I have a hypothesis. That bear heaven is fish hell. It's a very efficient system, and it's good enough that they don't need to linger here on Earth.
[00:22:29] Katie Dooley: I've heard that, uh, squirrel hell is dog heaven.
[00:22:32] Preston Meyer: Yeah. Perfect. So Christianity does inherit a lot from Jewish thought. It makes sense. Dispensationalism has got some tricky bits to it, but the inheritance system is inarguable. And that includes the matter of ghosts and the idea of possessing spirits I already mentioned shows up with the New Testament, but Greco-Roman thought shows a lot of its influence in the way that we see demons described in the Christian tradition that almost every ghost that you see described in the New Testament, apart from when they think that maybe Jesus is a ghost until he says, touch me and find out.
[00:23:17] Katie Dooley: Pull my finger. Preston just wiggled his finger at me, so... "Pull my finger." - Jesus, Matthew 22:34.
[00:23:26] Preston Meyer: Yeah, all the the ghosts are, well, terrible demons possessing people or making everybody have a bad time. Jehovah's Witnesses and Christadelphians outright deny the possibility of ghosts, which is really frustrating for them when you point out the holes in that logic. But. Oh, well they just stopped visiting.
[00:23:52] Katie Dooley: As much as I, uh, you know, try to be fair to... They're the least Christian of the Christians.
[00:23:59] Preston Meyer: I mean, it's so hard to delineate what what is Christian and what isn't.
[00:24:03] Katie Dooley: I know, but that's was my point. I was trying to poorly word, but yeah, but they're at least Christian.
[00:24:12] Preston Meyer: I can't argue with that in this moment.
[00:24:15] Katie Dooley: My next thesis.
[00:24:18] Preston Meyer: Um, Seventh-day Adventist got a lot of those in my family. They teach that any ghost you might encounter is absolutely, certainly a demon in disguise.
[00:24:28] Katie Dooley: Cool.
[00:24:29] Preston Meyer: Sure. Not that I'm encountering a whole lot of ghosts.
[00:24:34] Katie Dooley: No, but I just, like. I'm imagining a ghost pulling off its ghost mask, like in Scooby Doo and be like there's a demon under here.
[00:24:43] Preston Meyer: I like that imagery.
[00:24:44] Katie Dooley: Thank you.
[00:24:45] Preston Meyer: But generally everybody agrees they can basically shapeshift.
[00:24:48] Katie Dooley: Oh, oh that makes a lot more sense, but it's way less cool.
[00:24:54] Preston Meyer: Right? Most other Christians admit the possibility of the disguise problem, but acknowledge that a ghost could genuinely be the dead person you're after. The ghost that we see in the Witch of Endor story. It's not really answered in a really concrete way. Whether or not this should be expected to be a demon in disguise or the dead prophet returned. Because that wasn't the important part of the story. The important part of the story was stop getting witches to summon demons. Many Christians believe that the dead can take on the role of angel.
[00:25:34] Katie Dooley: Which is where, as we're writing these notes, I was like, we need to separate heaven and hell. And even we talked about angels. And I was like, but dead people become angels.
[00:25:43] Preston Meyer: Right.
[00:25:43] Katie Dooley: One so yeah, there's like a whole other piece to this.
[00:25:47] Preston Meyer: Yeah. Um, the Revelation talks about how there's like a third of the host of Heaven fell with Lucifer, as most people prefer to call him.
[00:25:57] Katie Dooley: Satan is accurate.
[00:25:59] Preston Meyer: [00:25:59]Satan is a far more helpful thing here. And so those generally [00:26:03] get to be the ones that we call demons within Christian theology models. But there are also talks of, well, if you're just a bad person, you can become a demon that way too. It's exciting. It gives you something to aspire to if you don't want to change your ways. Lots of goodies.
[00:26:23] Katie Dooley: Cool. The last of the Abrahamic religions, of course, is Islam. And I mean last chronologically
[00:26:23] Preston Meyer: Of course and the last one we're talking about.
[00:26:33] Katie Dooley: And the last one we're talking about today.
[00:26:34] Preston Meyer: Because we usually stick.
[00:26:36] Katie Dooley: Last but not least. Very similar, obviously, it's been influenced by Judaism and Christianity. When death is imminent, a family member or close friend is present to say the shahada, which is the, uh,
[00:26:49] Preston Meyer: There is no God but God, and Muhammad is his prophet.
[00:26:53] Katie Dooley: Yes. Uh, there's a word for it. Something of faith.
[00:26:57] Preston Meyer: Uh, statement of faith. Statement.
[00:26:58] Katie Dooley: Declaration. Declaration. Thank you. Declaration of faith. We talked about this in our Islam so years ago. But the shahada is also recited when you're born. So it's this. If you're born a Muslim, it's kind of a nice full-circle moment.
[00:27:12] Preston Meyer: It's a very convenient conversion tool. All you got to do is shout that in somebody's ear and bam.
[00:27:18] Katie Dooley: You actually shout it?
[00:27:20] Preston Meyer: I mean, some people like like the video of the guy who doing like a really awful baptism of a baby with dunk, dunk dunk dunk dunk.
[00:27:28] Katie Dooley: Baby gets shaken baby.
[00:27:29] Preston Meyer: Yeah. And the parents are just horrified. There are people who shout at the children. But that's not likely the typical format.
[00:27:39] Katie Dooley: All right. Again with like with the other Abrahamic faiths and more strictly Muslims do not cremate their dead. Some Jews do. I'd say half of Christians do, and no Muslims do. They do not cremate their dead because they believe in the physical resurrection that will happen. And autopsies are also forbidden. Unnecessary autopsies, obviously. I presume in the case of murder they would do an autopsy. But if someone dies in their home, they don't do autopsies
[00:28:11] Preston Meyer: Right. There's I mean, there are places where autopsies just aren't happening. But here in North America, yeah, if something bad happens, it's going to happen. And you can put on your frowny face all you want. It's still going to happen. You just muscle through it.
[00:28:30] Katie Dooley: Uh, but organ donation is okay because it helps people.
[00:28:33] Preston Meyer: So I'm really glad that exception exists. It feels weird.
[00:28:39] Katie Dooley: It feels contradictory.
[00:28:40] Preston Meyer: Yeah. But I appreciate that exception exists because it helps people.
[00:28:45] Katie Dooley: Yeah. I mean, you know, someone's dead and you don't care why they died. What is the point of an autopsy? Right. If they're 80 something years old.
[00:28:56] Preston Meyer: Yeah.
[00:28:57] Katie Dooley: And they died at home in their bed or in a hospital in the bed.
[00:29:00] Preston Meyer: There's gonna come a time 100 years from now, and our podcast will still be available on podcast libraries. And somebody's going to hear that it was normal for us to die at 80 and go. What the hell was wrong with these people?
[00:29:16] Katie Dooley: You think our life expectancy is going to get that?
[00:29:18] Preston Meyer: I think our life expectancy can reasonably be expected to be extended by decades. I got high hopes. We'll see.
[00:29:28] Katie Dooley: Uh, bodies are originally washed and wrapped in a white sheet before burial. And they are washed three times by a family member of the same gender as the deceased. Sharia law dictates that funeral planning start immediately after the death, and bodies are buried quickly. There are no viewings, so no wakes. You did not stay up all night drinking with your dead grandma. Have you seen Derry Girls?
[00:29:55] Preston Meyer: I've seen a little bit of Derry Girls, but I definitely have not seen whatever has come to your mind.
[00:30:00] Katie Dooley: There's an episode and they're at someone's wake. And my favorite character, Sister Michael, she's a curmudgeonly nun. Who I don't even know if she has that much faith. And there's one part. She's at this wake and she's talking to a family member. The family member is very annoying. She's like, oh my God, is this my wake? Am I dead? Am I in hell?
[00:30:23] Preston Meyer: I love it.
[00:30:26] Katie Dooley: Sister Michael, I'll show it to you after I love her. I watched through the whole series, and it's filled with charming teens. I was like, no, that grumpy old lady. That's my favorite.
[00:30:38] Preston Meyer: That sounds right. So, if you were wondering. Yes, Muslims believe in ghosts. Uh, the spirits of the dead are supposed to go on to an underworld called Barzakh.
[00:30:51] Katie Dooley: Oh, that's a good name.
[00:30:52] Preston Meyer: Yeah, I like the name. Be honest, I did not look up what the name means. I'm sure it's got meaning, but I'll look it up later. Improper burial can impede the journey to this underworld.
[00:31:03] Katie Dooley: Oh, that's why they're so regimented in it, okay.
[00:31:06] Preston Meyer: Because you don't want to risk screwing this up, and then you've got a ghost wandering around because, I mean, if you ever notice ghosts, it's not because they're doing nice things for you. Nobody's emptying your dishwasher. It's not happening.
[00:31:19] Katie Dooley: Oh, you seen that webcomic of this little ghost? And he's like, I love home decorating. And he's, like, moving around frames and vases, and the family's like, ah, but he's just this cute little ghost. It's like, I love this work. It makes me way too happy, but also sad.
[00:31:34] Preston Meyer: I love it. Yeah, that's great. Um, so the shades of righteous spirits are expected to linger at their own graves, which feels a little bit weird. I had to dig at this. There's like, the soul goes on to the underworld and awaits resurrection. But a shade, a shadow of that soul lingers at the grave so that people can come and talk to it and get whatever great mystic knowledge is reserved for, not the living. But apparently the shades are willing to share it sometime.
[00:32:16] Katie Dooley: It feels like a pretty common practice of like.
[00:32:18] Preston Meyer: Yeah.
[00:32:19] Katie Dooley: Visiting grave to talk to a loved one.
[00:32:21] Preston Meyer: I would say it's pretty close to universal that you would go to wherever you buried your loved ones to talk to them, hoping to get some sort of answer.
[00:32:32] Katie Dooley: But they believe that they actually stay there. That's cool.
[00:32:36] Preston Meyer: Yeah, it's kind of nifty.
[00:32:38] Katie Dooley: Yeah. All right. Heading to the East air quotes.
[00:32:44] Preston Meyer: Vaguely eastward from where we were.
[00:32:46] Katie Dooley: Or where we're heading to the Dharmic religions is actually a better title. Hinduism.
[00:32:52] Preston Meyer: Yeah.
[00:32:54] Katie Dooley: So when death is near, it is common to obtain water for purification from the Ganges River, which is considered sacred.
[00:33:02] Preston Meyer: Remember we talked about how the Hindu people are the river folks.
[00:33:05] Katie Dooley: The river folk is the part to be surrounded by loved ones at the time of your death. If the body is left alone, uh, light, ideally, a candle should be left near the body as close to the head as can be done safely so.
[00:33:19] Preston Meyer: Yeah. You don't want them catching on fire.
[00:33:20] Katie Dooley: No. Uh, to comfort the lingering spirit. Generally for Hindus, families are encouraged to remain conservative in their mourning, allowing the soul to move on quickly to its next stage. The soul is said to linger as long as people hold it with their thoughts. So mourners are encouraged to focus on happy thoughts and memories. I like that.
[00:33:41] Preston Meyer: Right? So it's okay to mourn, but not too long and not too negatively. Which is good. Remember the good times.
[00:33:51] Katie Dooley: Families typically prefer to bury the body within a day. Any work the coroner might need to do is a major inconvenience.
[00:33:58] Preston Meyer: I mean, that's true, generally.
[00:34:02] Katie Dooley: All organs need to be returned to their place before burial. So no organ donation here.
[00:34:07] Preston Meyer: Yeah, I'm there's definitely going to be exceptions to that. Some people are a lot more liberal than but the the general religious expectation is leave it be.
[00:34:20] Katie Dooley: The soul is believed to carry on to its next incarnation, whether as an angel, a human or an animal. Or better yet, escape the cycle of samsara and recombine with Brahma, the source of all creation, potentially to be recycled into creation. But that would be as a nearly totally new soul.
[00:34:40] Preston Meyer: Yeah, the this cycle of samsara is. A really interesting thing to study so much potential or just go back and recombine with God. And maybe he'll use you again.
[00:34:54] Katie Dooley: Maybe he'll use you for something else. You've done it. But now you're a rock. Because he needed a rock right here. Yeah, ad if you'll recall, the you come back based on how good you are. Good you were your karma in your past lives. So if you're doing good, you'll come back as something better. You're not doing so good. You're heading back to that rock.
[00:35:18] Preston Meyer: Yeah. And that's historically that was like the way to move between casts was just.
[00:35:26] Katie Dooley: Being reborn.
[00:35:27] Preston Meyer: Yeah. And now we've seen in some places some movement between castees is more possible than in other places.
[00:35:37] Katie Dooley: I mean, this generaetion, I think, is caring less about caste than ever before. And I'm sure in the next 20, 30, 40 years, it'll...
[00:35:47] Preston Meyer: Get a little bit better every generation. Yeah, one can hope anyway.
[00:35:52] Katie Dooley: Tell me about the Ghost, though.
[00:35:53] Preston Meyer: Oh, man. So there's some there's some baggage here with Hindu ghosts. You're supposed to move on to the next life.
[00:36:01] Katie Dooley: So if you don't, you're downgrading.
[00:36:05] Preston Meyer: Right? You're supposed to get a new body.
[00:36:07] Katie Dooley: So a ghost is like a variant of Loki. You've come out of the timeline.
[00:36:14] Preston Meyer: A little bit.
[00:36:15] Katie Dooley: Interesting.
[00:36:16] Preston Meyer: I mean, to the point where you've got folks like the TVA saying, no, you need to get back in line. Yeah, that's a little that is a fair enough analogy of what we're looking at. Okay. It's not perfect.
[00:36:29] Katie Dooley: But you're right because you're either supposed to come back better or come back worse. So if you're not coming back at all and you're not escaping samsara, there's a problem. Okay. I can't wait to hear this.
[00:36:40] Preston Meyer: So go start a very serious matter. Reincarnation is the normal path. Something is keeping spirits from passing on to the next phase, which could theoretically be nirvana. But if you're in this situation where you're lingering here, maybe that next step isn't Nirvana. So there's a good list of things that might prevent a spirit from moving on, and thus lingering is a noticeable and likely malevolent spirit. We've got improper burial. So a lot of religions worry about burying people properly to prevent ghost problems. Uh, we've got violent death. Loads of fun there. Unfinished business. I mean, that's bad karma. Most of these are bad karma type things. Sometimes it's not your karma, but other people's karma on you. But if you've got unfinished business, that's your own karma. And the worst of all of these, the one that had some serious baggage that I thought was really interesting is if a woman dies in childbirth or at the abuse of her in-laws, then she is said to return as a churel or chudel or whatever. 400 different ways are pronouncing that based on the various languages of the region. A malevolent and destructive spirit is what a churel is, and they are focused on the destruction of the family that wronged her. Yeah, it's apparently very dramatic, caused a lot of problems, and they've got ghost hunters to deal with that.
[00:38:15] Katie Dooley: Yeah, I was going to say that sounds like the plot of a good Bollywood movie.
[00:38:20] Preston Meyer: There's got to be one, right? The odds are good.
[00:38:23] Katie Dooley: The odds are... I might have to do some digging. Yeah. Cool. Buddhism.
[00:38:30] Preston Meyer: So I remember showing you a video a little while ago that looked super suspicious.
[00:38:35] Katie Dooley: I remember when I saw this, I was like, oh, okay. Yeah. Um, so Buddhism sort of overarching, very similar to Hinduism, trying to escape the cycle of life and death. But there's some nuances and some practices within Buddhism that are neat slash kinda gross.
[00:38:52] Preston Meyer: Yeah, they're care for the dead is completely incompatible with what we see in the Hindu tradition.
[00:38:58] Katie Dooley: I'm tempted to put a trigger warning on this part of the episode. I found it a bit gross. Sure, mostly the sokushinbutsu.
[00:39:06] Preston Meyer: You've been warned. Skip ahead five minutes if you don't want to handle this.
[00:39:09] Katie Dooley: Yeah, it's just like body horror is a bit strong, but it is a little gross. So we're gonna talk about Tibetan sky burials. Tell me about this video that you showed me.
[00:39:18] Preston Meyer: So there was this person in a little corral full of vultures because they don't always just fly around waiting for stuff. Sometimes they know where the good stuff is, and sometimes they're part of a farm. And this person was just chopping up a human skeleton up. It was a pretty clean skeleton. Somebody had already taken care of business.
[00:39:39] Katie Dooley: And it was very clear from the rib cage that it was a human skeleton.
[00:39:43] Preston Meyer: It was very obviously human.
[00:39:45] Katie Dooley: So this was a Tibetan sky burial. Sky burial. I don't know if it was in Tibet, but that's where it comes from. The term sky burial is a Western term. The actual practice, the translation translates to giving alms to the birds, which I kind of love.
[00:40:00] Preston Meyer: It's for the birds.
[00:40:02] Katie Dooley: This is a practice where the corpse is placed on a mountain to decompose through exposure to the elements and animal scavenging. Obviously, in the case Preston's talking about, for whatever reason, they need to speed it up. Or.
[00:40:14] Preston Meyer: I mean, this could have been taking care of the skeleton after the scavenging. Yeah.
[00:40:20] Katie Dooley: So Vajrayana Buddhists believe that the body is an empty vessel once the spirit has left. So none of this physical resurrection and therefore there's no reason to keep it. The person's got a new body somewhere else. They died. They've resurrected. They're not sorry, reincarnated somewhere else.
[00:40:40] Preston Meyer: Yeah, Buddhists just generally aren't terribly worried about the corpse. And that's nice. I can appreciate that. Just don't worry about it.
[00:40:49] Katie Dooley: Another Buddhist practice that mildly traumatized me. And it has a I feel like a deeper theological discussion we could talk about is Sokushinbutsu is the practice of self-mummification.
[00:41:06] Preston Meyer: So gross.
[00:41:06] Katie Dooley: Japanese. It started by Japanese Buddhist monks. Um, it's an ascetic practice. Acetic, ascetic? I always say it wrong.
[00:41:14] Preston Meyer: Acetic is a kind of acid.
[00:41:17] Katie Dooley: It's an ascetic practice that takes about 3000 days. That's what, eight years, roughly.
[00:41:22] Preston Meyer: Sure.
[00:41:23] Katie Dooley: To complete. And it involves essentially eating a tree. Monks would eat pine needles, resin and seeds found in these trees, and the process eventually eliminates all body fat.
[00:41:38] Preston Meyer: So you've you've had Buckley's tastes awful, but it works.
[00:41:42] Katie Dooley: Yeah, that's part of the tree.
[00:41:43] Preston Meyer: Yeah. So the reason that it tastes awful and works is because pine needle oil is mildly toxic. That's why grass doesn't grow right up to the base of the tree. Why would you want to eat pine needles? Unless, of course, this is your plan.
[00:41:59] Katie Dooley: Well. And yes. And this is I'll finish explaining it. But this like this idea and I guess it's like self-flagellation of, like, what is so important that you're willing to do this. And as an atheist I'm like, mm, nothing. Anyway, we'll we'll come back to that. Continue explaining this horrific process. So eating the tree eliminates all body fat. It does result in the starvation that it leaves the body well preserved, and they found corpses with skin, hair, teeth, nails in the forest, which is wild, and obviously probably because you're right of the biotoxins animals don't touch them right, and the skin doesn't rot away. So I don't know who figured this out. I don't know why anyone wanted to figure this out, but.
[00:42:44] Preston Meyer: Right. There's there's so much that we do that like knowing it. Sure. We can keep going. How did we first find out? Like cheese. The milk went so bad and then all of a sudden was fine again.
[00:43:03] Katie Dooley: There's a lot of things in life. I'm like, how did we figure this out? This is one I don't think we needed to figure out but... So the practice has been banned since the late 1800s in Japan. But and there's pictures of this if you do like this kind of stuff. The Buddhist monk Luang Pho Daeng died in 1973. He was a Thai monk from Thailand after practicing sokushinbutsu, and his body is actually on display and they just die while meditating. So he's sitting there cross-legged and they put sunglasses on them because apparently his eye sockets are pretty horrific. But, uh, I mean, it's an interesting example of... They didn't do anything to him. He's just he's behind glass now.
[00:43:47] Preston Meyer: But I would hope so because people, you know, people are going to be touching. Right.
[00:43:53] Katie Dooley: Yeah. But he's they didn't do any other sort of embalming to him besides...
[00:43:58] Preston Meyer: What he did himself, what he...
[00:43:59] Katie Dooley: Did to himself. So anyway, um, yeah, it's an interesting like but I guess we even have cases like 9/11. What do you believe in so much that you're willing to die for it? Something that takes 3000 days of some commitment
[00:43:59] Preston Meyer: Right? I mean, there's a lot of things I like to eat that would slow this process down.
[00:44:20] Katie Dooley: I don't I don't think you're supposed to eat other things.
[00:44:23] Preston Meyer: I know it's a major commitment.
[00:44:25] Katie Dooley: You'd be like, you'd eat like pine needles and then be like, oh, but a burger sounds great.
[00:44:29] Preston Meyer: Right?
[00:44:32] Katie Dooley: Um, yeah. And the the Luang Pho Daeng, he had six kids and a wife, and he left to become a Buddhist monk. And then he decided.
[00:44:41] Preston Meyer: He would end it all the slowest way possible.
[00:44:43] Katie Dooley: The slowest way possible. And I just, I, I don't know, I just I can't wrap my head around it, but I guess it's.
[00:44:50] Preston Meyer: Not for me.
[00:44:51] Katie Dooley: I guess. But John Paul II flogged himself and people flew into the Twin Towers and Luang Pho Dang starved himself to death. I don't, I guess. Maybe I'm just too apathetic, Preston.
[00:45:05] Preston Meyer: Maybe, I don't know.
[00:45:08] Katie Dooley: Maybe I just like life too much.
[00:45:10] Preston Meyer: There's a lot to like about life.
[00:45:12] Katie Dooley: I think so, but.
[00:45:14] Preston Meyer: All right. Well, believe it or not, Buddhists believe in ghosts, too.
[00:45:19] Katie Dooley: What? I'm seeing a theme. This might be the only universal belief in the entire world. I don't believe in ghosts, though, so.
[00:45:26] Preston Meyer: Well, we've already pointed out a couple of groups that deny the universality of the belief. Jehovah's Witnesses and Christadelphians.
[00:45:34] Katie Dooley: But I do know atheists that believe in ghosts, which is funny to me.
[00:45:37] Preston Meyer: Right? You can believe in ghosts without believing in God.
[00:45:39] Katie Dooley: No, but I just.
[00:45:41] Preston Meyer: No. I think if you do believe in ghosts, it's easy to talk somebody into believing that there's more. And then bam, you get into the mysterious agnostic belief in some sort of god.
[00:45:56] Katie Dooley: Or some sort of something.
[00:45:58] Preston Meyer: Well, even even if the universe is God, you still got all God.
[00:46:01] Katie Dooley: Yeah. Anyway, I was so excited to find a universal belief, its not even universal that puppies are adorable.
[00:46:09] Preston Meyer: Right? Puppies are haram.
[00:46:12] Katie Dooley: Are haram. Anyway.
[00:46:14] Preston Meyer: All right, so many Buddhists celebrate a ghost festival. Where they offer food to ghosts who might linger. This is an expression of compassion mostly, which is one of the greatest virtues of Buddhism. And in return, the ghosts do not bother the community, which seems to usually work, or, depending on your measure of things, maybe always works.
[00:46:39] Katie Dooley: Because they don't exist.
[00:46:41] Preston Meyer: Right? Um, ghosts might also move onto a realm specifically for hungry ghosts, where there are no offerings and everybody is just hungry all the time.
[00:46:57] Katie Dooley: That sounds scary.
[00:46:58] Preston Meyer: That sounds like hell. I feel like this is a really nice way of saying they're in hell.
[00:47:04] Katie Dooley: Yeah, I don't want to be hungry.
[00:47:06] Preston Meyer: Yeah. That sucks. In the Tibetan tradition. A bothersome ghost can be captured with a special trap and extra killed with a ritual dagger, sending it to be reborn again.
[00:47:20] Katie Dooley: My, do you know what that reminds me of? When people say he was killed to death, I'm like, uh huh, uh huh. Yep.
[00:47:27] Preston Meyer: Redundant.
[00:47:28] Preston Meyer: Murder-Death-Killed.
[00:47:29] Katie Dooley: Murdered. Death killed. He was murdered to death.
[00:47:33] Preston Meyer: But if a ghost is sticking around, that's. Yeah, there is a procedure in place to kill the ghost so that it is not an operating ghost any further.
[00:47:44] Katie Dooley: I was going to say that's the only context in which I will accept killed to death is when you're killing a ghost.
[00:47:51] Preston Meyer: Yeah, it's. It doesn't fit in the frame that we have for ghosts here. It's different than exorcism, which is kind of what we would talk about, about getting rid of a ghost. But there there are some, some commonalities. There is one particular ghost that I think is rather interesting. And the Dalai Lama agrees. Maybe not for the same reason. Dorjee Shugden is a powerful 17th century monk, I say is because that's what some people believe. In Tibet, he's revered by some who claim that his lingering ghost is a god. Most Buddhists don't really mess with arguments about theology. Don't worry about God's worry about your own path through samsara.
[00:48:40] Katie Dooley: This one is hot topic.
[00:48:42] Preston Meyer: Yeah, because a lot of people believe that Shugden is a God that is, like worthy of worship and like focus on him a fair bit. And other people, not so much. Of course, the Dalai Lama is not a fan at all. He says that Shugden is an evil spirit. And yeah, this division is causing a lot of contention in Tibet.
[00:49:06] Katie Dooley: Sikhs, Sikhism, like Buddhists and Hindus, believe in reincarnation, which is interesting because it's also a monotheistic religion. Remember, it's the baby of Hinduism and Islam.
[00:49:18] Preston Meyer: Hindu's a little bit monotheistic. That's true. Depending on your interpretation of all of the things and expressions of God.
[00:49:26] Katie Dooley: Um, so Sikhs believe in reincarnation that comes from the Hinduism side and to eventually escape the cycle and become one with God, but only one God. I guess, as you pointed out, Brahma.
[00:49:39] Preston Meyer: Right, one, three, 700 million, whatever.
[00:49:43] Katie Dooley: It's fine. Cremation is the preferred and traditionally accepted method to deal with the deceased in Sikhism. This is the first time we've seen that.
[00:49:54] Preston Meyer: It's like a system built around being wise in a very densely populated part of the world. Thought of a solution to one of a few problems.
[00:50:06] Katie Dooley: Family members are expected to witness the cremation process, which I thought was interesting. I don't think that's very typical here.
[00:50:12] Preston Meyer: I don't know if we make it very convenient to witness a cremation here.
[00:50:16] Katie Dooley: I think you can if you ask, but I don't think it's typicalbecause when we put down Paige, if you've heard our little jingles on the podcast, there's no more jingles anymore. It was an option to watch her be cremated. And I was like, no, I'm good. But I haven't had a human in my life cremated recently, so I don't know.
[00:50:35] Preston Meyer: Fingers crossed that it doesn't happen.
[00:50:37] Katie Dooley: I'm gonna do that.
[00:50:38] Preston Meyer: And if you're curious why people cross their fingers or knock on wood, we did an episode on that a little while ago.
[00:50:45] Katie Dooley: Ashes are scattered into a river. They believe that the body should be returned to the earth, and that the family left behind doesn't carry this attachment to the body. In instances where Sikhs may choose burial, headstones are not allowed because the body is just that shell that we've seen in the other Dharmic religions. There should be no attachment to the body. A Sikh funeral is antam sanskar. Antam Sanskar which translates to final ceremony. TThe deceased Sikh is dressed in their five Sikh articles of faith before the funeral and cremation. So that's the Kesh, Kanga, Katcha, Khara and kirpan. If you want to know what those are.
[00:51:31] Preston Meyer: Check out.
[00:51:32] Katie Dooley: Our episode. One of those is a little knife. Yeah, that's the kirpan. After a funeral service, family and friends gather to read the Sri Guru Granth Sahib. Which is the final guru and the holy book.
[00:51:46] Preston Meyer: So as an heir to both Hindu and Muslim philosophies, the ideas of ghosts live in both realms. To some extent, we do have the worry of the ghosts of the abused, that maybe they'll come back and cause some problems, and it's kind of hard to work that out of the faith when it's still living in at least the more secular portion of the Hindu reality. Yeah. Nothing terribly new and exciting there.
[00:52:13] Katie Dooley: Now we have some outliers, some that attach directly to religion. Some are just cultural practices around death. Now that we all know what Zoroastrianism is. They are actually doing something very similar to the sky funerals, they have a tower of silence.
[00:52:27] Preston Meyer: That sounds really cool.
[00:52:29] Katie Dooley: It does. They put their dead on this tower raised platform for scavengers and the elements to aid in decomposition. It is a circular ray structure used just for this purpose. This keeps corpses which are considered to be unclean, away from the sacred elements of fire, earth and water.
[00:52:53] Preston Meyer: Up in the air.
[00:52:55] Katie Dooley: Well, there's not much you can do about that. I figured it this way. Right. You either has to be Earth. Well, I guess any of them. One of them has to be tainted, though, to get rid of the body. So they've opted for air and give it to the animals. I didn't read the full article because it was behind a paywall, which I hate, but, uh, there's no Towers of Silence in in the West. So that has led Zoroastrians to have to compromise on their last funeral rites and traditions, which is kind of sad. I mean, right, and this is where.
[00:53:28] Preston Meyer: Fire is such a big thing, there's always these these fire temples for Zoroastrianism. And part of me wants to say, well, just build a separate fire for cremation, but that is still putting an unclean thing in sacred fire.
[00:53:44] Katie Dooley: But and this is where, you know, I said at the top of the episode, some things make a lot of sense, like getting rid of a body in a very both economical and ecological way makes a ton of sense, and I don't think it gets more sanitary than a tower of silence. Whatever, you could argue a sky burial mound could get into the water system or whatever. But yeah, you're right. The West is so uptight about.
[00:54:14] Preston Meyer: Dead bodies.
[00:54:15] Katie Dooley: Dead bodies, so do I think. You know, eating a tree to die makes a lot of sense. No. Do I think, uh, sky burial does? Yeah.
[00:54:24] Preston Meyer: Yeah. Fair.
[00:54:25] Katie Dooley: And so it made me sad for them. Like, imagine not being able to have a funeral the way you won't have a funeral for a loved one.
[00:54:32] Preston Meyer: There's. There's got to be a way that we can work around existing systems to make that work out.
[00:54:39] Katie Dooley: I don't know, I feel like you. Well, no, because there'd still be laws. But the solution is buying private land, right? But you still have to circumvent laws with dead bodies. And I don't know what laws.
[00:54:49] Preston Meyer: Cops aren't allowed on our property.
[00:54:51] Katie Dooley: Yeah, um.
[00:54:52] Preston Meyer: What's the tower for? None of your business. It's a religious structure.
[00:54:55] Katie Dooley: You can't see what's on top of it. Of course we have, of course, drones and airplanes and all sorts of things. People know there's dead.
[00:55:01] Preston Meyer: There's. Yeah. New project. I'm going to design a structure that isn't super friendly to drones, where you could have a tower of silence.
[00:55:13] Katie Dooley: Okay.
[00:55:16] Preston Meyer: This would be a thing that will happen a lot more easily if I knew people who were Zoroastrians.
[00:55:24] Katie Dooley: Well, if you know a Zoroastrian... If you know Zoroastrian, put them in touch with us. I would just love to interview them and, uh, Preston can talk about his scheme with them.
[00:55:37] Preston Meyer: Yep. All right. New Orleans jazz funeral is a fun little extra thing to talk about. Yeah. So, Louisiana. I've never been. Have you been to Louisiana?
[00:55:50] Katie Dooley: No. It's actually quite high on my list of places in the States to go. Um, I would really like to go to New Orleans.
[00:55:56] Preston Meyer: Yeah, it's from from what I've seen on TV and movies. A great collection of people. That's about what I got for my own knowledge. But luckily we do reading.
[00:56:09] Katie Dooley: Yeah. And I mean, I this is nice because we have talked about Voodoo and a little bit of Hoodoo in the past.
[00:56:15] Preston Meyer: Yeah. So there's strong colonial past there. Connects to Europe, Africa and the Caribbean. There is a great tradition of military style brass bands at these funeral processions. You can you can find videos on YouTube. They're great. Mix that with African spiritual practices, Catholic influences. And you know, this being the birthplace of jazz, New Orleans has a pretty unique funerary tradition. Lots of dancing. I've seen more than one casket drop.
[00:56:48] Katie Dooley: I mean, that person doesn't care anymore.
[00:56:52] Preston Meyer: And everybody's having a good time. You're like, for sure there are going to be a couple living people who are a little uncomfortable with dropping a casket, but that's not a thing that has to be remembered. Yeah. They really incorporate celebration into the mourning. Yeah. You lost somebody you love, but you get to celebrate the time you did enjoy with them and celebrate the fact that you've been brought together with your community and family.
[00:57:17] Katie Dooley: You know, I'm just going to touch on this right now because I'm thinking of it. Our good friend Sarah Snyder, our very first ever guest on the podcast, she shared a I guess it's a meme that's not a funny one the other day. And she said, things that are said at funerals should be set at birthdays. And I thought, I'm going to start doing that. I'm going to write long loving cards to my friends now. So I like it. It doesn't all get left to the last minute.
[00:57:41] Preston Meyer: Yeah.
[00:57:42] Katie Dooley: Ghanaian fantasy coffins. So interesting. We'll post some pictures on the day this launches on our Discord. These are works of art used by the Ga people of Southern Ghana. They believe that our lives continue into the next world the same as they did on Earth. So the coffins represent the deceased by using different symbols. Fantasy coffins are shaped and painted. You can get them in ships, mermaids, chickens, shoes and so much more. And yeah, often they use it to represent what your job was in life. So pilots will be buried in planes and.
[00:58:20] Preston Meyer: So I can get I wrap my head around a lot of careers that would get you buried in something that's shaped like a ship. What do I do I have to do to get buried inside a mermaid?
[00:58:32] Katie Dooley: I would also say ship related work. Ocean navigating. You can also be a professional mermaid now.
[00:58:41] Preston Meyer: Okay, fair.
[00:58:43] Katie Dooley: I don't know how popular that is in Ghana I feel like it's a real white person thing.
[00:58:46] Preston Meyer: Famadihana is the traditional Madagascar ceremony of the Malagasy people, of turning of the bones. It's basically just a way to continually remember the deceased. Bodies of ancestors are removed from their resting place, rewrapped and their names written on the shroud to be remembered. That's kind of nice. A little gross.
[00:59:11] Katie Dooley: Yeah, I was gonna say I want to be the person. There's like a there's a point where is horrible. And then once they're just bones, it's fine. But there's like the first couple of years where they're still icky. I wouldn't want to be that person.
[00:59:24] Preston Meyer: But yeah, when it's sticky, it's a bad time. Yeah.
[00:59:27] Katie Dooley: But once they're just clean bones, yeah, that's not so bad.
[00:59:32] Preston Meyer: And depending on the situation, I mean, it might not even be a long time, right?
[00:59:36] Katie Dooley: I don't know how long the body takes to decompose.
[00:59:39] Preston Meyer: It varies on region. Right. Well Madagascar is wet.
[00:59:42] Katie Dooley: Yeah. And then I mean over here they don't decompose because we put so many fucking toxic shit into them, which.
[00:59:47] Preston Meyer: There is that
[00:59:49] Katie Dooley: Please don't do that to me. I want to be a mushroom.
[00:59:52] Preston Meyer: Okay?
[00:59:53] Katie Dooley: Hollow me out and then turn me into mushrooms.
[00:59:55] Preston Meyer: Yeah. Okay, so there is more to this process. They don't just wrap them up and then stick them back where they found them. They dance with their skeletons. They have a real party. I'm almost. I'm gonna say Mexican Day of the dead level.
[01:00:12] Katie Dooley: Yeah.
[01:00:13] Preston Meyer: But there's this practice creeps a lot of people out, and so they're doing it less and less. I don't know if it needs to be stamped out. It doesn't feel like that is necessary, but the Christian missionaries have really put a lot of pressure on them to stop, even though the Catholic Church is okay with it.
[01:00:32] Katie Dooley: The Catholic Church has come out to say they're okay with it. So I'm guessing these are Protestant missionaries that are like, maybe we shouldn't dance with bones. Catholic Church has come out and said, no, it's fine. Have fun.
[01:00:43] Preston Meyer: I mean, especially this newest pope. He's mostly like, yeah, keep doing your good things. Please don't leave the church.
[01:00:52] Katie Dooley: I just heard by the time this episode comes out, this will be really old news, but that he's, like, not approved of gay marriage. But there's steps being taken to... You can't call them marriage, but you can get blessed.
[01:01:07] Preston Meyer: Yeah. The Pope did a little while ago announced that he will bless gay unions, which is. It's a step. It is a step.
[01:01:24] Katie Dooley: So, anyway, uh, Preston mentioned the day of the dead, and we've talked about it a little bit before. And it is, of course, the subject of video or popular animated films. The day of the Dead is November 2nd, religiously. Secularly. It has extended to more than a single day, and the festival is much more fun. The ghosts aren't likely offended, right?
[01:01:47] Preston Meyer: It's just loads of rum. Loads and loads and loads of rum.
[01:01:50] Katie Dooley: For that part of the world.
[01:01:51] Preston Meyer: Bright colors and parades. All right, so I did a bunch of deep diving into near death experiences. Um, so research into this field of near-death experiences is relatively new. We haven't been talking about it for even 200 years quite yet, really. And so it started when people started regularly falling from heights great enough to have time to contemplate their lives. So fairly recent history. And so when we started reviving people from clinical deaths, then we started getting a lot more people giving reports on their near-death experiences, experiencing the sorts of things in huge numbers, even enough that we could study them more effectively. So in 1975, a fellow named Raymond Moody. I think he was credited by most people as coming up with this term near-death experience. He studied about 150 patients who all claimed to have had a near-death experience. His findings outlined nine common steps in this experience, though not everybody experienced all nine steps, but they were nearly universally in this order, so.
[01:03:06] Katie Dooley: Almost everyone experienced one, and then they get less common. Is that my understanding?
[01:03:11] Preston Meyer: Sometimes you could have number two, number five, and then number eight.
[01:03:14] Katie Dooley: And I wasn't sure if one was the most common.
[01:03:16] Preston Meyer: And then no, this the these are all the this is the order of all the steps. Which ones you get to experience may vary.
[01:03:25] Katie Dooley: But this is okay I see. Okay.
[01:03:27] Preston Meyer: So the first is immediate peace and pain relief. Really sucks when this one's not on your list. And then there's this unfamiliar but calming sound or even music. And then there's the the moment where yourself is elevated above your own body. And sometimes watching medical professionals trying to bring you back or whatever.
[01:03:50] Katie Dooley: Bryant's aunt experienced that. Yeah, yeah, she's talked about that one. I don't know she if she experienced others, but she has talked about number three.
[01:03:58] Preston Meyer: Cool. Uh, and then the person leaves Earth and ascends quickly through a dark sky into a bright tunnel. And then the person arrives in a brightly lit heavenly space. Maybe it's a nice garden. Maybe it's at a fountain. Whatever. It's a nice place where you feel comfortable and you are in awe of your surroundings. And then the person is met by deceased friends and family. And then the person meets a god that usually matches their religious tradition. Or a brilliant mass of just tangible love and bright lights. And then the person undergoes an instantaneous life review and understands how all the good and all the bad they have done has affected them and the people around them. Usually this happens in the presence of that God. And then finally, after all of that, the person returns to the awareness of their body and they are told that it's not their time to die, or they choose to return to be with their loved ones who are not dead yet. Remember, not everybody has all of them, but this is the steps in that order, almost always in this order. And it's kind of nifty. There's there's been a lot of out of body experiences that people have reported on, and there's been loads of trials to try and figure out these out of body experiences. They've even done weird tests like, oh, we're going to hide a thing in the room that you're not going to know what's there when you're sleepy, whatever. But when you are outside of your body, maybe you'll spot it. And never has anybody ever successfully identified the hidden target. But there's also loads of reasons why they wouldn't like. Maybe they didn't look that direction, maybe they didn't get high enough out of their body to really see it. Whatever.
[01:05:56] Katie Dooley: See, I think it'd be more like a dream state where you dream. Even this afternoon I took a nap and I dreamed I was awake getting ready for the podcast. And then I actually woke up and I was like, shit, I'm not ready for the podcast. Um, but in my dream, I was sitting up on our couch. Um.
[01:06:10] Preston Meyer: Right.
[01:06:12] Katie Dooley: I'm getting ready to record.
[01:06:13] Preston Meyer: Yeah. We'll get into the more theories, that's how I want to finish this. I think it's normal to see personalities change in some way after this experience. I don't know why some people like Jehovah's Witnesses and other people like them, blame this on the soul transfer that comes with the blood transfusion. This is why you're a different person after a near-death experience, because you have somebody else's blood in you.
[01:06:42] Katie Dooley: Okay, but like reading your list, which you'll get into, most of these look pretty positive. So why would you be against blood transfusion? These all sound pretty good for the most part.
[01:06:51] Preston Meyer: Yeah, these nine steps are a pretty pleasant experience. Not universal. There are people who.
[01:06:58] Katie Dooley: No, but the changes that we haven't gone over. At first glance, all are quite positive. So why would you be against blood transfusion when, um. When it looks like it's a positive change?
[01:07:10] Preston Meyer: See, I think that it's just normal to be a little bit changed after a traumatic experience.
[01:07:16] Katie Dooley: Trauma, yeah, absolutely.
[01:07:18] Preston Meyer: Trauma changes you. That's the deal.
[01:07:20] Katie Dooley: That's literally science.
[01:07:22] Preston Meyer: But the changes that are typically happening with this experience, if we've got greater compassion. that's a win. Oh, no. The blood transfusion ruined it.
[01:07:35] Katie Dooley: Blood transfusion made me nicer, no!
[01:07:39] Preston Meyer: Uh, we've got higher self-esteem, greater sense of their purpose in the world. Less concern for acquiring material wealth.
[01:07:50] Katie Dooley: But capitalism.
[01:07:54] Preston Meyer: Um, we've got a desire to learn more about the world around them. Elevated spirituality, though not necessarily a greater commitment to any religion. Just generally more aware of feelings.
[01:08:06] Katie Dooley: Spirit level. Yeah.
[01:08:08] Preston Meyer: And just the greater self and the thing that binds us all together. There's also they usually stop worrying about death as much, but they're more willing to and more interested in really living their life as much as they can. And most notably, these folks often claim to have witnessed an afterlife, and we're talking about millions upon millions of people reporting these experiences. The most recent number I got for the United States is unfortunately ten years ago or more. But they said 9 million people in the United States in 2011 had reported a near-death experience. And that's just the United States.
[01:08:52] Katie Dooley: In that sense. Such a huge number. But then you forget how big the states is. So like in the grand scheme of things, it's not a huge number. But that's a lot of people.
[01:09:00] Preston Meyer: And you're we're talking about a country that builds itself in a way that makes it super likely to have a near-death experience. But I think it's really interesting that this is nearly universal. These things have been recorded in nearly every culture group around this planet. I think the stats are 95% of culture groups, 95% have reported at least one instance of somebody reporting a near death experience. Okay. Yeah. And I found a really cool article came out just a few years ago in 2019 on an LDS study on the subject. So I'll post that in our Discord. It's kind of nifty. An awful lot of people who go through near death experience that there's a panic. And so it makes sense that when they suffer a clinical death, um, maybe they don't have this experience. Maybe they do a lot of them. Instead of reporting this near-death experience like we've described it, report nothing at all. That and then they come back. So there's nothing on the other side. Nothing even matters. I feel like that's exactly as valid as all of the others. I don't think there's any reason to believe that these experiences positive, negative or nothing at all really define anything beyond the self. It just makes sense to me.
[01:10:27] Katie Dooley: And I know this is impossible to like test, but it'd be interesting to see if you could change it without. Like what a near death experience would be like without cultural and religious influence. Like, because you can't.
[01:10:43] Preston Meyer: You always have culture.
[01:10:44] Katie Dooley: Even an atheist has seen the movies and read the stories, right? So is there an afterlife or is it just that I think this is how it's supposed to go, and when your body goes into panic mode?
[01:10:57] Preston Meyer: Right. Yeah. It's it's a tricky thing.
[01:11:01] Katie Dooley: So anyway, again, you can't test it because even if you go to another country, they have their own guts and their own belief in the afterlife, so they would have that experience program in their brain, whether they are religious or not. Right? If you're someone living in India and you're an atheist, you could still have a religious death experience just from the cultural influence. Yeah, is my point. I hope that was clear.
[01:11:24] Preston Meyer: Yeah, there's there's a lot of different models that explain the phenomenon. And I'm a big fan of the expectancy model that you see what you hope or expect to see, if you see anything based on everything that you've just listed. Yeah, there's alternative models too, and I can't just list the one that I prefer.
[01:11:45] Katie Dooley: All right, well, lay them on me.
[01:11:47] Preston Meyer: There's the depersonalization model that posits that the trauma of an event causes something like a schizophrenic break. Depersonalizing the experience, the experience of impending death. The problem with this is that not everybody has an out of body experience when they have this near death experience, and the survivors almost never display anything that looks like they've had a personality break.
[01:12:13] Katie Dooley: Yeah, but I think that's still a good explanation of an out of body experience. Like because. You know what the room was like when you were in it, and you know what your body looks like lying there. You know, so I think your brain projects that the as opposed to an actual spirit. Spirit watching.
[01:12:35] Preston Meyer: There's the dissociation model, which I think is a better alternative to the depersonalization model. Yeah, that, but it's still it really only addresses the out of body experience. Then there's the birth model that tries to explain why you have this tunnel, part of the experience, that it's a revived memory of your birth experience. So the weird thing about that is that we're actually really close to about half and a half on. Some of these people were born vaginally, others were born through the cesarean. And that's that's one trouble that half of these half of these people weren't born in the typical way that you might expect anyway. I mean, cesarean section is getting a lot more common. So it's not I don't think it's fair to call it atypical.
[01:13:26] Katie Dooley: Or I mean, you know, my brother came out feet first. So we're very reverse tunnel.
[01:13:33] Preston Meyer: Briefly wore your mom as a hat. Also, it's noted by an awful lot of scholars that have issue with this birth model that infants are not equipped to process or remember being moved through the birth process. So the memory of the tunnel experience is not supposed to be even possible.
[01:13:57] Katie Dooley: Yeah, I mean.
[01:13:58] Preston Meyer: The mind is a puzzle.
[01:13:59] Katie Dooley: Yeah. I mean, there's a few instances where people claim to have birth memories, but even then that's so hard to prove. Again, same thing is, I mean, how many times have you seen a birth, whether it's in sex ed or on TV or so you can say, yeah, I have a memory of birth, but like...
[01:14:15] Preston Meyer: And it's, it's so easy to construct memories if you just build it an emotional connection to a thing that you've seen, you can build it into your memories so that later on when you reflect and say, oh yeah, no, I've got this memory stored. Yeah. It's wild.
[01:14:31] Katie Dooley: I mean, I the it's not really addressing this, but I mean, people have talked about this before of like, what do you think happens when we die? Well, what do you think happens before we're born? Right. And probably that, you know, the first time you yeah, have any sort of cognitive function is not in utero. Right.
[01:14:50] Preston Meyer: Yeah, it's interesting stuff though. There are also models that get into the brain chemistry stuff. I don't think we're really prepared to discuss that. But we did talk about drugs a little while ago. Several episodes ago, High and Mighty, I think was the name of the episode. .
[01:15:06] Katie Dooley: That was I mean, that's the question a year ago now.
[01:15:08] Preston Meyer: Easily DMT might get you something pretty close to a near-death experience and honestly, it's likely that there's a combination of psychological and physiological elements that play into the near-death experience. But it's fascinating stuff.
[01:15:23] Katie Dooley: This whole episode was fascinating. Not that I don't enjoy all of our episodes, but this was a particularly.
[01:15:29] Preston Meyer: And so I really want to hear from our audience in our Discord some things that maybe we shouldn't have left out. And build some conversations around that.
[01:15:39] Katie Dooley: Yeah. Or even funerals. Right, right. I've only I shouldn't say I've only ever been to Catholic funerals, but I've been to in relatively to a lot of Catholic funerals. So which is weird because I'm not Catholic. Um, but yeah, just different traditions and practices. And I'd love to hear people's opinions on things like the sky burial, which again, I think is very economical and ecological. Why don't we do that here? Why can't I just leave a body on my backyard? Why aren't there bear ghosts? Let's get to the real root of the problem. Bear ghosts!
[01:16:18] Preston Meyer: You can also join the conversation on Facebook and Instagram. Our best conversations are on Discord, though we're also on YouTube and Patreon, where we can hopefully talk you into giving us some of your money in exchange for goods and services.
[01:16:34] Katie Dooley: For bonus content. And of course, the subscription model is not your thing. We have our Spreadshop where you can buy some sweet merch.
[01:16:42] Preston Meyer: I think that's about it for today. Thanks for joining us.
[01:16:45] Katie Dooley: I wasa going to say stay alive everyone.
[01:16:47] Preston Meyer: Yes, join us next time.
[01:16:51] Both Speakers: Peace be with you.
[01:16:52] Katie Dooley: Don't die, we need listeners
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Angels in most traditions are heavenly messengers, and modern pop culture has greatly exaggerated almost every feature. While it makes sense to assume that there are female or feminine angels, each one named in Abrahamic scriptural tradition is a man.
The word Angel comes from the Greek Aggelos (lit: messenger), and the Hebrew word Malak has the same meaning.
In this episode we explore the groups of archangels listed in various sources, most notably Michael, Gabriel, Raphael, and Uriel, but also including Raguel, Sariel, Remiel, and the Metatron.
But more than just a handful of favorite messengers, there are also different kinds of angels, from the baby-faced Cherubim (think of the Renaissance Cupid, though Ezekiel gave them interchangeable animal faces), to the brilliantly dazzling Seraphim (aka fire-folk), to the cosmic horrors known as the Ophanim (the famous "biblically accurate angels" that are simply haunting wheels of eyes and wings and twisted metal)--that last one is dubious in angelic status....
Angels show up all over the Hebrew and Christian Bibles, and the entire Quran is said to have been delivered by the same angel that brought Mary and Joseph the news of her pregnancy. In more recent times, works like Paradise Lost and The Divine Comedy have contributed a lot to how we see angels in Western tradition.
Angel is also a fair label for demi-god-like beings in other traditions, such as the Devas of Dharmic tradition, the Vördr of Norse tradition, the Yazata (lit: holy) of Mazdeism (aka Zoroastrianism), and the Daemons of Greco-Roman tradition. We consider each of these, and how some are better fits than others for this label.
Interpreting Colossians 1:16 to contain a list of angels is ridiculous, and nobody should be that bad at reading.
All this and more....
Support us on Patreon or you can get our merch at Spreadshop.
Join the Community on Discord.
Learn more great religion factoids on Facebook and Instagram.
[00:00:11] Katie Dooley: There's a fine. You can go to jail if you... And a fine. There's both.
[00:00:19] Preston Meyer: Oh, good.
[00:00:19] Katie Dooley: Both a fine and jail. If your phone goes off.
[00:00:23] Preston Meyer: That's a bad time.
[00:00:24] Katie Dooley: Yeah. It is. You could always ask an angel for help if you go to jail.
[00:00:34] Preston Meyer: Ah, there's a lot of stories of people meeting angels in jail. Makes you wonder about those angels, doesn't it?
[00:00:39] Katie Dooley: Right. Well, we're gonna explain more on today's episode of.
[00:00:43] Both Speakers: The Holy Watermelon Podcast.
[00:00:47] Katie Dooley: Yeah. So. I like that. This is. I feel like we haven't done an episode like this in a minute where we talk about a whole bunch of. We talk about a concept in a whole bunch of religions.
[00:01:03] Preston Meyer: Yeah, it has been a minute.
[00:01:03] Katie Dooley: I'm excited. So we're talking about angels.
[00:01:09] Preston Meyer: Say it ainn't so.
[00:01:12] Katie Dooley: Or if you were a really bad speller in junior high an angle.
[00:01:16] Preston Meyer: I feel like. Yeah, I must have shared it on our discord this Christmas of somebody who shared a collection of angles that they brought to their family.
[00:01:25] Katie Dooley: Yeah, there was a girl in junior high with me. I won't call her a friend because she wasn't. But this was when everyone was on MSN, so you had everyone's email. And her email was sweet angle and then some number. I was like, oh boy.
[00:01:41] Preston Meyer: Mhm. Yeah. Spelling is important.
[00:01:45] Katie Dooley: Yeah. We all have those cringey emails.
[00:01:47] Preston Meyer: Well, it's like most people just cannot spell rogue.
[00:01:52] Katie Dooley: Almost every time I see somebody try to say rogue they spell rouge. Now, being a Star Wars fan in a French immersion program growing up, I was not going to make that mistake. Instead, I made all kinds of other mistakes of spelling words the French way in an English context.
[00:02:07] Katie Dooley: Well, that's good. Um, but speaking of words, tell us where the word angel comes from.
[00:02:13] Preston Meyer: So the word angel as it is known in English. Yes, the the word angel, as you know, it comes from the Greek word Angelos, spelt with no Ns but two G's. Huh? You can complain about that, but English does stupid things too. The word means messenger, which is speculated to have been derived from the older word for mounted courier, which I think is just a cool extra layer of meaning to that. The Hebrew word that typically gets translated into angel in the Greek Bibles is malak, which also means messenger. So there's also the last of the Old Testament or Hebrew Bible prophets. In the Christian Bible format because remember they arrange the books differently is Malachi and he's got the perfect name it basically just means my messenger. Was that his name? We'll never know.
[00:03:20] Katie Dooley: Interesting. And yeah, messenger, mounted courier. I'm getting a lot of mailman vibes. Even. Malak. Malak. Malak. Yeah. Mailman.
[00:03:36] Preston Meyer: Most of the angels that we see in the Judeo-Christian tradition are men rather than women. So yeah, mailman's great. So the frustrating thing is that the ideas that come along with this word over centuries of thought and baggage collection there's there's a lot of variety and meaning. And most traditions have gotten to the point where the word doesn't mean messenger anymore. Uh, usually it it's just thought of as this is a demigod. The word means some sort of class of demigod, usually with multiple classes. We'll get into that later. And in a lot of religions, you'll see them treated basically as demigods that have dominion over various elements because they can't be gods, because usually you're looking at them in a monotheistic lens.
[00:04:36] Katie Dooley: Yeah, I can, especially when when you said it, we'll get into the hierarchy of the angels. But like it's like, how does this even work in a monotheistic tradition to have all of these layers of divine beings?
[00:04:50] Preston Meyer: Yeah, they're they're residents of heaven, so they're better than you and me, but they've got great powers, is the deal.
[00:05:00] Katie Dooley: And I guess we don't worship angels. I guess saints would actually be a worse sort of like knock to the monotheistic than an angel.
[00:05:09] Preston Meyer: Oh, but see, I think it's a mistake to separate them In the Catholic tradition specifically, or any of the the Orthodox, the saint traditions. Lutherans whatever. If you if you're into saints, Saint Michael is one of them. Michael the Archangel, he's a demigod, just like Mother Teresa. Yeah and maybe with better reasons. I.
[00:05:43] Katie Dooley: Mean, can't be worse.
[00:05:45] Preston Meyer: One has tales of actual divine power, the other is known to be just awful.
[00:05:52] Katie Dooley: Yeah. Cleaned and reuse needles. Yeah.
[00:05:54] Preston Meyer: I want to believe that there is a way to clean needles safely. But I know that actual health care professionals say, don't do that. And there's good reason for that.
[00:06:04] Katie Dooley: I mean, you're probably right. I'm sure there is. But to, like, guarantee its safety is probably near impossible. Just donated blood this week. Right? Like it's such a small little needle. How would you make sure it was maybe the syringe part, but the little needle anyway. Gross. Don't do it, don't. Clean needles for all.
[00:06:25] Preston Meyer: Yeah. Adding angels to monotheism. It does look an awful lot like demigods in a system where there is just one greater God. And we've had this conversation about how Hinduism, you've got a lot of lesser gods under Brahma.
[00:06:44] Katie Dooley: Yeah. And I mean even Shinto, all the kami, there's greater kami, there's lesser kami.
[00:06:51] Preston Meyer: It's complicated. And it just makes the argument for strict monotheism the way most people define it, a lot harder to argue.
[00:07:01] Katie Dooley: Yes. And all the Abrahamic religions have angels, and those are the monotheistic ones. And people are vehement about the fact that they're monotheistic. And it's like, but then they're saints and angels, whether you group them together or not. I mean, even in Christianity, there's the Trinity.
[00:07:22] Preston Meyer: Yeah, I saw a meme on Reddit the other day, and it was it was definitely a Mormon kid posting a meme slamming the Trinity in a group that has historically not been friendly to Mormons. And they roasted him hard in the comments, but all of the arguments they offered were absolute nonsense. It's frustrating. Like, it's it's okay to believe in the Trinity if you're going to believe in anything, whatever. But if you're going to slam somebody for not getting it, make sure you get it.
[00:07:22] Katie Dooley: This is such an old movie, but in Bill Maher's Religulous.
[00:08:07] Preston Meyer: Oh, that's a lot of fun.
[00:08:08] Katie Dooley: It is. He asks one guy about the Trinity, and he, the guy explains it that it's like water. It can be ice, or it can be steam, or it can be water. And that's the Trinity. And I was like, well, that or Bill Maher was like, well, that sounds good on paper, but it really doesn't explain it. They're different, but they're the same. Anyway, we're digressing a bit, but let's jump into talking about angels in the Hebrew Bible.
[00:08:32] Preston Meyer: Yeah. So there's. A lot of appearances of angels. It's kind of a recurring theme.
[00:08:40] Katie Dooley: Yeah, and not just in the Hebrew Bible, but there are also angels in rabbinic literature and in the Apocrypha as well.
[00:08:46] Preston Meyer: Oh for sure. Yeah, the angels are, I would say, a pretty prominent part of this faith.
[00:08:51] Katie Dooley: Yeah. And from my research, it feels like there's more angels in the Hebrew Bible than in the Christian Bible.
[00:08:59] Preston Meyer: There's definitely more angels named in the Hebrew tradition than there are in the New Testament. The New Testament names Gabriel outright and then just mentions, oh yeah, and other angels showed up for this event.
[00:09:15] Katie Dooley: And I guess also like the whole last half of the Christian Bible is just letters.
[00:09:24] Preston Meyer: Yeah, not a whole lot of narrative storytelling. Whereas the Hebrew Bible has a lot of really great storytelling in it.
[00:09:32] Katie Dooley: Right. Uh, in the Hebrew Bible, the angels visit many people, including Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Moses, Joshua, and Hagar, and they're typically used as messengers, like the name implies. But sometimes they appear as warriors and they're supposed to look like regular people without wings.
[00:09:49] Preston Meyer: Yeah. It's just dudes. They're just here doing stuff. And not a whole lot of religions love that. They gotta have the wings. We talked about this before. We recorded the biblically accurate angels that are so popularly memed right now, specifically one type of type of angel. We'll talk about that later. These angels look like men.
[00:10:12] Katie Dooley: Yes, but all the angels with wings don't just have a pair of wings. They have multiple pairs of wings.
[00:10:18] Preston Meyer: Well, you got angels with one pair. You got angels with two pairs. You got angels with three pairs. Four pairs. And then you've got the absolute cosmic horrors. Lovecraftian nonsense with gears and wings and eyes without number. Yeah. There are options.
[00:10:37] Katie Dooley: There is some frustrating ambiguity on angels in the Hebrew Bible, obscuring the relationship between Yahweh and the angels.
[00:10:46] Preston Meyer: In our Patreon exclusive Bible study. We're not yet to the really interesting. Well, I guess we have covered a few scenes where this has happened for you. Um, there's going to be more. So the appearance of the Angel of the Lord in the Hebrew Bible does have a pattern to it that I think is really interesting, that it does make it hard to tell who we're talking about in the story because of everything that's going on when it happens. The narrator introduces the Angel of the Lord, and then this angel feels pretty godlike in the way he shows up. He does huge miracles, sometimes annihilating a whole army like in 2 Kings 19. It's pretty epic. Not a thing you'd expect somebody who isn't imbued with God-like power to accomplish. And then the witnesses worship him, which, whether he's the creator or not, you're going to receive a great deal of gratitude for saving a bunch of people from a devastating army.
[00:11:54] Katie Dooley: Yeah, yeah, in that instance for sure.
[00:11:56] Preston Meyer: And this is a pattern that goes on several times in the scriptures. And I think it's interesting. Though it's always treated as though he is the Lord himself, not a messenger and there's a couple of different explanations for what's going on there. But I think whaneighbourst's very likely happened is that this text tradition that we have simply originally said that the Lord showed up and did this thing he's called the Lord of armies. That's one of his titles, kind of a big deal. He was a God of war as far as the neighbours were concerned, and fairly so since they often lost to the Israelites. And then later editors, I think, decided that their God wouldn't do this thing himself. He's too far beyond us, so he would send an angel to do it. And so they added this Angel of the Lord. That's my hypothesis. Pretty hard to prove what an ancient editorial process would have been without variance in the text that back me.
[00:13:08] Katie Dooley: Right? The Jewish scripture also introduces four angels that will become the Christian archangels that surround God's throne. So Michael shows up in the biblical book of Daniel as the victor in a battle between nations. The name means "Who is like God?" most prefer to read that as a question. Who is like God?
[00:13:28] Preston Meyer: As a challenge. God is the greatest, which is a weird name. latter-dayThe Latter-Day Saint tradition says that this name was given to Adam because he was like God, not terribly popular in the broader Christian community.
[00:13:47] Katie Dooley: Gabriel also shows up in Daniel more as a messenger than as a conqueror. The name indicates the power of God usually has a bearer.
[00:14:00] Preston Meyer: Somebody who conveys.
[00:14:01] Katie Dooley: I do know what the word means, but I'm like that feels like a lot of Rs. The name indicates the power of God usually has a bearer of an empowering message. These are the only two mentioned by name in the Bible.
[00:14:14] Preston Meyer: Gabriel and Michael. But, you know, there's lots more angels. There was an angel that Jacob wrestled with who later came to be known as Israel. And maybe that was the Lord himself? Maybe it was just an angel. Maybe it was Michael. Maybe it was Gabriel. Maybe it was somebody else that we don't know their name because he's not outright named. Except for maybe that Angel of the Lordbusiness.
[00:14:46] Katie Dooley: Right. Then there's Raphael, who's features prominently in the apocryphal Book of Tobit, a story with notable similarities to the Bhagavad Gita. The name Raphael highlights the healing power of God. I'm just thinking of the Lucifer TV series. I'm like, I know that character, Uriel. I think he was a bad guy in Lucifer. He rounds out the set of four showing up in the apocryphal additions to the writings of Ezra. His name means God is my light suitable to his role as guide and instructor.
[00:15:19] Preston Meyer: But wait. There's more.
[00:15:21] Katie Dooley: What? There's so many.
[00:15:23] Preston Meyer: So for a long time, it was really nice that we had a set of four, and they matched the four cardinal points of the compass, the four corners of the world. They took care of the world and the dealings of men within it. And then we got our Enoch literature. And we throw away this need for four and say, well, wait, we can do better. There's seven. And one of the ideas that makes this look good is that it matches the lampstand that's in the temple that has seven branches. So that's kind of nice. And then we get Raguel, whose name means "God will pasture" like a shepherding kind of business. He's connected with justice. He's supposed to watch the damned to make sure they stay within their bounds, which is kind of weird. Like, I guess without him, demons would just absolutely ruin this planet. Like humans couldn't do well enough on our own.
[00:16:24] Katie Dooley: It also gives me, like, big, like, Hades vibes.
[00:16:26] Preston Meyer: Sure. Yeah. He guards the demons that are locked away in Tartarus. Tartarus being a Greek place where the Titans are held. Yeah. You notice how there's going to be problems here of ideas crossing national boundaries. Yeah. Um, then we have Sariel. His name means "God is my Ruler". Uh, basically serves the same purpose as Raguel without being connected to the idea of justice so explicitly. Sidekick, I guess? Then there's Remiel, which means "God has Thundered". We talked about Thunder as a great nickname a couple episodes ago. I think that was. This is an interesting situation. He's connected to hope, and he's supposed to be the one responsible for all true visions, and he is also a bit of a psychopomp. That he would be the guide that takes you to heaven if that is your destination. Yeah, kind of interesting. This name is too similar to Ramiel, who, according to the same book, liked the human ladies too much and became the father of many of the watchers, the great giants in the early part of human history, when the one legendary version of our religious history has angels mating with humans to make giants, and they just ruined everything.
[00:17:54] Katie Dooley: So there's Remiel and Ramiel. That is very confusing.
[00:17:54] Preston Meyer: Especially when we're talking about a language that was originally written with no real differentiation between vowels. The vowel marks we have today are pretty new. So it's just a tradition. And so the confusion that exists today is certainly an old confusion. And then of course, there's lots of other angels that are named in the apocryphal literature. And some of them get multiple names, including some of the ones we've talked about. They're also known by other names sometimes. And the great thing about having a list of your favourite angels is you can swap them out sometimes and just say, no, this dude wrote this list. I don't like that one. I'm gonna pop in my guy over here. Just cause. Did you ever watch Dogma?
[00:18:49] Katie Dooley: No.
[00:18:50] Preston Meyer: We need to fix that.
[00:18:51] Katie Dooley: Okay. Movie night?
[00:18:53] Preston Meyer: Absolutely. Okay. Dogma is an absolute treasure. Part of Kevin Smith's Jay and Silent Bob saga but this features Alanis Morissette as God and Alan Rickman as the Metatron, and oh, why can't I think of the names right now? Ben Affleck and Matt Damon are fallen angels.
[00:19:18] Katie Dooley: Oh, wow. It's ridiculous, isn't it?
[00:19:20] Preston Meyer: It is so much fun. But the Metatron is just this really weird figure in religious angeology. I guess it never made any sense to me ever. And my first exposure to it was Alan Rickman.
[00:19:36] Katie Dooley: But it is in actual religion, the Metatron?
[00:19:36] Preston Meyer: Yeah. Everything you see in dogma is taken from real religious ideas and then twisted for humor, which is great, except for I don't I haven't found yet any validation for the Golgotha poop demon but, the ideas behind it are validated in many religious ideas so there's that. But so this Metatron, according to Kabbalistic sources, is the name of Enoch after his transformation into an angel when he was promoted to the great office of Heavenly Scribe. So he would be the one who writes down the book of life for God. Which is completely different than the job that he has in dogma, where he speaks for God. Because if you were to hear the voice of God, your head would explode and you would die. A lot of religions actually really buy into this idea, even though it absolutely contradicts what we have in the biblical text.
[00:20:44] Katie Dooley: Yeah, because God talks to a lot of people.
[00:20:47] Preston Meyer: Yeah. Well, so the idea that a lot of people have bought into as well. Yeah, it says God talked to them, but he talked to them through the Metatron. It's a stretch that I don't love. The name I think is really interesting for the Metatron, and people are going to argue about it forever, probably because we still haven't come to a solid conclusion on it. Some say that it's the Hebrew word for some sort of keeper. Others say that it comes from the Greek construction of Meta Throne, so that we have the guy in the chair beside the chair. Remember, we've talked about the very obvious and well-documented polytheistic origins of the Israeli religion. Yahweh is the son of El. There was never only one throne. So the guy on the chair, beside the chair, beside the chair, beside the chair, who knows how many chairs there are? Whatever.
[00:21:50] Katie Dooley: I mean a lot. There's a lot.
[00:21:53] Preston Meyer: Right. Well, in the theology that is evident a little bit in the book of Job, there is a council of God.
[00:22:03] Katie Dooley: I mean, because even they talk about Michael being the right hand of God, but Jesus is also the right hand of God. So they're going to wrestle over that.
[00:22:09] Preston Meyer: Well, so that's something that the Jehovah's Witnesses think they've fixed. They say Jesus is Michael.
[00:22:20] Katie Dooley: Perfect. Wrap it up.
[00:22:21] Preston Meyer: Rather than admitting that the Bible is very clear that Jesus is Jehovah. Every time you try to come up with a really good, tight little bow to simplify things there's a really good chance you're screwing it up.
[00:22:38] Katie Dooley: Yeah, because it's religion.
[00:22:41] Preston Meyer: Yeah. Nothing's ever as simple as you want it to be.
[00:22:44] Katie Dooley: So I just threw this wrench in our notes because I started explaining the angelology of the Hebrew Bible. And then I realized everyone has angelology and it just be easier to explain what that is right now. So angelology is the ranking system of angels. That's how many angels there are.
[00:23:09] Preston Meyer: And it's never as simple as you want it to be.
[00:23:11] Katie Dooley: No, it's like I saw a ranking and then I saw different rankings and then I saw different ranking. So I don't think we've included any rankings in here.
[00:23:21] Preston Meyer: Just to keep it simple. Stick with the basics.
[00:23:24] Katie Dooley: If you're curious on how angels are ranked, pick your favorite scholar and go for it. So in the Abrahamic religions, Islam has no standardized hierarchy, but scholars divide up the angels into different groups depending on the scholar. This can be anywhere from 8 to 14 different groups. So while they're all on par, there's different species of angels? Categories?
[00:23:47] Preston Meyer: I think species is a fair classification, I guess we'll talk about some angels that definitely feel like they would be different species from others.
[00:23:58] Katie Dooley: Then there are different types of angels that appear in Judaism and then therefore Christianity. And they have been ranked a variety of different ways depending on which rabbi or kabbalist you're reading.
[00:24:14] Preston Meyer: Yay! Complicated.
[00:24:16] Katie Dooley: Very complicated.
[00:24:18] Preston Meyer: Um, the Hebrew Bible differentiates between different kinds of heavenly beings as well. And they're all called angels, generally speaking. But sometimes you'll get other great titles like Seraphs or Seraphim.
[00:24:32] Katie Dooley: I think the best way to compare this is that there's dogs and then there's dog breeds, there's angels, and there's types of angels.
[00:24:41] Preston Meyer: Sure. Yeah.
[00:24:43] Katie Dooley: They're all dogs. They're all angels. They're just... They got special features.
[00:24:48] Preston Meyer: Sure. I don't know if it's a perfect analogy, but it definitely helps with explaining what's going on here,
[00:24:53] Katie Dooley: That they're all angels, but there's cherubs and seraphs.
[00:25:00] Preston Meyer: So my whole life I've, I've never heard people say cherubs. But that's definitely the way the word is spelled. Yeah.
[00:25:13] Katie Dooley: In Hebrew?
[00:25:15] Preston Meyer: Yeah and even when we spelled it c h, it was meant to be like the ch in Loch Loch Ness. We just we've gotten used to doing all the CHs as cha- so we went with cherubs.
[00:25:31] Katie Dooley: I'm going to start calling them cherubs at Christmas.
[00:25:33] Preston Meyer: Absolutely. Even though a cherub is a thing you eat, that's fine.
[00:25:39] Katie Dooley: Sorry. Go through your types of angels.
[00:25:41] Preston Meyer: So cherubs are best known for being painted in Rome as children. That's just the deal. But it was one of these who protected the tree of life with a flaming sword in Genesis. We see cherubs on the the Ark of the Covenant with their wings and all that. Ezekiel gives them more wings than everybody else but Ezekiel was getting, maybe a little too much of that temple oil that we now know for sure had hallucinogens in it.
[00:26:15] Katie Dooley: Nice. How many wings? Was this the three and four pairs?
[00:26:20] Preston Meyer: I think Ezekiel's cherubs only had two pairs of wings.
[00:26:24] Katie Dooley: That's still four full wings.
[00:26:26] Preston Meyer: Right. He also gave them interchangeable faces of lions, oxes, men and eagles. It's a little bit weird. Um, the same faces that we have described in Ezekiel. They get used again in the Revelation of John. So the name cherub, hard to know for sure, it may have been derived from an Old Assyrian word caribou meaning mighty.
[00:26:52] Katie Dooley: Interesting. So where we get caribou...?
[00:26:54] Preston Meyer: No. Entirely different.
[00:26:56] Katie Dooley: Okay. Well, because those are pretty mighty creatures. Yeah. Majestic even.
[00:27:01] Preston Meyer: Haul Santa's fat ass across the sky at Christmas.
[00:27:05] Katie Dooley: Um, tell me more about seraphs.
[00:27:07] Preston Meyer: Seraphs, the name means burning, and they're always illustrated verbally or in art, in visual arts, as being surrounded by light. So these guys get described by Isaiah as having six wings. Other than that, they're people-shaped, but lots of wings. And so those are the two reasonable ones, because cherubs are always described as children for a long time as a kid or not as a kid, as a teenager trying to figure out angels from the Latter-Day Saint perspective, where we really don't talk about angels very much at all relative to the things we're talking about today. It's mostly you've got either spirits who haven't got bodies yet or people who have got bodies, died. And thus are still unembodied, or those great spirits who have come back resurrected with their bodies in full glory. And so you got cherubs would be the young ones who haven't got bodies yet. Seraphs are the glorified ones who have got their bodies and all the glory of God, whatever. Ophans have never been part of this discussion. The ophanim, the name means wheels, and this is a class of angels described only by Ezekiel and depending on your version of the Bible, you might not even recognize that he's talking about angels. So there's some argument on whether or not these even belong here. But when people talk about biblically accurate angels, the ones that are absolutely terrifying and monstrous, it's the ophanim. Sometimes they're called thrones because these gear monsters support the throne where God sits. And that's their deal. They don't visit Earth. They're not messengers.
[00:29:07] Katie Dooley: Good, good.
[00:29:09] Preston Meyer: So the whole be not afraid meme of no, this is the most terrifying moment of my life. The ophans.
[00:29:16] Katie Dooley: Were not those messengers. That's good. They remind me of the Bhagavad Gita. The guy with infinite eyes and infinite mouths, like. I don't want to be visited by that.
[00:29:28] Preston Meyer: No, I don't think anybody would.
[00:29:30] Katie Dooley: I think... That's is that Krishna or Vishnu in their, like, real form? I think that's what it is. I forget now, but, um, someone will listen to our...
[00:29:39] Preston Meyer: The Messenger was Krishna in the Bhagavad Gita. So these these guys are just wild. It's really hard to know what Ezekiel was experiencing, but I feel like he was definitely getting the best of the temple oils and the way that eyes are described here with all these wing imagery. My instinct is to say that he was also seeing and failing to interpret correctly because of it, wonderful intoxication, a peacock.
[00:30:18] Katie Dooley: That's interesting. Yeah. That's a not a terrible theory.
[00:30:21] Preston Meyer: Well, so the the tail feathers, they all got eyes. Yeah. And wings might be hard to see where one wing ends and the next thing might be a wing if you're high, especially the peacock just feels right.
[00:30:38] Katie Dooley: Okay. All right.
[00:30:43] Preston Meyer: But yeah, so they are not visitors to Earth. They're not messengers. They're their own special thing built out of wheels and gears and eyeballs and feathers that support, apparently, according to Ezekiel's vision and some creative license and interpretation, the throne of God. And taking that into consideration and the description of the cherubs with the weird heads of all these various animals, it makes sense that there's some interesting sorts of ideas, like the they're chimeras of one sort or another, that we see all over the old world. And it makes sense that a lot of scholars would agree that some of these ideas are coming in they're very odd forms from neighboring nations.
[00:31:35] Katie Dooley: Fair, you gotta make it popular to the public.
[00:31:37] Preston Meyer: Right? Plus, people love stories about that. Weird monsters thing. So yeah, popular to the public helps.
[00:31:46] Katie Dooley: Yeah. So in the Christian Bible, angels appear only as messengers and teachers, though there is a scene in the Revelation of John illustrating Heaven, where the four faces of Ezekiel described as cherubs, are represented.
[00:32:02] Preston Meyer: We also get Gabriel. He's the one who showed up to Joseph and Mary, both of them separately, to let them know, "Hey, there's a baby in there. Don't freak out. It's Jesus."
[00:32:16] Katie Dooley: Though I do love the memes about Joseph.
[00:32:19] Preston Meyer: Yes, they are certainly entertaining.
[00:32:22] Katie Dooley: Have you seen the one where Joseph is like, "I made you a cherry pie", and Mary's like, "we don't have cherries." And he was like, "God gave them to me. Do you see how stupid that sounds?" Uh, and then the stepdad, ones "I'm the dad that stepped up".
[00:32:43] Preston Meyer: Oh, yeah, yeah. I feel weird about Joseph being left out of the story after the nativity. Like there's the sons of the carpenter or whatever, because Jesus had brothers. There's no arguing against that. But we never know about him dying. But also, he wasn't there when Jesus died. People just lost track of where his stepdad was.
[00:33:09] Katie Dooley: Yeah. Angels who go undescribed appear at a few crucial points of the end of the Jesus story, presumably in regular human form. No wings.
[00:33:20] Preston Meyer: Yeah. We got angels who were there when Jesus came out of the empty tomb. Well, when he made the tomb empty. We got angels standing around in Jerusalem when Jesus ascends up into the clouds. Reminding people. This what I'm doing, that they said he'll come back the same way he left. So if you find somebody claiming to be Jesus reborn, biblical contradiction. And then we have more angels in medieval writings.
[00:33:55] Katie Dooley: Which is pretty cool.
[00:33:56] Preston Meyer: Yeah. Have you ever read Paradise Lost?
[00:34:00] Katie Dooley: I haven't, but I want to.
[00:34:02] Preston Meyer: I also have not read Paradise Lost. I've only read about it. It's one of those great popular things that just hasn't hit my table yet. John Milton's Paradise Lost, written so, so long ago, 1667, was when it was published. Great couple of great poems. Angels are super important. We got the story of Satan / Lucifer. Because for so long, everybody just assumed Lucifer means Satan.
[00:34:32] Katie Dooley: Yeah. So the two we're going to talk about, I, tell me if I'm wrong and maybe, maybe we don't know because we haven't read it, I think this is where the connection of Lucifer and the Bible is to the devil, because Lucifer in the Bible is not the devil,
[00:34:45] Preston Meyer: Right? Lucifer in the Bible is not ever the devil.
[00:34:48] Katie Dooley: So this must be where...
[00:34:50] Preston Meyer: I feel like that's.
[00:34:51] Katie Dooley: And even in, uh, Dante as well.
[00:34:55] Preston Meyer: Yeah, I've talked with a couple of doctors of theology in my time at university, and there's not any solid consensus on whether Dante Alighieri, who wrote The Divine Comedy, was super influential on Christian theology, or if he was writing about things that he'd been learning at church. Um, there's not a strong consensus there, by the sounds of it, but very fascinating stuff. Not that Dante agrees with all of the thoughts on angels, but his thoughts are very well preserved.
[00:35:34] Katie Dooley: Sorry, we are jumping ahead a little bit, but Paradise Lost is an epic poem. And yes, it talks about Satan, Lucifer. It also talks about Adam and Eve in a separate part. It outlines the hierarchy of angels. It talks about Lucifer, Satan's rebellion, the war in heaven, and what fallen angels are, which I read that there's parts of this all pulled from, like the Dead Sea Scrolls. So there is a...
[00:36:00] Preston Meyer: Well, the Dead Sea Scrolls weren't available when Paradise Lost. It's been like 70 years.
[00:36:08] Katie Dooley: But anyway it had biblical or Apocryphal references.
[00:36:13] Preston Meyer: Yeah, yeah, there's definitely a lot of rabbinical literature that would have been some good source material for,
[00:36:18] Katie Dooley: Because there is no fallen angels in the Bible.
[00:36:22] Preston Meyer: There is a couple of passages that allude to huge swathes of angels being cast out of heaven before the foundation of the world. What that looks like is the matter of many hypotheses.
[00:36:38] Katie Dooley: So we started talking about the Divine Comedy.
[00:36:40] Preston Meyer: It's even older.
[00:36:42] Katie Dooley: Yeah, and most people are familiar with Dante's Inferno, which is a part one of the three parts of...
[00:36:47] Preston Meyer: Dante's Inferno, is great drama because it's the first part of a trilogy. And so if you're going to get tired and quit, at least you'll have read some of Inferno. But it's also the great part where Dante gets to slam on all the thinkers and popes that he didn't like and say, "Ha! You guys are in hell. I know, because I'm the dude who wrote the book".
[00:37:12] Katie Dooley: So this is also written in a poem format, and he wrote it between 1308 and 1321, and it describes the afterlife. Obviously, the inferno is the hell part and Paradiso is the part that describes heaven.
[00:37:29] Preston Meyer: And then there's the part in between. Purgatorial. For purgatory.
[00:37:29] Katie Dooley: So Paradiso describes the nine spheres of heaven. There's what? Seven circles of hell. Nine circles of hell anyway. Inferno describes the circles of hell. I don't remember how many. And Paradiso describes the nine spheres of heaven in the ninth sphere. I'm reading the notes wrong. The ninth sphere of heaven is where the angels reside. It's called Prima Mobile. There's one more sphere where God resides. So according to Dante, angels are beings that are most familiar to God, and they are made of an immaterial.
[00:38:07] Preston Meyer: Now, what sort of substance is immaterial, Katie? But light is matter as well. Light is a particle and a wave. It's like when people say that God exists outside of time and space.
[00:38:21] Katie Dooley: I'm, uh. I'm rereading His Dark Materials. They're probably made of dust. Have you read?
[00:38:21] Preston Meyer: No
[00:38:29] Katie Dooley: Oh. They're great. They were very controversial when they came out of the 90s.
[00:38:33] Preston Meyer: Sure. That's the, um, the Amber Spyglass.
[00:38:37] Katie Dooley: Yeah, yeah, yeah. Um, so probably dust is what I'm going to call it.
[00:38:40] Preston Meyer: Sure, but dust is matter too.
[00:38:43] Katie Dooley: No, in the book it's a divine matter, but they call it dust. Capital D dust.
[00:38:47] Preston Meyer: Okay. When I think of immaterial substance, it sounds like they're just holograms. But I'm always reminded of, I think it was Neil deGrasse Tyson who said, you know, if you if your God exists outside of time and space, that's how you describe a thing that does not exist.
[00:39:06] Katie Dooley: So like tug on the collar...
[00:39:08] Preston Meyer: It's a really popular description for a lot of Christians and people of other traditions as well. And I don't see the need to describe God as outside of time and space, especially when it causes you the problem of now you've described something that doesn't exist.
[00:39:26] Katie Dooley: Maybe out of time, but definitely not out of space.
[00:39:30] Preston Meyer: Even outside of time doesn't make any sense to me.
[00:39:34] Katie Dooley: I guess time would be irrelevant for God, I guess is my point.
[00:39:37] Preston Meyer: Right and yeah, if you live long enough, time might not matter but you still exist in a state where there's an event and things before and after that.
[00:39:46] Katie Dooley: Now we're getting into the multiverse and.... It's all great in theory, but very confusing in practice. So we touched briefly on angels in Islam because of their non-hierarchy but groupings. In Islam, they believe they are heavenly beings originating directly from God. Like little God offspring.
[00:40:08] Preston Meyer: Yeah, but usually in the creation sense, like molded because in the Islamic tradition, the Quran is very clear that God does not have children. The Quran is also very clear he had three daughters.
[00:40:24] Katie Dooley: What a holy book that contradicts itself? Say it ain't so. Colour me shocked.
[00:40:30] Preston Meyer: It's tricky. But they would have been angels, not gods, even though they were definitely figures that were recognized as goddesses among the heathens.
[00:40:43] Katie Dooley: It's fine. So the Quran is the number one Islamic source referring to angels, but there's also angels in the hadiths and elsewhere in Islamic literature.
[00:40:53] Preston Meyer: I mean, the whole thing wouldn't have happened if not for an angel at least allegedly appearing to Muhammad. Um, good old [00:41:02] Jibril. The same figure that we called Gabriel earlier in this [00:41:06] episode. They're messengers, servants for God. And Jibril is the greatest messenger. I don't remember hearing anything about Michael and looking up things in Islam.
[00:41:18] Katie Dooley: Um, they have sort of a 1 to 1 comparison I put in the notes. Um. But I don't know where they appear in the Quran.
[00:41:27] Preston Meyer: So, like in Judaism, angels are super great for protecting against terrible things. Angels are attracted to sacred places. The whole guardian thing makes sense. And every now and then, you'll find them protecting people. With it an angel will not enter an unclean place. This is pretty typical of most religions. That an angel that is supposed to be so good and pure, not going to go to places that could be called haram or go near a dog even because that's dirty.
[00:42:04] Katie Dooley: My dog was an angel, so.
[00:42:04] Preston Meyer: Many are.
[00:42:10] Katie Dooley: I disagree with that. Maybe they're more powerful angels. And so other angels are scared to come by.
[00:42:19] Preston Meyer: Uh, there are many classes of angels. Or maybe Paige was just a jinn.
[00:42:24] Katie Dooley: Oh, wow. But it's probably more accurate anyway. Angels in Islam, are believed to be older than humans and the jinn that Preston mentioned. And they have no human desires. They don't tire, they don't get hungry. They're never angry.
[00:42:38] Preston Meyer: So they're often described this way in Jewish literature and the trouble that I have with this idea is that they saw in most versions of early Judeo-Christian Abrahamic origins of the world. They saw the daughters of man and said, that's a really good place to play hide the sausage, and that's not an angel that doesn't have passions. Oh, well.
[00:43:18] Katie Dooley: Um, Muslims do not believe in the concept of the fallen angel like in Christianity. Rather, they believe that angels are infallible.
[00:43:25] Preston Meyer: Right? And the Iblis isn't a fallen angel, but a terrible jinn. I'm pretty sure, if I remember correctly.
[00:43:34] Katie Dooley: So they, as Preston, sort of asked, Islam shares three out of the four archangels with Christianity. So we have Jibril, who's Gabriel; Mikhail, who's Michael; Israfil, who's Raphael. And then the fourth one is Azrail, or Azrael is the English name, but that's not Uriel. Those are their archangels.
[00:43:57] Preston Meyer: And, um, Azrael would be a little bit more familiar with the Angel of death called sometimes Malak Hamad. There's another name that I can't remember, Samael, I think. I might be confusing with another angel. I have to look that up later.
[00:44:16] Katie Dooley: I mean, that sounds correct to someone who watched the entire series of Lucifer, but that's my only frame of reference right now. That's terrible.
[00:44:27] Preston Meyer: Popular culture is a great tool for education as long as it's well-written.
[00:44:32] Katie Dooley: So the Quran describes angels as well-formed human beings. Nice build. Sure. Uh, made of pure light. And they have multiple pairs of wings. So I read two, three, four pairs of wings.
[00:44:47] Preston Meyer: Right. So we get very similar descriptions for the jinn. But the jinn are newer and a lot more selfish and a lot more likely to do sexy things so than the angels in this tradition. And then we can change gears a little bit to Zoroastrianism. And I think a lot of the ideas of angels that we get in Judaism probably find a much more comfortable home in Zoroastrianism. Um, the writings of Ezekiel. Are generally thought to have come post-exile. And so this influence would have been definitely a part of this deal. If that is how that worked out. So then in Persian Zoroastrian tradition, there are several forms of yazata. I like that word. Any word that has a bunch of syllables and the same vowel every time. I don't know why it gets me just right. Like Canada.
[00:45:52] Katie Dooley: How patriotic you are. Rococo. Rococo.
[00:45:58] Preston Meyer: Rococo. That first I was a little soft, but I can appreciate it.
[00:46:04] Katie Dooley: It's a great art movement.
[00:46:05] Preston Meyer: So anyway, the Yazata are a class of beings defined nominally as worthy of worship. Gods, in the simplest sense. This is complicated by the fact that we still don't have a good definition of what is a God that everybody can agree on. If it is worshiped, it is a god. That's the deal. That's for today's discussion. I feel like that's pretty fair. So this same word, yazata is applied to all the really good things, including some plants and even prayer formats. So because of that, I feel like a really fair way to translate that into English instead of worthy of worship would be anything that is holy.
[00:46:54] Katie Dooley: Holy, sacred, yeah.
[00:46:55] Preston Meyer: Yeah, and like the Most Holy One, would be your Most High God, which in this case would be Ahura Mazda, the greatest of the Yazata. So in the earliest writings, Yazata is anything good, and in slightly later early writings the Yazatas are completely and absolutely divine, and so it quickly went from holy things as opposed to profane things, to holy things, as in the gods and God adjacent things in a religion that's mostly monotheistic but isn't quite either. Tricky business. We've talked about this in our Zoroastrian episode. The Persian, the Legend of Persian Zoro. Yeah. Tricky business. So the most popular yazatas received a formal ranking. Relatively late in the Zoroastrian time frame. In about the fourth or fifth century BCE, a calendar was instituted that used the names of the angelic Yazatas to name the months, the days, and even the portions of the days. There's five parts of the day, and each of them are named for various yazata angel figures and so based on that, we got what became of well known because everybody needs to know how you're measuring time, angelology. That was kind of nifty. And so for the Mazdaists, the seven Amesha Spenta, we've talked about them before, they're roughly equivalent to archangels. And so it feels like maybe the shift from 4 to 7 might have been influenced from this time of exile with the Babylonian.
[00:48:56] Katie Dooley: Yeah. I mean, this is all happening in the same place at the same time in the world, so.
[00:49:00] Preston Meyer: Yeah. And so Ahura Mazda is often described as the father of the Amesha Spenta, but it's generally not taken literally. Just like the Muslims say that Allah is the creator of these angels, not the father, father.
[00:49:16] Katie Dooley: Though there was one Amesha Spenta that is described as his daughter. Do you remember that?
[00:49:20] Preston Meyer: Well, they're all described as his children.
[00:49:22] Preston Meyer: No, there was one specifically that was like, it's his daughter.
[00:49:25] Preston Meyer: This one is definitely a daughter. Oh, and he's got other sons, too, right? But they're more godly and less angelic. But they are all yazata. Not that it's not confusing.
[00:49:38] Katie Dooley: I haven't said this in a long time. A square is a rectangle, but a rectangle isn't a square.
[00:49:44] Preston Meyer: The trouble with that is that for a long time, a square was also called a rectangle.
[00:49:52] Katie Dooley: Oh, I thought you were gonna, like, correct me on the yazata. Like, not all yazata are gods, but all gods are yazata.
[00:49:59] Preston Meyer: No, that's... Yeah, you got that right. But there's even more. Because why stop with just the Judeo-Christian and immediately Judeo-Christian adjacent? There is other great ideas.
[00:50:13] Katie Dooley: There's so many. So the Dharmic religions, this is Hinduism, Buddhism and Jainism all have Devas, which means heavenly, shining or divine being. The word is generally applied to the gods of the Hindu peoples, as well as to cosmic principles that might manifest during meditation. It is a worthy goal to ascend from this human level and to be reincarnated as a deva. Devas are said to be mortal, expected to die after thousands of years, and be reborn if they don't escape samsara.
[00:50:47] Preston Meyer: Imagine being demoted from Deva back to human.
[00:50:50] Katie Dooley: I mean, it happens.
[00:50:51] Preston Meyer: I mean, the story is that it must.
[00:50:58] Katie Dooley: Each has their own... Each of the devas has their own identity, different than an avatar, right? So there's different avatars of Vishnu and different avatars of Krishna, which is a temporary embodiment of a god.
[00:51:10] Preston Meyer: When they just come down for what for them is a weekend. And I think it's really interesting that for Zoroastrianism, the Devas are, well, not the Devas. Deva was an evil god. He's the bad guy.
[00:51:30] Katie Dooley: Oh yeah.
[00:51:32] Preston Meyer: So I'm curious if that label comes from conflict between the two nations.
[00:51:40] Katie Dooley: I don't know.
[00:51:41] Preston Meyer: And I haven't been able to find anything that says, oh yeah, sure, "this idea is good, Preston", but I still like it in my head. Next on our list, we have the border. In ancient Norse tradition, we have the Vördr as basically essentially guardian angels. Some of them will follow people around, some of them are trees that you might have in a yard that have been around for a while. And so they'll house minor guardian angels in their root.
[00:52:13] Katie Dooley: That's cool.
[00:52:14] Preston Meyer: It is kind of cool. The name Vördr basically evolved into what we have in English as warden means watcher, but the word wraith also comes from this root and wraiths, as far as I've been able to find meaning in it is like the scary.
[00:52:35] Katie Dooley: Yeah, never positive. I always just think of the ringwraiths but...
[00:52:38] Preston Meyer: Sure. Yeah. Bad times. Yeah, they're they're not good friends, but the Vördr are our guardian angels, basically. It's hard to tell how much the idea changed when Christians showed up into their neighborhood, but it probably did change a little bit. Or maybe they're partly responsible for the way we see guardian angels in our Anglo tradition.
[00:53:06] Katie Dooley: Yeah. Well. And then it's interesting. There's also demons in ancient Greek mythology spelled d-a-e-m-o-n-s so pronounced the same but not to be confused with demons.
[00:53:19] Preston Meyer: In so many words we just drop that A it's interesting that we allow it to persist in this word, but I think there's a good reason for it.
[00:53:30] Katie Dooley: Well, and then topical in His Dark Materials, in one of the worlds, everyone has a daemon, which is an animal spirit attached to you.
[00:53:40] Preston Meyer: That's spelled with an A.
[00:53:40] Katie Dooley: And it's spelt with an A. And when I was a kid in reading, I had no idea how to say it.
[00:53:46] Preston Meyer: Did you say a damon the whole time? Yeah. That's fair.
[00:53:52] Katie Dooley: So demons with an A are positive. And just like the Vördr, they are minor deities that would act as guides, guardian angels or whatever. And it's the same thing. We kind of have this, cuple of traditions that are very influential on Judeo-Christian and Western, therefore Western culture of this idea of guardian angel.
[00:54:14] Preston Meyer: Yeah. Looking up angels across all these religious traditions has been pretty cool. There's something like the idea of an angel in almost every religious tradition, though naturally, they're not all going to be called angels. But the idea that there's somebody watching out for you is pretty universal. In the more primal religious traditions, it makes a lot of sense that usually we're talking about ancestors.
[00:54:44] Katie Dooley: Right? Their ancestor worship. And we haven't actually talked about... I guess Shintoism, has some ancestor worship, but we haven't talked about Daoism at all, right. Which is a big ancestor worship religion. Maybe that's one we should add to our list right away. I think you're right. But that's basically Mulan. Where she...
[00:55:05] Preston Meyer: The good animated one.
[00:55:06] Katie Dooley: Yeah, absolutely. Where's she? lights some incense and prays to her ancestors for guidance.
[00:55:13] Preston Meyer: And then has to try to keep a straight face while traveling with Eddie Murphy. Oh, now I want to watch Mulan. Thanks. Yeah, so that is a big. topical guardian angels.
[00:55:29] Preston Meyer: Right.
[00:55:29] Katie Dooley: Mushu is a guardian angel.
[00:55:30] Preston Meyer: Here we are in a year of the Dragon.
[00:55:32] Katie Dooley: What? It's all coming together.
[00:55:35] Preston Meyer: But it's not the year of the Fire Dragon. In the 60 year cycle, it's the year of the Wood dragon.
[00:55:40] Katie Dooley: Wow, interesting I didn't know that. You, dear listener, congregant, could be our guardian angels.
[00:55:48] Preston Meyer: We would love it so much if you would support this podcast financially.
[00:55:55] Katie Dooley: I was going to say you can do that a few ways. So, um, spreadshirt is great. If you want to buy someone a gift, buy yourself some merch, one time fee. You have our Patreon with bonus episodes, extra content from our interviews, if you like a subscription model, there's more coming down the pipe there as well. We also would love your support your warden watcher wraith on our social media. What social media are we on, Preston?
[00:56:22] Preston Meyer: We are on Facebook, Instagram, YouTube and of course Discord, where we have some pretty great memes and discussions organized into great little channels. I love discord! You can also share this podcast with a friend and give us five stars on Apple Podcast. It's a great way to help us out.
[00:56:39] Preston Meyer: Thank you so much for joining us.
[00:56:41] Both Speakers: Peace be with you.
-
Katherine Spallino is the author of The Bad Cadet, a memoir of her days as a child-slave to the secretive Scientologist "Sea Org."
Before she joined the Sea Org officially, Katherine was raised away from her family in a boarding school for cursed and abandoned children, part of the last batch permitted by the Sea Org before they banned Sea Org members from having children (and naturally started encouraging abortion).
In addition to spilling some personal bits that she was forced to leave out of her book, she shares more information about the organization beyond her childhood experience, and gives us an peek at some of the stories that will be in her follow-up book about her leaving Scientology permanently.
Katherine tells us about the contradictions between public statements and internal policies, as well as the motivation behind some of the weirdest paperwork you might ever be asked to sign. As a true believer, much of the Sea Org life might seem natural, but to outsiders, it is truly shocking.
We also get some hot gossip about the Scientologists hitting headlines, like Danny Masterson, Tom Cruise, and John Travolta, as well as some who managed to get away, like Nicole Kidman and Katie Holmes (both formerly married to Tom Cruise). Katherine also gives us an answer to that great question: Where is Shelly?
All this and more....
You can WATCH this interview on YouTube.
You can also follow Katherine on Amazon, and Twitter.
Support us on Patreon or you can get our merch at Spreadshop.
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[00:00:11] Katie Dooley: Hi Preston.
[00:00:13] Preston Meyer: Ah it's another great interview episode today. Uh, we've been doing a lot of reading in preparation for this one.
[00:00:20] Katie Dooley: Yes uh, we have a fabulous author on today's episode of.
[00:00:25] Both Speakers: The Holy Watermelon Podcast.
[00:00:28] Preston Meyer: One day we'll get it in.
[00:00:31] Katie Dooley: We always try to stay in sync, but usually we're in the same room, so it's easier. But, uh. So. Yes. Welcome, Katherine.
[00:00:38] Katherine Spallino: Thank you guys so much for having me.
[00:00:41] Preston Meyer: So Katherine grew up on a secluded ranch within the Cadet Org, the Church of Scientology's Sea Org School for children. At a young age, Katherine began to journal about her day to day life, capturing the thoughts and experiences of a child coming of age in a cult. Katherine's background offers the rare opportunity to tell the story of the hundreds of children who rarely saw their parents, and were indoctrinated to become future Sea Org members. Katherine is no longer a Scientologist and lives in Minneapolis with her husband, happily raising three rambunctious boys.
[00:01:13] Katie Dooley: So very busy.
[00:01:14] Katherine Spallino: That's me.
[00:01:16] Katie Dooley: Busy. And, uh, yeah, you gotta have kids. After all that was.
[00:01:20] Katherine Spallino: Yes. Yeah, I'm living the dream. Except for I didn't realize children were so hard to raise. When you're a child, you're like, I want to have kids. It sounds so magical. And then you're raising the children and you're in the thick of it, and you're like, this is great, right?
[00:01:36] Katie Dooley: Um, and also a little bit different of, like, actually raising your children instead of a ranch.
[00:01:42] Katherine Spallino: Yes, exactly.
[00:01:43] Preston Meyer: I was always told growing up, you're gonna have kids and they're gonna be just like you. And it sounds like you were a little bit of trouble growing up, too.
[00:01:51] Katherine Spallino: Yeah. So I'm kind of getting. I'm reaping what I sowed.
[00:01:56] Katie Dooley: I loved I loved where your book ended, but it left so much to know. And I know there's a sequel coming. I'd love to figure out, you know, what eventually made you leave Scientology? And maybe a little preview of the Bad Scientologist.
[00:02:11] Katherine Spallino: Yeah, I've decided I will give a little, like spoiler, because I do think it's important for people to understand that I am not a Scientologist. And the book ends. It's it's a spoiler. So you can mute me if you want, if you are going to if anybody listening wants to get the book. But I mean, it's obvious that I'm not in Scientology, so it's not really a spoiler in a way. But I do end the book leaving how it's how I left the Sea Org. But there's a whole nother journey I have to take to leave Scientology. And that's what the, uh, my second novel will be. Because when you're in a cult, you believe something everything's so much, and they teach you to not look at outside information. So it's really hard to leave cults because they're, like, literally trained to not listen to anybody else. So what when I, I was living my best life, when I, when I had left and was living in LA supporting myself at 17 years old, like had my own apartment, out partying on the weekends like it was great. Broke all the time, so broke. But it doesn't matter. You know, I was free, but I was still a Scientologist and I had something happen where my brother, who's older, he was dying. He had a diagnosis when he was young of aplastic anemia. And I went into remission. It came back in his 20s. So they in Scientology world, if somebody's sick, somebody is made sick. So they my brother was getting sick and he was in what's called the Sea Org. The Sea Org is the people who work for the Church of Scientology. And they dedicate a billion years of their life like they work 12 hour days, very little pay. They're going to be there their whole lifetime. That's what I had left, and my brother was still in it. My mom and dad was still in it. I realized I didn't set this up for any of your listeners, and my sister was still in it. So my brother was getting sick. I was still considered a Scientologist, like I'll go to Scientology events. I wasn't really taking any services, but I wholeheartedly believed in Scientology. And I got called in to the church and they said, you're causing your brother to be sick. And they said, I'm basically evil. And that if I say one negative thing about Scientology, which I hadn't been, I would be what's called declared a suppressive person. And when they do that, it's like being excommunicated from the church, which is like so, so devastating to hear. And I had to just respect that and like, not talk to my mom and my dad and my sister. I was about to turn 21 and I had to hold it all into my chest. You can't complain about Scientology also to others. So I was holding all this information, and the person I was dating at the time, who was actually now my husband, grew up Christian, and so he was like, you don't seem like your normal bubbly self, like what's going on? And I was like, oh no, it's fine. And meanwhile I turned 21. No call for my parents because they can't talk to me. My husband said at the time, I'm never going to be a Scientologist. So whatever it is, you could tell me. And hearing that gave me the freedom to talk about it because I was like, oh, I'm not going to stop his path to join Scientology. That's literally how much I believe in Scientology. Yeah. So that gave me like the I felt comfortable enough to like, I could tell him about it because I didn't want him to not be able to join Scientology because it says something negative about it. Like I literally thought, like, Scientology is the answer to everything. But when he said he wasn't going to do it, I was like, well, I could tell him about these random people that are just like bad apples in the Church of Scientology. Like, I was still kind of I was excusing it in my mind, but hearing myself talk about it, I think, opened up like a crack in my mind. And then I started to kind of go on the internet, which you should not do if your a Scientologist. So many stories on the internet about the truth about L. Ron Hubbard, the founder of Scientology, and how he made up all these lies, and then there's all the people who were in the church who had left and all their stories. So I began to read all of that, and that's how I was able to, like, educate myself enough to leave. So there's a whole journey there that still it took another couple of years, and that would be in my book. But like having how does somebody extricate themselves from a cult without losing their family? And so that's what I did and then I still managed to keep my family because I just was like able to communicate to my mom, who grew up in a Pentecostal household, like, hey, you didn't want to be a Pentecostal. You wanted to go learn for yourself, let me go learn for myself. And that was something she could relate to, so she would still visit me and so on. But then my best friend was on Leah Remini's show, and I knew about it. And the fact that I knew about it, my parents cut me off like, just like that. And then I was like, okay, I guess I'm going to write this book because I wasn't going to write it because I was like, I need to keep my family in my life. You're not allowed to talk negative about Scientology, though, and my book isn't even negative, right, about Scientology. It's just telling a story. But they would consider it negative because it does open a lot of eyes to the circumstance of all these children who were just shunted off from their Sea Org parents and raised as little adults, and not given the proper care that you would normally give a child.
[00:07:10] Katie Dooley: Yeah, absolutely. But you're right, it wasn't particularly negative. I mean, reading about the author and knowing about you. It's after doing that, you know, you've left Scientology, but other than that, it's just a great, more on what it's like growing up in... And that was the last Cadet Org because they're not allowed to have children anymore. Were you kind of the last cohort of kids?
[00:07:32] Katherine Spallino: There was like five Cadet Orgs, two in California, uh, one in Florida, one in Australia, one in England. So another thing that happened in 1985 is senior members were told you can no longer have children. So there's a high abortion rate in the Sea Org. People are forced to get rid of their babies. Some do leave and they manage to have like a backbone and they're like, no, I want to keep my baby and they leave the Sea Org. You can't be in the Sea Org with the child. So because of that, yep. Like in the late to early 2000, late 1990s, all the networks started being closed because we were 14. We're old enough, 13, we're old enough to work full-time jobs in the Sea Org now. And which is what happened to me for all the listeners. The Sea Org is like, you work really long days. So I was in a school and I did not live with my parents in the school, was at a boarding school called The Ranch and I did not. I saw my parents once every few months, and I was just treated like a little soldier and like, this is how you're going to be a Sea Org member. You're not going to be as no, you're going to be an astronaut. You're going to be a vet. You're going to be, um, a musiSea Orgn or whatever you want to be like, no, you're going to be a Sea Org member. This is your purpose. And I believed in that purpose until I was actually in the Sea Org. And I realized what that actually meant and how much everything is controlled. Your whole life is laid out in front of you, of just working in a cog in the machine of the Church of Scientology, and not being able to have your own freedom to make choices and do anything. The book tells of my journey of how I was able to be like, why? Like, do I want to save the world? Because that's what they think they're doing or do I want to just go have a life, which is really selfish when you put it next to do you want to save the world? And I decided to be selfish, basically.
[00:09:23] Katie Dooley: I mean, following your own path, though, you're probably helping a lot more people either leave Scientology or not fall into the trap that is Scientology. So, helping more now than if you had stayed in the Sea Org.
[00:09:35] Katherine Spallino: Yeah. And I don't believe the Sea Org is actually saving the world, so. But at that time I believed that. And it's a hard thing to be like told. You're like basically a loser because you don't want to help save the world. You just want to go, like, frolic around in the dangerous world, you know, they make the world seem so dangerous. You're going to get on drugs. You're going to work at Burger King flipping burgers that was like a line they would say, like, you're not going to be successful. So to take that route was like a very... Now I look back, I'm like, oh, that was really brave of me because I also didn't have my parents were in the Sea Org. It's not like I had a place to go. So we had to find a place for me to go. Relatives that were not Scientologists. And I had to just start my life over with, like.
[00:10:17] Preston Meyer: You would have made more money at Burger King, though.
[00:10:20] Katie Dooley: That's true.
[00:10:21] Katherine Spallino: Yeah, I would have made more money at Burger King than in the Sea Org. Because in the Sea Org, you get paid $50 a week before. I think they get like, really? It's like Social Security gets taken out and like a couple other. So it's like ends up being like $38 and I don't know if it's still that much, but that was in 2000. But that's how much they get paid a week. Yeah, it's like a stipend because they're a religious. Believe it or not, they're considered a religion, so you don't have to pay them. You don't have the same legal, um, obligation. Yeah. So they get paid this very little amount. And then the Sea Org members have like medical issues and they don't have they're like on Medicaid, like the church doesn't pay for their medical stuff. They use the government to pay for it. Like it's such a like it's ridiculous.
[00:11:06] Katie Dooley: So you are still an SP. The church considers you an SP. Does that mean we're SPS now too?
[00:11:13] Katherine Spallino: You are by association a suppressive person.
[00:11:16] Katie Dooley: Yeah, we've done one episode on Scientology that was pretty, um, critical. So. But I don't think anyone heard it. So.
[00:11:24] Katherine Spallino: So some of your listeners might know. But yeah, being an SP was like like growing up was like, I would never want to be declared an SP. And like, you go on what's called an E-meter, which it looks like a picture, a lie detector, and they would like be like, you just have to sit there and they'd wait for your needle. If it turns dirty, that means you've you've done something naughty that week. And I'd always be like, don't rock slam, because that means you were SP. And I was like, get evicted from the school. So I had these tricks where I would just like, think of happy thoughts and so I wouldn't get declared an SP. It's like, that would be the worst. You're going to lose everybody. But now here I am, I'm an SP and it's not so bad.
[00:12:03] Preston Meyer: I'm glad you don't think it's so bad. It's a good party to be in.
[00:12:07] Katherine Spallino: It's a good it's it's okay to be able to to not listen to people and have your own opinions.
[00:12:14] Preston Meyer: I do have one unanswered question from reading your book about the pay. You went a really long time without getting paid. Did you get back paid when you finally started getting paid? Or was it just pick up where everybody else is at?
[00:12:31] Katherine Spallino: Nope, no back pay for me. It was so unfair. Like so all of these kids would get we would get $15 a week after Social Security. And I wonder what my Social Security is, how much I have. It's like a dollar a dollar a week. But I stopped getting paid because my parents, because of I don't know why, but they never registered me when I got born, so I didn't have a social security number. So then they stopped paying me and all these other cadets are getting paid, so I couldn't buy like, uh, we would go to Walmart on the weekends to buy our hygiene supplies like shampoo, conditioner, underwear, things like that. And I was not able to buy these things for myself. And then eventually, a year or two later, they finally managed to pay me and or pay like I started to get paid again and all these, and then they're like, oh, the kids who didn't get paid because they had whatever issues that they. There were a couple other kids, but not as bad as me who had back pay. Theirs was like 50 bucks or something wasn't bad. So they got it. But they're like, yours is a lot. So we're still trying to work it out. And then I just never got it. And I was like, I don't... I'm a child. I don't know how to like, you know, advocate for myself and be like, this is unfair! But yeah. So that I'm like, I look back, I'm like, it's so unfair. And I there's a point in my book where I like, don't have shoes, I don't have a way to get shoes. And borrowing my friend's shoes. And then her mom tells her to stop lending me her shoes, and it's like, why isn't her mom, like going, hey, somebody, this kid needs shoes. Like somebody or let's buy, I'll buy her shoes, you know, like looking out for me. But there was nobody doing that.
[00:14:04] Preston Meyer: A church without a community. It's great.
[00:14:07] Katie Dooley: I was going to say at that point, like the family dynamics within the Sea Org and Cadet Org must be very fractured if mom doesn't even see a kid in need. Like. I mean, I think anyone would see a kid in need, but to be like hypersensitized to like someone else's kid needs help and you're not going to do anything. They must really break down those family bonds then.
[00:14:29] Katherine Spallino: Yeah, they really do. And they make it so it's not important. It used to be when we were younger they would have like a family day and we're like three, four and five like those pictures of me as a baby, like on a picnic blanket. And I'm like, I was like, oh, what is this? Because I didn't remember it. And my mom's like, oh, that's family day. Once a year, we would all get together on Family Day. I was like, oh, that sounds so nice. And then they stopped doing that. I don't know why. And then when they were then we had like, they have Sea Org day for the Sea Org members, but that's not for families. So the kids don't get to go to that. So it would be like Christmas. And even then sometimes the parents would have to work on Christmas. And so it was like we would see our parents so infrequently. It was like normalized to not see. And like there were a couple cadets who were only children, so their mom or dad would make an effort to come. But I think me being one of four, I don't know. But there's like there were at most cadets did not see their parents every weekend like once a week. And it was like once every couple months. And then if your parent was put on what's called the RPF, which is like the punishment group, you would see them like once a year and your parent was basically ostracized and they wear all black, live in like a crappy dorm, eat after everybody else in the Sea Org, and they I think they got like half pay. So it was like 15. Same as like a cadet, but they're adults. So that's like every like parents were so almost irrelevant to us. Like they're like, oh, that's my parent. Like I had love for my mom and dad and or my mom especially. I think it shows in my book and I still do to this day, even though she doesn't talk to me. But she was just like a person. She wasn't like somebody I can like go to for anything. It was like a person I could get a hug from.
[00:16:13] Preston Meyer: So when you leave the Sea Org, you get a bill for the things that you've theoretically consumed intellectually. Did they count what they owed you from your back pay against that, or was that...
[00:16:27] Katherine Spallino: I should have brought that up! I should have been like, oh, I have a back pay, take that off. But luckily I never paid it off because, you know, it wasn't I wasn't high on my priority list when I was 17, 18, in LA, 19, and I was just getting by to barely get gas to go to work. So I it like, ramen noodles, you know that type of situation? No health insurance. I just like living. Living the dream. Living the American dream.
[00:16:54] Katie Dooley: Oh, boy. I'm curious what the transition to. And you talk about this in your book and maybe clarify for our listeners, but Sea Org versus public member, you said you didn't do a lot of services. So what did they try to do to keep you in? Did they try to bring you back to the Sea Org? I'd like to hear about that.
[00:17:12] Katherine Spallino: So the Sea Org... it's a great question. If you're in the Sea Org your life is like all about just working. Go to bed. Courses or registration courses, like how to recruit people into the Scientology, things like that. So you have a period of the day we're doing Scientology studies, and then most of the day is dedicated to working. Whether you're a registrar, getting new people signed up or you're a course supervisor. And then which is if you are a Scientologist, you'd be going to course, that's what they call it. So when you go in and take like a college course, you can imagine, but it's like Scientology related. So you're either doing that or you're getting auditing, and the auditors will be Sea Org members. And the auditing session will be similar to a therapy session, except for it's L. Ron Hubbard type written counseling that you follow to the letter. You cannot change anything. L. Ron Hubbard is basically considered like a god, like nothing is to be questioned and they follow this. He has something called the bridge. And then the public are working their way up the bridge. And the bridge costs about $200,000 to $300,000 in the end. More because then when you're up there, they have you maintain your sessions so you audit yourself and you get like paid. You still pay like the Sea Org. So all this money, the Scientologists are the people paying the church, the Sea Org, to get these services. So when I was in the Sea Org, I did five Scientology courses to join the Sea Org, and that's what they billed me for when I left because like, that's free. That's something public would pay for, even though it's not. It was training to be a Sea Org member. Just like if you joined a company, they send you to training, they pay for it. But when you leave the company, they don't tell you to pay them back, right? Like you're getting to work for them. But in the Sea Org there's a policy letter L. Ron Hubbard wrote called freeloaders and he was concerned people were joining the Sea Org to get free services and leaving. So then that's his policy. And then to people who became like who trained to be an auditor, they left like I have cadet friends who left with 60K bills and there are 20 years old. It's not even college though. Like it's like that's enough for, you know, at least a couple of years of a good college or like a state college, you know. So eventually there was a lot of kerfuffle when so many cadets were leaving that the anyone who was underage, they canceled. I never saw it in writing, I just heard it verbally, that the dollars towards it or something, that I never paid it because they also if you had paid it, too bad, so sad. Like an adult and you leave the Sea Org you have to pay that money the for the courses back and you want to get back in the good graces. So like when I was like an ex-Sea Org member, I would go to an event like I would get like the stink eye still kind of a little bit, but I had also just like see my old cadet friends and we'd still chat and catch up and they're like, when are you going to go back on course? I'm like, oh yeah, whatever. Someday. Even though I believe in Scientology, it also wasn't enough. Like I actually didn't want to do Scientology courses, which is like says a lot. Like that's how much I think I was lucky that I didn't really believe in it in the end. Right.
[00:20:15] Katie Dooley: I have a follow up question to that. And I guess it makes sense explaining that auditors are all Sea Org members, but of like satellite churches. So we have a Church of Scientology where we are. I can't imagine there's many members. So what they get auditing at some of the you know, we're not in Florida or California, we're in Canada. Would they get auditing here? Or if they wanted auditing, would they have to travel to Florida or California?
[00:20:39] Katherine Spallino: So there are satellite places and then you're just a staff member and that is still you get a freeloader if you left. But that's only like a five-year contract. And then you're working there and you can be an auditor and you could train to be an auditor. And then if you did your five-year contract, that would be actually better if somebody wanted to be an auditor, because then you can leave and you don't have to owe any money as long as you did your five years, I think. Something like that. But that one is like, yeah, there are smaller orgs, but you only can go to a certain level in the bridge. And then if once you're at a certain point on the bridge, which is like still so much left, then you have to go to like LA or Florida where it's like the big land bases and they deliver those services with the Sea Org members. Okay. So eventually you will have to pay the big bucks.
[00:21:25] Preston Meyer: I definitely expected every contract to be a billion years.
[00:21:29] Katherine Spallino: Mhm. It's so like and if you read the contract like people Google it. It's so dramatic. It's like we are going to. Save the World. It's like Star Wars you know. And we are we totally believe it. You know.
[00:21:41] Katie Dooley: I was listening to another podcast I don't remember which one unfortunately, now. But they basically said like it's so ridiculous. It doesn't even like it doesn't hold up in court. Like nobody could contract you even for your entire lifetime. They're like, it's a ridiculous contract. So let alone a billion.
[00:21:57] Katherine Spallino: Yeah. There's like some, uh, couple lawsuits going on where people are now trying to sue and saying it's trafficking, you know, like trafficking bodies and using them and especially the children that were coerced into doing it. So if that wins, it's been a lot because Scientology has so much money. They have so many lawyers, a lot of like it's taking forever, but if that wins, that will be huge. It'll be really nice if like people are starting to protest more and more out in Hollywood. There's a whole movement going on on YouTube called SPTV, where people are telling their stories. And I think the more people know about this, we can get rid of that tax-exempt status that they have and the religious status that they have in America, because that's like all this money that could be going towards our schools and other things. Instead, it's just being kept by the Church of Scientology, and they buy these huge buildings in major cities around the world, like the Catholic Church or something. And they just they're most of them are empty, like most people when they go to these, these, uh, satellite orgs, they're you don't see anybody in them, but they're huge, massive buildings to me I'm like, are they just trying to invest their money somewhere? The funniest part is too, is like they have the local people, like, raise the money to buy the building. Like it's still like Scientology doesn't even buy those buildings. It's in their name. But the people are the church members are still paying for those buildings, even though Scientology has the money to buy those buildings.
[00:23:25] Preston Meyer: Yeah, but you can't go dipping into Big Dave's wallet. That's not okay.
[00:23:29] Katie Dooley: No, we call him slappy.
[00:23:30] Katherine Spallino: No. He's got a fly on his private jet and go hang out with some of your Scientologists. I don't know.
[00:23:35] Katie Dooley: Again, if you're a Scientologist, I can't imagine working with the man, but.
[00:23:40] Katherine Spallino: No. And like the stories you hear, I'm like, oh, I believe it though, because when I was in the Sea Org when like a high ranking Sea Org member was coming, like you're treated like a grunt, like, do this, do this. No, no backflash like, which just means no talking back. They have a whole language. And like I was there's here's a little tidbit for you. I didn't put it in the book because my book was actually when I wrote it, 150,000 words, and I had to shorten it down to 90,000. But one chapter was when I was called a tech page, which would sound really cool, but all I did, I was 13 years old. I would be bused down to LA an hour bus or like a 45 minute drive, and I would have to iron shirts for like the sea of the commanding officer of the Pack base, and I would have to, like, fetch her food. I was a little like grunt, but I and I wasn't going to school like they were just like they would rotate cadets to do this for like two weeks at a time. And it's like, that's how they treat like anybody who's an executive, they get treated like better than most people. And then on top of that, like children were being used as like little servants and like the I don't know if you guys have seen L. Ron Hubbard way with the bricks that are laid, it's like a really pretty street. There's all these bricks that make the street that you drive on. We the cadets and the RPF, the the poor souls who were put on the RPF, the Sea Org member adults and slaves making that street like they don't pay like outside companies to do these things. They use Sea Org members or children and to like get anything done.
[00:25:18] Preston Meyer: That's how you save money.
[00:25:20] Katherine Spallino: Yeah, saving a lot of money! And I like, I knew how to, like, renovate a dorm. I could, like mud walls, I could paint, I can do all this stuff. I can't anymore. It's like lost all that. I'm like, I need to hire a handyman to come and do that stuff for me.
[00:25:35] Katie Dooley: I mean, you put in your time. If you didn't want to do it, I wouldn't.
[00:25:39] Katherine Spallino: Yeah, I don't yeah, I don't like I'm not a crafty, like, handsy person. And in my book, you could tell, like, I'm not a hard worker, like, labor person. So I just.
[00:25:50] Katie Dooley: We snuck off to hide...
[00:25:53] Katherine Spallino: Yeah.
[00:25:55] Preston Meyer: Now I'm curious what other sorts of stuff didn't make the final cut of the book.
[00:26:00] Katherine Spallino: Well, another chapter which was like epic was I went horseback riding and we had horses and they were like kind of trained, um, mustangs, which was cool. And there was DWP was behind the ranch called the Department of Water and Power, and they had all this land. So we would ride our horses and they'd always say, don't ride your horses back. And of course, you know, we're kids. We decided to gallop back and we are galloping and I was on my I was on one horse that used to be it was actually an Arabian horse, but all the other horses were mustangs. And this Arabian horse used to be a barrel racer, so took really sharp turns, and she took a turn so sharp that like, kind of bumped into the other horse next to me with my friend on it, and I fell off of my horse, onto her horse on the neck, and they're still galloping. And then I fell onto the ground and the horse jumped over me like I totally could have died. And I'm like, I guess it's a cool story, but didn't need to be in the book.
[00:26:56] Preston Meyer: That's fair. That's a that's a cool story, though.
[00:26:59] Katie Dooley: Thanks for sharing. So you talked a bit about like, not going to school, that you spent two weeks looking after people. How hard was it to reintegrate into society? Like how bad was your education actually, how was the post growing up on a ranch?
[00:27:19] Katherine Spallino: It was really it was my math, especially because I would avoid doing math. And there wasn't like a lot of monitoring on what you were working on because independent study at the ranch when we did regular school. So my math was really poor, and I was put in sophomore year because I'm a August baby, and so I could have been sophomore or junior. But based on my transcript, they put me in sophomore year. And when I went to high school and there was a whole culture shock, which I'll talk about in my book, because I grew up around, a lot of Scientology's white people, so that's what I grew up around. And then the school I went to was in Florida, and it was like Puerto Ricans, Dominicans, black people, like it was like 5% white. So it was like Save the Last Dance or something. And I made friends and everything, but it was still like it was just like, whoa. And then like, going to, uh, math class was I was totally lost. I think I finished that year with like a D. It was not good, but everything else was fine because, like, I liked history. So I did study history, I liked reading, I like so because I read all the time, I was fine, like English class was a piece of cake. So yeah, I think that's. But that's because I just educated myself, you know, like, if I didn't like school, if I didn't like reading at the ranch, then I would have been very like there were illiterate people at the ranch or kids.
[00:28:40] Katie Dooley: And I guess those illiterate kids became illiterate adults, which is a scary thought. Not being able to Google Scientology, even if they wanted to Google Scientology, they wouldn't be able to.
[00:28:51] Katherine Spallino: Yeah, I think they could read like most ended up being able to read, but it would be like a struggle for them. So they're not going to read if it's a hard thing to do, right?
[00:28:59] Katie Dooley: Yeah, it's a scary thought.
[00:29:01] Katherine Spallino: Yeah, like my friend who's in the book, her name's Lacey in the book, her older brother was pretty illiterate like. Yeah. And it's funny because like, now I see him on some of the YouTube videos, he's still in the Sea Org and I'm like, poor guy thinks he's like, he's doesn't talk to my friend anymore. Like the amount of cadet friends I have who are out of the Sea Org is like all of the like most of the parents chose to disconnect from us, which is really sad. Like for nothing. Like my friend one friend just didn't want to do, she got what's called a community of evidence because she was talking negative about Scientology, and they wanted her to do all these courses. She's like, I'm not going to. So they declared her and then her parents stopped talking to her. So it's like, why can't you just live her life? And you guys could still have her in your life and she had kids. And then by association, my friend Lacey, she's the little sister. She's like, I'm not going to disconnect from my sister. So then she also got disconnected. It's that's how like, much control they have over the family dynamics. And they'll even be like a married couple. And then like, the husband will say something negative about Scientology, and the wife will write the husband up, and then the husband will get pulled in to get handled and like, get auditing, and they have to pay for this. And then if they don't want to do it, you're going to end up you, they get divorced. And then that husband's like he gets declared and now they can't talk to the kids. Like even like Danny Masterson. Apparently he's been declared now by Scientology. And now after everything after the ruling. And so it's like, wait, so now is his brother and sister not going to talk to him like, I wonder? I'm like, I want to know this. Um, but I don't have a way of knowing that. But I'm like, I was shocked that because they were standing with him this whole way through, because they had Scientology lawyers in the courtroom with him that they civil court. So the woman who he you know, I don't know if I could say the word, but yeah, him and the Church of Scientology. Because they had him. Because they covered it up. Like they're telling the woman not to use the word the R word.
[00:31:07] Katie Dooley: Um, and I know there were rumors that like, and I've seen sort of both sides of it, but like, Nicole Kidman's not allowed to talk to her kids with Tom Cruise. She's sort ofs said we're doing what's best for the kids, but I think they're actually not allowed to talk to her.
[00:31:21] Katherine Spallino: Yeah, like I think she's declared a suppressive. And I think Katie Holmes is probably declared a suppressive. It's kind of funny when you talk about, like, celebrities. It's like, it's weird that, like, this is the like when she did what she did, was she, like, kind of just disappeared and like, divorced Tom Cruise. Like, that's called a blow. Like she did it. She blew! I'm like, oh my gosh, it's so funny to see. Like she did what I did because I blew the Sea Org and I came back, but like, but in a police car that's in my book. But it's like she did it and her I think her dad's a lawyer. So then he was able to like, boom, like, shut it all down. But Tom Cruise does not see Suri I think like he just gave up full custody.
[00:32:01] Katie Dooley: Well I mean probably best for Suri. And I think that's where your book is so good because the general public hears about Scientology through the lens of celebrity, through Tom Cruise and John Travolta and Danny Masterson and celebrities already live a weird life. At the best of times so to here, like your story is very similar to Nicole Kidman's or Katie Holmes it just kind of humanizes their journeys a bit.
[00:32:27] Katherine Spallino: Yeah, and celebrities are treated really well because they're celebrities. They want to keep them promoting Scientology, but they are under the same rules. And jurisdictions are like follow like what Scientology says. So like Paul Haggis, for example, his daughter came out and is gay. And then he found out San Diego Church had signed like against gay rights. And he was like, oh, like reached out to like, a spokesperson at the time of Scientology, Tommy Davis. He's like, hey, you guys should say a statement saying, like, you don't agree with that. And he, Tommy Davis was like, no, we're not gonna do that. Because actually, L. Ron Hubbard does say homophobic stuff in his text. I think they've now finally removed it. But before they like, it was normal in year 2000 that there were homophobic slurs and like, treated them badly. But then to the Paul Haggis was mad about it. And then he saw that Paul Haggis said on CNN or one of those big shows, Good Morning America. I think that there is no disconnection policy. And the Sea Org, like blatant lie, which is there's literally a disconnection policy called disconnection policy.And he was like, whoa, I can't believe they lie like that. So like him asking questions already, like put him in a bad light. And then he went online and he was like, saw all the stuff. It's like when you go online, that's when it really happens. And even Leah Remini, right? She asks, where is Shelly Miscavige? And she got rained for it and yelled at, sent to Flag, which is the headquarters, to do auditing that she had to pay for because she dared to ask somebody where Shelly Miscavige was. So like, even though they're, like, treated really well, these celebrities, they they have to follow the same rules that all of the little grunts have to follow. So, like, even if Elisabeth Moss decided to leave Scientology, she has to do it so quietly because she doesn't want to lose her dad, who's a Scientologist, right? Like these, like Beck, who's no longer a Scientologist. Apparently he's now saying that, but like, he probably wasn't a Scientologist like 20 years ago, but that's like they all have this like fear, just like we do of losing our family.
[00:34:36] Katie Dooley: Yeah. It's a very powerful tool in cults.
[00:34:42] Preston Meyer: Do you have any guesses on where Shelley is?
[00:34:45] Katherine Spallino: My guess is this like place... They have, like, was at what's called the Pack Ranch, which is like the lower level Sea Org member kids. And then there was the INT ranch, which is for the higher-level kids. And then near there was another piece of property like in Hemet. And people say they think she's there. And like, she's just like, okay with living out her days, making amends. Because apparently what happened was she, like David Miscavige, like on a trip somewhere, and she decided to reorganize the org board, which is like, org board is like what job each member has. And when David Miscavige came back, he was really mad about it. And then put her what's on it. He basically put her on the RPF, but by herself and like with some Sea Org members watching her and like, if you believe so much in Scientology, you could be like, internalize everything and say, oh, it was my fault. I need to do conditions and like just be okay with being shunted off. Like she probably is fine where she is, like, but she's not fine like she's under a mental prison, but she thinks she's fine. Do you know what I mean? Like, my parents are okay with the fact, but are they really okay? I don't think so. That they no longer talk to me and that they're missing seeing my kids grow up? Like, I managed to talk to them a few, like, six months ago, and they were totally, like, happy to hear from me. And we chatted for a while, and then I was like, okay, well, I'm like, I would love to see you. And they're like, but wait, are you still connected to Miriam? That was who went on Leah Remini's show. And I'm like, but why does it matter? And then I'm like, also, I have to tell you, I have a book coming out, but so now you really won't see me. But they already weren't going to see me for something that was so minor, because I'm not willing to give up my friendship. Like because I'm not going to be controlled like that. But also they are willing to be controlled like that, like they could take a stand, but they can't. Do you know what I mean? Like, they're just they believe so much. They're like, it's because they also believe in reincarnation. If you have children, many lives. Okay, I'm not gonna see my daughter this life. There's always the next one, right? Like you could justify it in your. I'm just trying to. I try to, like, think in their brain and like, because I couldn't imagine doing that to my own kids because they did it to my brother, too. My brother didn't even do anything. It's just he's my brother. And he didn't even, like, know that it was happening. I had to tell him, like, just so you know, our parents and sister, we have a older sister are no longer talking to us. He's like, no, I don't believe you. I'm like, believe me. And then they, like, ignored us at Christmas time and then the next Christmas and he's like, oh, I guess they're not talking to us. I'm like, yeah.
[00:37:20] Katie Dooley: Yeah. It feels like when things come to a head, there's one of two groups, people who double down on Scientology and people who stick with their friends and family and people getting divorced, you know, some couples end up leaving together because they're not willing to lose their spouse or they get divorced.
[00:37:36] Katherine Spallino: Yeah. And I would say it's, but it's more rare for them to choose their spouse like or their baby, like if they're going to have an abortion or not. Generally they stay, and they have the abortion like they believe in it so much. And I think for myself, because I grew up the way I was, where I was already questioning things all the time, and I was curious that I was I never really fully bought it, even though I bought it like I still was a full Scientologist. Like it was easier for me to extricate myself because I think people bought it even more than I did.
[00:38:08] Katie Dooley: Yeah, yeah. I mean, when it's the only story you're told. Yes, Santa Claus or Jesus or Xenu. That's the only story, you know. Then you buy into it. But to have that curiosity is really good.
[00:38:22] Katherine Spallino: Mhm. And I think I'm just, I like luckily I had that personality. I think it's just a personality trait that I had. And so that like pushed through and, and it was never able to be suppressed by Scientology or the Sea Org. I'm like grateful for it now. I'm like wow. I'm like so glad I was such a annoying teenager and annoying everybody. I wasn't even bad though, right? Like, I was just like a teenager, you know, and but in a very controlled environment, which is why they would be upset. Like, they don't want me to be loud. They don't want to be wrestling with boys in the hallway, not like naked or anything, but like being silly with boys, flirting with boys. And that's like was my main concern at 15 years old was boys and having fun and realizing the Sea Org is not fun.
[00:39:09] Katie Dooley: I mean, yeah, I don't blame you.
[00:39:11] Katherine Spallino: Yeah. And honestly, there were following when I left because I was one of the first. It was like one other cadet before me like for my age group. Like over that year, like they started trickling out. And by the time I got back to LA when I was 17 and we were just like hanging out and it was really fun. But also like, nobody, we're all just like doing our best. And we were I mean, it was I'd say it was fine because we had so much freedom, you know, like we never experienced that before, to have our nights and weekends to ourselves, to do whatever we wanted.
[00:39:44] Katie Dooley: That's a lot of fun. And those are the ranchers you dedicated your book to, I presume?
[00:39:48] Katherine Spallino: Yeah. And we have like that. Yeah. Our sense of humor and like how we talk. Yeah, exactly. Dedicated to them. And I have some girlfriends. So on my Instagram page, people can scroll through @TheBadCadet, and you could see photos from the ranch and the people, and then you could see the people who I still hang out with to this day and that we're really close, like we see each other every year. So, as bad as like my childhood technically was. I also got a lot of good out of it because of how little we were supervised. We were so close, like me and my girlfriends and even the guys. Like when I see the guys like, it's like brother-sister camaraderie. Like we joke around and it's so that part is something special. So I'm like, okay, like, I could take some of the good from that too.
[00:40:33] Preston Meyer: Absolutely. So what can you tell us about your work in the Sea Org, specifically around trying to bring back wayward Scientologists?
[00:40:43] Katherine Spallino: Well, like, I was my first job. My post, that's what it's called. I was 15 years old, I was titled, my title was Rudiments Registrar. And you would have I would have to call disaffected Scientologists or people who hadn't been in services and try to persuade them to come in. And then sometimes they'd send us out in a car to their house and unannounced and try to convince them to come in. But the amount of people I would call who would scream at me and hang up on me because they were basically being harassed and stalked and I was only 15. And I'm like, why do so many people hate Scientology? I'm like, red flag. So that was my first job. And for like being for anybody when they're like start to slowly leave, either they're smart about it and they don't tell people so that they could just slowly leave and exit. Or if they do tell people, then they're going to get pulled in and get auditing and you might get re-indoctrinated from that auditing and then you're just kind of back in again. So people do have doubts sometimes even for the Sea Org they want to leave. And then I show that in my book. And then they change their mind because they get auditing and they go back in the Sea Org and they stay on post. That one friend of mine, towards the end of my book, who decides to rejoin the two of them, rejoin the Sea Org. They ended up leaving eventually, so yay!
[00:42:02] Preston Meyer: That is good news.
[00:42:05] Katie Dooley: Just a quick anecdote. When I did my first year of religious studies in university, one of our assignments was to go to a service that wasn't one that we belonged to. And my teacher was like, do not go to Scientology. He's like, they will never stop calling you. He's like, go pick any other one. He's like, they will harass you forever if you go.
[00:42:25] Katherine Spallino: And you'll get their mail. Forever. They keep all the records.
[00:42:31] Preston Meyer: Yeah. I saw a letter posted to Reddit just a couple of days ago, actually, after I read your book. But while planning for this, that a guy had bought a copy of Dianetics back in 1990, and then the church never heard from him again. And he got a letter just before Christmas, like weeks ago saying, hey, you bought a book in 1990. Do you want to talk about it? No.
[00:42:58] Katherine Spallino: He was like, wow, I still have my information. Yep. It's in the central files. I'm sure it's all been scanned now. Back then it was paper. But yeah, that's where that's also one of my jobs when I was in the Sea Org, was working in the central files and getting all the addresses and stuff. My mom was a letter registrar, and she would write letters to people inviting them to come out to the church. That was all she did all day. How boring is that? To write letters nonstop. That's... Most jobs are like, you know, there's several different things happening.
[00:43:32] Katie Dooley: I mean, Scientology isn't a big organization. When we did our episode, the numbers were like 60,000 worldwide. Like, it's not a huge group of people. So to keep Sea Org members busy and yeah, there's probably a lot more Sea Org members than there is jobs for them. But there's also the cult tactic of keeping them mindlessly busy.
[00:43:56] Katherine Spallino: Yeah, they definitely keep them mindlessly busy. Like it's I don't know what's happening. I think that was one of your questions. Like, I feel like there's no way they're getting new members, but yet somehow they're still existing. And like, especially if you watch like, TikTok, there's like all these people now protesting all the testing centers. That's where they try to recruit new people and they're like, it's a cult. Don't go in there. It's like, but it's all over, like the news, just like the negative aspects of Scientology. And then the members can't have kids. Now, Scientologists could still have kids. So there is still those younger kids growing up in it, but I don't know. We'll see what happens. I'm very curious. I do feel like it's I don't know what's going to happen.
[00:44:44] Katie Dooley: Especially after like. Yeah. So very committed members aren't having kids. There's a lot of bad press. But I also wonder what happens after David Miscavige and Tom Cruise are no longer... Once they pass away, because L Ron Hubbard didn't have a succession plan, which is how David Miscavige got in there. And then Tom being the right-hand man and a celebrity, I don't know, I feel like there's no even draw after that.
[00:45:09] Katherine Spallino: It would be like I so he has such a monopoly and like he's made it so it's a dictatorship. It would be amazing if he just, like, stepped down if we got sued and had to go to jail for something, you know? And then they could be a board of directors and then it could and like, calm down. Like, honestly, even though I believe all the stuff that I told you does most of it is bullshit. There is some helpful self-help stuff at the beginning of joining Scientology, which is what draws people in, like how to communicate or how to have a better marriage like L. Ron Hubbard just pulled from different like psychology and like Buddhism and things like that about how to be. It's like self-help. At the beginning of Scientology, but then after that, most of it's crap, right? And like, but if people like that crap and they feel good about it, fine. I don't really care. But stop this family control of like breaking up families, controlling how people think. Like I would if a different group of people took over Scientology and they were more lenient about it and like chill, and they didn't have a tax-exempt status too it was more of like a corporate self-help group. Cool. Like that's fine. Like that's what you are then. But like and like that you're being more honest and transparent. But to be a church when it's not really church, there's no deity, there's no god. And it's you have to follow all these rules or you get excommunicated, and then they don't pay any tax dollars on top of it, and it costs a lot of money. That's the part that really, like ticks me off, you know? They have money for lawyers, right? And they sue the crap out of everybody.
[00:46:41] Katie Dooley: Wait, so you're telling me Earth isn't the prison planet?
[00:46:45] Katherine Spallino: No. And that's like the funniest part too, is like, that would suck. Like, if you get all the way to OT3, which is what you find out about the aliens, remember? Like guys listening, like, if you're paying all this money and now everybody you know around you is a Scientologist and you're so in that life, and then you find out about the aliens, you know, you gotta accept it at that point, right? You're kind of screwed otherwise. So it's like I've heard my dad... is on OT three. Oh, it's okay. I was just gonna say my dad's on OT3 and he's never moved past it because I think he's he's probably like, oh God. Now I what else is out after that? That's my theory. He wouldn't agree to that.
[00:47:23] Katie Dooley: And I've heard some prominent Scientologists I forget one. He was like David Miscavige's right-hand man. And then I think even Leah Remini said, like when they hit OT three, they were kind of like, what the fuck is this? And but.
[00:47:38] Katherine Spallino: Yeah, it's like... Yeah, and now you have to believe it. And then when it's implanted in you, so then you have to get rid of the aliens by you audit yourself which would like, you like tell these I don't know what the process is you know, like go a little psychotic if you think things are living inside you. Like, I feel like that process would be not good.
[00:48:04] Katie Dooley: Actually, here's a good question. It's not on our list. And we've talked about this before. Do you think? David Miscavige and Tom Cruise, believe it or does Scientology just give them power?
[00:48:17] Katherine Spallino: I actually think that for sure. I think Tom Cruise for sure believes it, like you see it in his eyes. It's like they're like, he's so into it. David Miscavige, I don't know. Sorry. I have to plug in my laptop, but I'm still talking. Yeah, I don't know. I feel like he uses it for his own advantages, but I think he does believe it, I don't know. And I don't know. I mean, L. Ron Hubbard I think he did try to make money, but I think he also believed in himself like he not he thought he was a genius and had the right to make up all this stuff and he's a narcissist or like somebody who's like, oh, I'm helping everybody by making them pay all this money. You know, I don't know.
[00:49:06] Katie Dooley: Yeah, I believe that L. Ron Hubbard was a narcissist, for sure.
[00:49:10] Preston Meyer: That's pretty easy to believe. I'm on board.
[00:49:14] Katherine Spallino: Yeah.
[00:49:16] Preston Meyer: So after leaving the Sea Org and subsequently leaving Scientology altogether, what does spirituality look like for you?
[00:49:25] Katherine Spallino: It's challenging, like, to believe anything anymore. So my kids do go to choir at a Christian, liberal Christian church just down the street from our house. We walk to it, and that's a good church. I like what they say and in the sermons. So I only go to the church itself when the boys are singing in choir, when any of the boys are. But I personally have a hard time, like when I hear we are all sinners. When they say that part in church, I'm like, I don't like that. And my husband's like. I think it's more along the lines of like, we make mistakes, forgive, like, God will forgive you. I'm like, well, that's nicer. Can you make sure our boys know that? You know, I just I'm still I hope I didn't offend any Christian listeners. I'm just it's hard for me to like I didn't grow up with Jesus and God and all of that, so. But I want my kids to. I do want them to have, like, a sense of morality and like a community and more people talk about being kind to each other. So I do think there's good of being in a church community that's like not a controlling church. Which is what we have. I hope that answers. Yeah. If they start controlling things I'll be like, oh I'm out.
[00:50:41] Katie Dooley: You probably have a pretty sensitive radar for that.
[00:50:44] Katherine Spallino: Yeah, I think so.
[00:50:46] Preston Meyer: Have you ever reconnected with your sister? You mentioned her twice. That you got to see her in passing in your book. Do you ever get more than that?
[00:50:55] Katherine Spallino: Well, she was in the Sea Org at the same time as me. So we just pass each other in the hallway and say hello. And then Christmas Day was always just like we'd all open presents together. Like somewhere random, like on the sidewalk, on a bench, because we don't have a house. And then and you can't go to each other's dorms. Sometimes we go in my parents room, but it's tiny. And then we would go out to eat, like at the Glendale Galleria in Glendale and then go to a movie like that was like our family day. And she would be there. Um, and then once I left the Sea Org, my sister would come visit once a year, which was really nice. And that was actually when we really got to get to know each other. And my mom and dad would come. And when I had twins seven years ago and they came for like two weeks, which is like crazy long for a Sea Org member. So it was like a week and a half at least I had to beg them to do it because I had read all these. I was like intimidated about having twins, and I had a three-year-old and I was like, everybody says, parents help out, you need to come. And I was able to like put like, it looks bad if you don't come. It looks bad on the church. So then I think they wanted to come, but also it's hard to leave. But if they write their what's called a CSW, which is a request in a way that's like sent the, uh, Katherine's family won't understand if we don't come. So we need to come. So it looks like we care, basically. So that was how I got them to come. But it did mean a lot to me. And it was really sweet. And that was the last time I got to see them. And I didn't know that, because then by the following fall was when the fallout came from Leah Remini's show. Um, and then they stopped talking to me and my sister, too. And I had always hoped, I'm like, my parents won't be those parents. Like, I hope that they'll like, you know, I don't know what was I thinking? I was naive, but then they did it. They pulled the plug and that was a lot to deal with.
[00:52:44] Katie Dooley: Uh, your sister was promoted very quickly, I guess, like in your book, you talk about she was above your parents. What would have caused that? And that just feels really icky to me.
[00:52:57] Preston Meyer: Yeah, I was I was worried for her when I read that.
[00:53:00] Katie Dooley: I was worried for her safety.
[00:53:02] Katherine Spallino: I never even thought of it that way. But there is a thing with the Commodore Messenger's office, which is called CMO, where they like young children to be in charge of adults. It's super weird. It's like all of CMO is young, most of them pretty girls and pretty boys too, or attractive boys. And it's like modelled after because L. Ron Hubbard, when he was on the Sea Org, was named the Sea Org because it used to be on a ship, because they would avoid the he didn't want to be taxed. It all comes down to money. So he was out on an ocean and he had CMO Commodore messengers and they were all children. There was Sea Org members kids like cadets, and they were called the Commodore Messengers, and they would fetch him things, do all these things for him. And then they were kind of like middle management still, even though there were children. So then in the sea, like when it moved to land, I think that tradition just continued. And they would always just have young, young girls and boys, 13, 14, 15 who are bossing around. Or they go around and they check on progress reports and check on how everybody's doing and make sure they're all following their targets. And that's and so my sister was there for a while, but it is interesting because then when she was older, 21, 22, she somehow she left. I wonder if they age out and they say that. But I'm like, because now she just works in like the production part of the Sea Org where they make all the books called Bridge Publications. So she's like doing that.
[00:54:29] Katie Dooley: And she has 13-year-olds checking in on her. Yeah, that's, uh. That's weird L. Ron.
[00:54:39] Katherine Spallino: Yeah. And I actually, it's funny that you said that because I never really considered the fact that, like, was it an ageist thing, like, they liked them to be young and then them is I'm just realizing like. And then when she got old. Old as in, like, it's so weird.
[00:54:56] Katie Dooley: I mean, there's a policy for it somewhere written down.
[00:54:59] Katherine Spallino: yeah. There are like hidden policies, apparently, that some people don't read. I mean, which makes sense just because like, half of the bridge is secret, that's what people don't understand is like, people in Scientology and the Sea Org don't know about the aliens. Aliens, like my mom is not at that level. So she doesn't know about the aliens. Like my dad won't tell her because she's not ready to know, you know?
[00:55:19] Katie Dooley: Because it'll melt your brain if you find out.
[00:55:21] Preston Meyer: And you could die.
[00:55:22] Katie Dooley: You could die
[00:55:23] Katherine Spallino: You could die.
[00:55:25] Katie Dooley: We had to put the death warning on this episode, including a trigger warning. You're gonna hear what OT3 is, it might melt your brain.
[00:55:36] Katherine Spallino: Exactly. You should put that disclaimer that would get some listeners. They'd be like, what? What is it? I want to melt my brain.
[00:55:41] Katie Dooley: I want my brain melted! .
[00:55:44] Preston Meyer: I'm curious. Did you. How far along in this bridge did you get Katherine?
[00:55:49] Katherine Spallino: Um, nowhere. Okay. I'm on the bridge to nowhere. Yeah, because I was too busy, like, not going on course. And even then, because they were doing Sea Org courses, so I was just doing more training. Like, they actually a lot of members are not high up the bridge. They're all low down because they're using the auditors to audit paying public. Why would they audit you. Like why would they? They only do an auditing if they're like, call them PTS when they have a suppressive Person making them PTS like that, then they'll do audit as a Sea Org member, but they don't really provide auditing for Sea Org members.
[00:56:24] Katie Dooley: And I mean, you even mentioned in your book your parents bought you some auditing because you were just the worst, apparently. Um, yeah. And then they had to pool money together with your brother. So, like, your Sea Org members don't even make enough money to pay for auditing.
[00:56:39] Katherine Spallino: Yeah. And they and technically, the auditing should be provided by the Sea Org. And yet there they are paying. And like the same thing. Like they would have new releases all the time and it's called like they had like books will come out and my mom will buy them. I'm like, why? Like you have them in the library at the org. She's like, I just want to have my own copy. But it's like this. Like, I don't know. They like, enjoy putting their money back into the or into the church or into the org. It's very.
[00:57:08] Preston Meyer: How do you identify the real believers?
[00:57:11] Katherine Spallino: Exactly? Like they're like we're showing how much I care,
[00:57:14] Katie Dooley: But I mean, unless you're rebellious, I don't think anyone cares how much you care. You know, it sounds like the most devoted members get completely ignored.
[00:57:25] Katherine Spallino: Yeah, yeah. But like even like how... aad there's definitely a money element. Like the more money you make and give to Scientology, the more you're you're revered. So like, I definitely was like, when I leave the Sea Org, I'm going to make all this money and like, give it back to the church and like, donate it all so that people are nice to me. So, like, Tom cruise is revered like he even though he, he and he probably has no restrictions because he's best friends with David Miscavige, like David Miscavige was his best man. So he's living his best life. He's basically gets to live like a god, right? Like you're already when you're a movie star, everything's done for you. But you do have some accountability. Like you got to treat your employees, hopefully halfway decent. Like in his case, there's no accountability because they're all most of them are all Sea Org members or Scientologists who are all like, you have to just like say yes, yes, yes. There is no, no for Tom cruise, you know? Live that way.
[00:58:24] Katie Dooley: Yeah. Everyone needs to be told no.
[00:58:26] Katherine Spallino: Yeah, I don't think I doubt he's ever told no.
[00:58:31] Katie Dooley: Yeah. I can't imagine who would be that brave. Yeah. But, I mean, maybe a director. Do it again, Tom. That's probably close to a no as they get, but...
[00:58:46] Preston Meyer: Well see Tom's a producer and most of his movies, too,
[00:58:48] Katie Dooley: I guess so now. Yeah.
[00:58:50] Preston Meyer: He has authority over directors, too. Yeah.
[00:58:53] Katherine Spallino: Oh, yeah. Good point. I haven't even watched the most recent Mission Impossible out of, like, just like I was like, I'm not going to watch this movie.
[00:59:02] Katie Dooley: I, I don't disagree with you. I don't think we should give any more attention than he already gets.
[00:59:08] Preston Meyer: If you're curious, pirate the movie. That way he doesn't get any financial credit for it.
[00:59:14] Katherine Spallino: Yeah. Well, now it's on Paramount Plus, so I'm like, maybe I'll watch it. But like on if my kids want to, you know, but like, yeah, I wasn't going to go to the theater. That's what I mean. Yeah. Right. And same with like Elisabeth Moss. I'm like I did end up watching The Handmaid's Tale, but how much of a contradiction is that to like she's in a show that's very similar to Scientology except for like the making, the having the, you know, the part where you have to I'm trying to use the word procreate, like all the women have to procreate. Right? But the same idea of the cult part is like is very similar to the Sea Org. And then she's just like da da da.
[00:59:57] Preston Meyer: What do you think the chances are? She sees the irony?
[01:00:01] Katherine Spallino: I don't think she does. I think she's just like, that's so different. And also she's not in the Sea Org. So I think if you're a Scientologist, it's easier to in a lot of ways. So you could be blind to a lot of things and especially. Yeah.
[01:00:16] Katie Dooley: Yeah, I think...
[01:00:17] Katherine Spallino: I think if you're in a Sea Org it's a lot more intense. Yeah.
[01:00:20] Katie Dooley: Yeah. So tell me if I'm wrong, Katherine. But I think public members probably don't see a lot of the abuses that go on behind the scenes. I, I know a lady, uh, we met locally in the business community here, and she said she's a Scientologist, and I'm like. Clearly you haven't done any googling, but like if all you do is go to, you know, the Church of Scientology building and do some courses, then yeah, it probably doesn't seem that bad.
[01:00:46] Katherine Spallino: I was going to say, like in every Scientologist is told to not listen to the people on the internet and they're all liars, media's liar. So like, they're like, oh, whatever. They just ignore it. Just like even like people now, right? If you believe in a certain political, political candidate, you don't care about all the other negative stuff people say they're like, those are all lies, right? Like people could believe are very easily persuaded to not look at both sides.
[01:01:13] Preston Meyer: Yeah, what does, um, the promotion for the Sea Org look like to the public church? Is there any praise for the organization, any push to get people to join it?
[01:01:25] Katherine Spallino: Uh, yeah. And they tend they, but they tend to target the younger kids. So like 16, 17 I think. I don't know if it's true or not. I heard that they switched it to just 18-year-olds, but I don't know if that's true. But it's easier to persuade somebody who's really young. So 18, 19, 20 who they don't even have their brain fully developed to make these like lifelong choices, especially if they're a little lost and then be like, hey, like, here's something that's really worth fighting for. You're going to save the world. You have a good purpose. And if they're like just kind of floating, it's like, oh, that's great. Like now this is all taken care of for me. You can make my choices. I'm going [01:02:01] to be saving the world. [01:02:02] This is a lot easier way to live for me. And they might stay forever. Or eventually they might be like, oh God, what did I what did I set myself up for? And it's easier for a Scientologist to leave the Sea Org. It's still hard. Like you have to get a confessional called a sec check and leave. But if you are back in the day like the cadets, it was harder for us because they didn't want to create a like. It's like a issue to find a place for us to stay. Where are we going to go? So they would take forever to get it to let us leave the Sea Org.
[01:02:32] Katie Dooley: Yeah, because childcare. You're 15. You can't live on your own yet. Not that you weren't already looking after yourselves, but.
[01:02:45] Preston Meyer: Yeah it's pretty wild stuff.
[01:02:47] Katherine Spallino: Mhm. Yeah. Sometimes I'm like people like I can't believe you grew up like that. I'm like no but it's like I'm fine, I don't know. It's like it's just like. And I get that it is all very strange and weird, but I'm like, I turned out okay, like I don't hold.
[01:03:03] Katie Dooley: It's your normal. It's your normal. You didn't know anything.
[01:03:07] Katherine Spallino: And I think writing the book or processing it and thinking about it like I just don't hold a lot of like, anger about it. And yeah, it was my normal at the time. I didn't know anything different.
[01:03:17] Preston Meyer: So the next book, The Bad Scientologist, basically a sequel to The Bad Cadet, is going to follow the same memoir format?
[01:03:25] Katherine Spallino: Yeah, I'll follow the same memoir format. And, uh, yeah, hopefully next couple of years here. I know it's a while down the road, but yeah, it takes a while to write a book.
[01:03:37] Preston Meyer: That it does.
[01:03:39] Katie Dooley: Well, we love to have you back on when that time comes. Do you want to?
[01:03:43] Katherine Spallino: Yes, absolutely.
[01:03:44] Katie Dooley: You can promote your existing book a little bit.
[01:03:48] Katherine Spallino: Sure. Well, if anybody's interested, it looks like this. If this goes on YouTube, I don't know if my video is even working on your end, but on my end, I'm frozen. Okay? And, uh, I have an audible coming out version of it coming out, hopefully, it's in. It's submitted for approval, so hopefully in the next week or so. So if anybody just likes to listen to books, I'm the one narrating. So that's if you didn't find my voice too annoying today. That's an option as well. And then I'm on Instagram and I'm on Facebook @TheBadCadet. If and if you want to reach out in my DMs, I do chat with people if they have more questions. I'm also on, I have a YouTube channel that I have not done much with. I have like two videos on there. If you're a YouTube person called, I think it's under also the Bad Cadet or Katherine Spallino.
[01:04:36] Katie Dooley: Awesome. Thank you so much.
[01:04:38] Katherine Spallino: Thank you guys. Thanks for interviewing with me.
[01:04:40] Katie Dooley: Absolutely. This was super informative.
[01:04:43] Katherine Spallino: Yeah. I'm glad. I'm really glad. I hope that people are getting an idea of what it's like in the Sea Org and Scientology.
[01:04:52] Katie Dooley: Bad.
[01:04:55] Preston Meyer: That's the short answer.
[01:04:56] Katie Dooley: Yeah. Uh, Preston, do you want to do all of our promo?
[01:05:01] Preston Meyer: Yeah, we've got Facebook and Instagram. We're going to have all the links in the show notes, not just for ourselves, but also for Katherine and The Bad Cadet. Um, we're on YouTube and we've got our Patreon, where we hope to get a little bit of money from those of those people who are interested in getting a little bit more from us. And of course, we've got merch. I'm repping my shirt. Peace be with you. What else am I forgetting? Discord. Great for conversations.
[01:05:29] Katie Dooley: If you donate to our Patreon, you'll get to go up the bridge of the Holy Watermelon. This episode only. All right. Thanks so much, everyone.
[01:05:41] Both Speakers: Peace be with you.
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Bonnie Lu Nettles and Marshall Herff Applewhite, Jr. founded what is known today as Heaven's Gate, a fantastic group of UFO enthusiasts and religious believers. Though they both came from a Christian background in Texas, the mystery of Area 51 affected their daily lives to the very end.
Nettles was a nurse, and Applewhite was a pastor, but they shared a willingness to adjust their cosmology (and theology) with new information. Before the end, they had biblical arrangement of seer and spokesman, but they were a lot more extreme about sexual abstinence than even your most annoying Christian friend.
Bonnie and Marshall adopted new names about as often as you might change your shoes--something that Nike would prefer not to talk about.
While the evidence suggests that Nettles and Applewhite were true believers, going so far as to offer financial support to those who decided their commune wasn't right for them, thing proved dangerous at the end, when Applewhite decided that the spirit of a long deceased Nettles was on a spaceship tailing the Hale-Bopp Comet, which would pass by the Earth in 1997.
Fearing an unprovoked Waco-style massacre, and believing the next stage of human evolution was achievable through suicide, the cult of Heaven's Gate willingly took their own lives with pudding/apple sauce mixed with phenobarbital.
We explore the realities surrounding brainwashing, and the various pseudonyms taken on by everybody involved, and the fantastic range of names adopted by the church before settleing on Heaven's Gate (Anonymous Sexaholics Celibate Church; Human Individual Metamorphosis; Total Overcomers Anonymous).
All this and more....
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Apotheosis is the process of becoming a god, and that gift isn't always limited to the dead.
Some classic examples include Asclepius, Ariadne, and Glaucus.
Apotheosis also appears in the Abrahamic tradition, in a varity of manifestations, including the Alawite tradition, which elevates Ali ibn Abi Talib to godhood. We examine the diference between Apotheosis and Theosis in the Christian tradition. Preston expounds on the exaltation promised in the Latter-day Saint tradition.
We look at the worship of mortals in cults of personality (Jim Jones, Amy Carlson, Joseph Kony, Nirmala Srivastava, and Alan John Miller), the god kings of the empires, and those who were deified posthumously by their followers (Buddha, Hitler, Washington, Pythagoras, Mother Mary, Saint Teresa of Calcutta), and even some who were involuntarily deified in their lifetimes (Raj Patel, Kumari, Prince Philip, as well as some of the old Apostles of Christ).
There's also the wonder of Apocolocyntosis (divi) Claudi, or pumpkinification, the extravagant or absurdly uncritical glorification of a person.
All this and more....
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Euhemerism is essentially the hypothesis that many of the gods who have been celebrated throughout history may not have been simple fabrications but real people around whom great myths developed and grew to legendary proportions.
Euhemerus was a fellow who entertained and educated with tales of how the old gods of Hellenic (Greek) tradition were originally humans, mortals who lived mundane or occasionally exciting lives, and died, forever to decay into nothingness, who would have been forgotten if they hadn't become objects of institutionl veneration. Most of his hypotheses have been forgotten, but the principle remains, and naturally leads to interesting speculation.
Was Odin a real man, or an amalgamation of wisened wanderers? Were the Aesir (Asgardians) Asian kings, or Germanic immigrants to Scandinavia, rather than simple legendary personifications of the elements and national ideals?
We also discuss why Christianity isn't a good fit for this discussion on Euhemerism, but that maybe the Abrahamic religious origin could be. All this and more....
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