An introduction to religious and spiritual experience

Branch Davidians
In 1993 David Koresh was the leader of a group of Branch Davidians, a 
sect with links to the Seventh-day Adventists. He believed that he was a 
prophet referred to in the Biblical Book of Revelation, and that this her-
alded the imminent end-time. His community settled at the Mount Car-
mel Centre near Waco. Koresh had begun to abuse his power by taking 
‘spiritual wives’ and became increasingly fixated on the end of the world. 
He began to stock up on food and ammunition in preparation for the 
apocalypse. When the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms attempted 
to raid where David and his followers had set up their community, they 
held out in a siege, which lasted for 51 days. During that time the media 
became interested. David broadcast his religious ideas while the world 
was becoming aware of the goings-on in Waco and learning that David 
had sexually abused many young women followers. It was eventually 
decided to send in the FBI in a CS gas attack, which led to a fire and the 
deaths of 74, many of them children.
There are many sects and movements in which individuals, often vul-
nerable, are held in thrall and even abused. As religion can operate on a 
deep level, at times taking absolute control over an individual, it is impor-

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Types of Spiritual Experience
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tant to understand the difference between spiritual support and human 
power dynamics. In 
Ungodly Fear, Fundamentalist Christianity and the 
Abuse of Power
, Stephen Parsons gives an overview of different kinds of 
abuse of vulnerable people.
The story now to be recounted can be summarized in a few sentences. 
After eight years as members of a large, successful charismatic church 
in an English city, John and Rachel left to become members of a com-
munity church which was run by an American pastor and his wife. 
Within a short time they had handed over £78,000 to the church, the 
proceeds from the sale of their house, hoping in that way to become 
founding members of a group living in community. The reality was 
very different. After a couple of years they found their position so 
impossible that they left, even though in doing so they became tempo-
rarily homeless and penniless. John and Rachel are now members of 
no particular church, but they are able to look back over their experi-
ences without bitterness, with their faith still intact.
John later analysed what had happened, giving an insight into that 
kind of situation.
The church was creating dependency without responsibility. I was 
getting my identity from the church. I was fleeing from family respon-
sibility by going to all these meetings. I shudder now to think of all the 
damage done. The status we had was from the organization, not one 
under God. We propped up the organization. We were being offered 
palliatives without ever being offered a path to responsibility. We both 
had low self-esteem. Give me more comfort was the message. You’re 
sold the wrong stuff. We ended up worse off in the end.
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With difficulty John and Rachel left the first church. Only after another 
similar experience of authoritarian church communal life, entailing the 
loss of money and control over their lives, were they finally able to free 
themselves from a damaging cycle of dependence. Theirs was a tale of 
vulnerable people in thrall to a manipulative organization. In the end they 
had to take responsibility for themselves, rejecting institutions but main-
taining their faith.