Chapter 1: What cultural icons are mentioned at the beginning of the episode?
When it comes to cultural icons, it's hard to imagine a place that's seen more superstars than Madison Square Garden. Taylor Swift, Paul McCartney, Billy Joel, and Bruce Springsteen. All of these performers and more have graced that legendary stage while loyal fans worshipped at their feet.
But little did those screaming fans know, an even more fervent kind of worship was taking place just out of sight. And in this case, worshipping at their feet becomes a little more literal. Just a two-minute walk from the world's most famous arena is a church. Within that church is a shrine, and upon that shrine is a single linen sock. A sock stained with blood.
It had once belonged to a saint known lovingly as Padre Pio, an Italian priest and mystic who passed away in 1968 at the age of 81. During his lifetime, he became known for a whole slew of holy party tricks, from reading souls and celestial visions to getting in straight-up physical brawls with Satan himself. But there was one miracle he was known for beyond all else.
For years, he suffered from constantly oozing stigmata. A symptom of that would be immortalized in a dark bloodstain, smack dab on that sacred linen sock. And sure, one Vatican physician may have called Padre Pio an ignorant and self-mutilating psychopath who exploited people's credulity. But that hasn't stopped true believers from flocking to his bloody sock.
Nor did it prevent Pope John Paul II from canonizing him in 2002 in front of 300,000 people. By comparison, Madison Square Garden fits roughly 20,000. At the end of the day, though, it doesn't matter if a person is the real deal or not. All you really need to garner a cult of followers is a bit of charisma, a hell of a story, and sometimes a little spilled blood.
I'm Aaron Manke, and this is Lore.
Defining a cult is harder than you might think. After all, most of the telltale elements, the belief in a messiah, charismatic leaders, religious fervor, could also describe just about any mainstream theology. So when scholars refer to cults, what exactly does it mean? Well, when it comes down to it, it's all really about popularity.
A religion is a belief system accepted and practiced by the mainstream. A cult, on the other hand, rejects the mainstream. They are fringe groups, usually reliant on an us-versus-them mentality. You know, only we have the truth and no one else does. That sort of thing. In other words, it's less about what a group believes and more about how many people believe it.
Now, it's a wiggly distinction, to be sure. That kind of shapeshifts depending on the society's opinions, too. Mormonism, Jehovah's Witnesses, Seventh-day Adventists, Pentecostals, Christian scientists. In the 20th century, these were all categorized as cults. But when they got trendy, well, voila, a cult became an accepted religion.
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Chapter 2: Who was Padre Pio and why is he significant?
of A. that took the art of cult building to the next level. And it makes sense, right? After all, this nation was first settled by an extremist religious sect, a little cult called the Pilgrims. From the moment they arrived at Plymouth Rock, America became a land of fanatics. The cults came in waves, too.
In the mid-1800s, pre-Civil War era, revivalist religious movements and spiritualism swept through the states. Another swell between 1910 and 1935 saw cults focused on reincarnation, symbolic mysticism, and communal living. As one writer put it in the late 1920s, America had become, and I quote, overrun with messiahs.
Heck, during those early decades of the 20th century, you could even join a mail-order cult. Simply stuff some cash into an envelope and address it to institutions with names like Psycheana, the Arcane School, or the Mayan Temple, and then mystical teachings would arrive right on your own doorstep, like an analog Patreon membership.
And then, of course, there was the notorious cult boom of the 1960s and 70s. And I can't help but wonder, what exactly prompts these waves of increased cult activity? Well, one scholar named Philip Jenkins has a theory. He believes that these waves are brought on by the later stages of a baby boom. Basically, young people tend to be more open to cultural innovation.
Thus, eras with more young people than usual means a stronger push toward that innovation, like hot new religions, for example. Speaking of which, when Jenkins wrote about this phenomenon in 2000, he foresaw another boom beginning around 2010. And I hate to say it, but I think he nailed it.
Whether seeking a sense of belonging, answers to the big questions of the universe, or innovative truths unavailable in the mainstream, people join cults for all sorts of reasons. And as it turns out, the same goes for the people who start them.
way out in the utah desert sits a ghost town called home of truth rotting slapboard buildings sag against the parched earth a stone church rests in half crumbled ruins while wind whistles through creaking metal gates but the place wasn't always empty no once upon a time this town held none other than the secrets to the end of the world and it all started with a regular middle-aged woman from new jersey
Her name was Marie Ogden, and up until 1929, she lived a totally normal life. Her days were filled with music foundation meetings, athletic club luncheons, charity projects, you know, normal activities for a regular American housewife a century ago. But then, everything changed. You see, in November of 1928, Marie's beloved husband of 26 years was diagnosed with cancer.
Despite exhausting rounds of treatment, he died just months later. And suddenly, Marie's life was turned entirely upside down. Grief overtook her. She tried to turn to her Protestant upbringing for comfort, but faced with real tragedy, the church's explanation of life after death seemed impossibly flimsy.
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Chapter 3: What defines a cult versus a mainstream religion?
Once the new world arrived, she promised, the climate would become nearly tropical. All kinds of fruits and vegetables would grow right there. No one would go hungry. And Church Rock would become a bubbling fountain. And there was one last very important promise that Marie Ogden made to her flock. A promise good enough to brush all complaints aside. In her new world, no one would ever die.
It was a bold promise, but one I assume that offered those people an extra bit of hope. Little did they know, however, that death would show up at the home of truth long before their new age ever had the chance to arrive.
There was no doubt about it.
Edith was sick. Her cancer, in fact, was terminal. Her doctors said that time was running out, but Edith didn't mind, because she knew something those doctors did not, that out in the Utah desert lived a mystical woman with the power to heal her. And, yeah, I think you know who she meant. Now, in Marie Ogden's defense, she had never once made such a dramatic claim.
But when the 50-something-year-old Edith Peshak and her family arrived at the home of truth, begging for a miracle cure, Marie sure did give it the old college try. She would meditate for hours, asking healing spirits for help. She held Edith's hands, trying to absorb the sick woman's spiritual impurities, which Ogden saw as the real root of the problem.
She even advised Edith to, and I quote, "...cure herself by ignoring her pain and by focusing her faith on removing negative thought matter." Which, I have to go on record to say here, I do not recommend as a course for cancer treatment. Or, I guess, any treatment. And it very much did not work. On February 11th of 1935, Edith Peshak passed away. Which should have concluded her tale.
But buckle up, folks, because it is only the beginning. You see, if there's one thing that cult leaders hate, it's seeing their teachings proven wrong. And for Ogden to have applied all of her spiritual powers to save Edith, only for it to fail, well, she couldn't have that. But don't worry, Ogden had a solution.
She would simply declare to all of her followers that Edith, despite all evidence to the contrary, wasn't really dead. According to Ogden, Edith was having an out-of-body experience, sort of like astral projecting. Her spirit had taken a little vacation to go receive instruction from the spirits, but was still tethered to her body via a silver life cord.
And as for that pesky corpse that she left behind, well, it wasn't a corpse at all. Sure, Edith wasn't exactly using it right now, but she would plop back into it eventually. All that said, Edith's earthly body still needed to be taken care of until the soul was ready to return. Taken care of how? I am so glad you asked. First, Marie Ogden laid hands on it often.
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Chapter 4: What historical examples of cults are discussed?
By the summer of 1937, only 12 true believers remained. And believe it or not, one of those people was Edith Peshack's husband Elmer, who still didn't consider himself a widower. Remember what I said about grief? Marie Ogden herself lived out her final years in a rest home. She died in 1975 at the age of 91. Or, well, died according to medical science, that is.
And she took her secrets to the grave. In the wake of Ogden's death, one of her few remaining followers burned all her papers, including an entire unpublished manuscript Today, the home of truth's crumbling remains still sits out there in the Utah desert, slowly being reclaimed by the elements. Driving through, you might even miss it, if not for a single hand-carved wooden sign.
Hung by the new property owners, that sign simply reads, Marie's Place.
you
Folks, thank you so much for joining me on this whirlwind visit to the site of a doomsday that never happened. Looking back, these are tales filled with drama and weirdness. In the moment, though, they must have been terrifying to watch unfold.
Now that said, while cults are famous for their creepy going-ons, they are far from the only collectives known for dabbling in the mysteries of the universe. In fact, I have one last story for you that proves they're not even the only groups hanging out with dead bodies. Stick around through this brief sponsor break to hear all about it. This episode was made possible by 1-800-Flowers.
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