The cult included men and women who brought along their children and handed over their properties and wealth to their leaders. The prophecy for Millennial Apocalypse was made. Those who sincerely believed in the doomsday gathered in a church and burnt themselves to death. Those who did not were indiscriminately and brutally murdered. The irony is that one of the Ten Commandments prohibits murder.
Human history is replete with similar doomsday prophecies and ghastly killings.
The hold of irrationality over gullible people through leaders like Jim Jones and David Koresh is difficult to comprehend. It appears that between Known and Unknown, Unknown is much mightier and alluring. Human mind has a tendency to disregard that which can be understood easily, and look at with awe and respect that which it finds difficult to comprehend. Uganda doomsday killings episode revived in me some memories. I recollected that sometime in 1995, my wife and I visited a Meher Baba lover family in a town of India.