Church Universal and Triumphant

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Church Universal and Triumphant

Formation	1952
Type	New Religious Movement
Founders	Mark Prophet and Elizabeth Prophet

The Church Universal and Triumphant is a New Age new religious movement and organization founded by Mark L. Prophet and Elizabeth Clare Prophet. It is one of the branches of The Summit Lighthouse and its members can be found in many cities throughout the world.

Contents 1 Membership 2 Theology 3 History 4 Recent news 5 Church Universal and Triumphant in popular culture 5.1 Literature 5.2 Music 5.3 Non-fiction books 6 References 7 External links

[edit] Membership

The membership size of the church peaked at about 10,000 core participants, but membership seems to have sharply declined following a series of crises and controversies in the early and mid-1990s.^[1]Elizabeth Clare Prophet stated in 1985 that the membership of the church was between 75,000 and 150,000. ^[2]

[edit] Theology

Gordon Melton lists the C.U.T. as a religion of the "Ancient Wisdom" tradition akin to Theosophy and The "I AM" Activity. ^[3].

C.U.T. theology is a syncretistic belief system, including elements of Buddhism, Christianity, esoteric mysticism, the paranormal, alchemy and belief in elves, fairies, and other beings it calls elementals (spirits of nature). It revolves chiefly around communications received from Ascended Masters through the Holy Spirit. Many of the Ascended Masters such as El Morya, Kuthumi, Sanat Kumara, the Master Jesus and Saint Germain have their roots in Theosophy and the writings of Madame Blavatsky. Others such as Buddha and Confucius are historical religious figures.

Mark, and later Elizabeth, claimed to be a Messenger of the Ascended Masters. As Messengers they were able to communicate with these Masters and deliver their instruction of these Masters to the world. Dictations that were described as coming directly from the Masters were published weekly as Pearls of Wisdom.

Group members practice prayers, affirmations, mantras, and a dynamic form of prayer known as decrees. These serve many purposes: devotion, calling to angels for protection, calling forth the light of God on earth, praying for healing, for wisdom, asking to know God's will, and for the transmutation of karma. One of the most important decrees is the Violet Flame Decree - believed to be the most effective means of balancing karma that has built up in the past. The doctrine of the Seven Rays is also taught, as well as teachings about the chakras and reincarnation.

In the summer of 1993, a team of academic specialists conducted an interdisciplinary study of the church and its membership. The results were published in "Church Universal and Triumphant in Scholarly Perspective," edited by James R. Lewis and J. Gordon Melton.

During the late 80s and early 90s anti-church articles and letters were published in the local newspapers of the Livingston Enterprise and the Bozeman Chronicle. The newspaper articles frequently labeled Church Universal and Triumphant as being a cult. The church has usually been labeled a cult by fundamentalist Christian groups.^{[citation needed]} Several of the letters were written by former Church members who lost in lawsuits against the church.^{[citation needed]}

[edit] History

Mark Prophet recounts that he was first contacted by the Ascended Masters at about the age of 18. In about 1945 he joined the Rosicrucians (AMORC) and later affiliated for a time with Self-Realization Fellowship. In 1952 he started a small group known as the Ashram, sending out periodic letters from the Ascended Masters, in particular El Morya.^[4] In about 1956 Mark Prophet came in contact with The Bridge to Freedom, an offshoot of the I AM Activity led by Geraldine Innocente (d.1961). Innocente had been a member of the I AM Activity, but left in 1951 to begin her own group. Prophet studied with the Bridge until 1958 while also continuing with his own Ashram group. On August 7, 1958, Mark sent the final communication to the members of the Ashram, announcing the establishment of The Summit Lighthouse. The founding meeting of The Summit Lighthouse was held in Philadelphia on August 7, 1958. The headquarters was in Washington, D.C.

In 1961, Mark met Elizabeth Clare Wulf; they married in 1964 and had four children. Wulf, subsequently Elizabeth Clare Prophet, had grown up under influences including New Thought and Christian Science.

In January 1966, the Prophets moved their church to Colorado Springs, CO. In 1970, a second major center of the organization was established in Santa Barbara, California. The first session of Ascended Master University - a religious study center for teaching of the ancient wisdom - was held there in July 1970. (Ascended Master University was later renamed Summit University.)

On November 2, 1971, the church opened a branch of Montessori International, a private school based on the principles of Italian educator Maria Montessori. In later years, the school was expanded to provide a full program from preschool to Grade 12. On May 1, 1972, the church opened the Four Winds Organic Center in Colorado Springs, a health food store and organic restaurant. On February 26, 1973, Mark Prophet passed on, leaving his wife as leader.

Church Universal and Triumphant was incorporated as a part of the organization on May 1, 1975. The organization moved its headquarters to Pasadena, California, in 1976. In 1978, it moved to "Camelot," a 218-acre (0.88 km²) property in the Santa Monica Mountains, outside of Los Angeles.

In 1981, the organization purchased a 12,000-acre (49 km²) property in Montana, on the northern border of Yellowstone National Park, which it named the Royal Teton Ranch. Camelot was sold and the organization moved its headquarters to Montana in 1986.

The church became well known during the late 1980s when it predicted the possibility of nuclear war at the end of that decade. Members were urged to prepare by building fallout shelters and supplying them with food and other necessities. The predicted date of the nuclear war was April 23, 1990. ^[2]When nuclear war failed to occur, Prophet claimed that the community had averted the war through their prayers. Some adherents were left in debt or bankruptcy. Since then church membership has fallen in the United States. However, the C.U.T. remains a significant presence in the area of its headquarters, and centers continue to be active in large cities across the nation. During this period, international membership has grown significantly.

With its decline in U.S. membership and changes in employment laws for non-profit organizations, the church was forced to downsize its headquarters staff in the late 1990s and the first years of the 2000s. In July 1996 Elizabeth Clare Prophet handed over the day-to-day running of the organization to a new president and board of directors, who oversaw this major restructuring of operations at the church headquarters. Portions of the Royal Teton were sold to the U.S. government as part of a complex sale and land-exchange agreement. A second large property that had been purchased in 1983 was sold on the open market, along with other smaller landholdings.

Due to health reasons, Prophet retired in 1999.

[edit] Recent news

Elizabeth Prophet developed Alzheimer's disease in the late 1990s, and by December of 2008, she was living in Bozeman, Montana under house care. This led to the church coming under the direction of a two-person presidency with a board of directors and a council of elders.

In recent years several individuals have come forward claiming to deliver dictations from the Ascended Masters, Archangels, and Elohim. Former CUT minister Monroe Shearer and his wife, former member Carolyn, founded a new activity in 1995, The Temple of the Presence, now based in Tucson, Arizona. Another former church official, David C. Lewis, claimed to be delivering dictations by some of the same Ascended Masters named in Church Universal and Triumphant as well as other Ascended Masters unmentioned before. Now based in Livingston, Montana, Lewis claimed that the process for how one applies to be a Messenger has never been made public and that the elder to whom he submitted his application told him "there won't be any more messengers."

Many Ascended Master students believe that Ascended Master organizations are brought into existence through dispensations by the Masters, and not by their sponsored organizations and the Messengers for that organization. Most prior sponsored organizations have not recognized the next dispensation and in some cases not even the former ones.

Three organizations that recognize the Summit Lighthouse and former sponsored organizations are The Temple of the Presence, ^[5] The Hearts Center and the Shangra-la Mission. Kim and Lorraine Michaels, former students of the Summit Lighthouse, founded the Shangra-la Mission in 2002 after claiming they were given the mantles of Messengership direct from the Ascended Masters. They never applied to be Messengers for the church, which rejects any such claims that they are sponsored messengers.

The Shearers have dismissed Lewis's claim to being a Messenger, as Elizabeth Clare Prophet dismissed the Shearer's claim, and as the leader of The Bridge to Freedom, Geraldine Innocente, dismissed the claim of The Summit Lighthouse founder Mark L. Prophet. CUT continues to hold quarterly retreats at the Royal Teton Ranch and to hold Summit University sessions around the world. Retreats for teens and young adults are held internationally twice a year.

[edit] Church Universal and Triumphant in popular culture

[edit] Literature

• The Church Universal and Triumphant figures in The Emberverse series by S.M. Stirling.

[edit] Music

Since a recording by the church entitled "Invocation for Judgement [sic] Against and Destruction of Rock Music" appeared on the record Sounds of American Doomsday Cults Volume 14, it has been sampled many times by various musical artists—mainly in electronic genres. Among the most prominent of these:

• Negativland, in "Michael Jackson", from the album Escape from Noise; a remix by Fatboy Slim appears on his album Better Living Through Chemistry.
• Mylo, in the title track of the album Destroy Rock & Roll
• O.S.I., in "Set It On Fire", from the album Free

[edit] Non-fiction books

• Kenneth and Talita Paolini, parents of Inheritance cycle author Christopher Paolini, were once members but later left the organisation. They have since written the book 400 Years of Imaginary Friends: A Journey Into the World of Adepts, Masters, Ascended Masters, and Their Messengers, which discussed their experiences of the sect as well as a history of it related to other groups.^[6]

[edit] References

[edit] External links

• The Summit Lighthouse website
• University of Virginia Religious Movements Project[1]
• [2]
• New Religious Movements--Church Universal and Triumphant:
• Newspaper article on Erin Prophet, daughter of Mark and Elizabeth Clare Prophet, on her memoir about CUT:

Anti-CUT sites:

• Life in CUT [3]
• Rick A. Ross Institute info on CUT [4]
• Anti-CUT information [5]
• Apologetics Index [6]
• Picasso Revisited: The Might "I AM" and a Newer Prophet [7]

Offshoot organizations (not supported by CUT):

• The Temple of the Presence [8]
• The Hearts Center [9]
• Shangra-la Mission [10]