MONTREAL/November 22, 2004—
A free love, cloning religion?
On Thursday, November 25, at 5 p.m., a book launch will be held at Paragraphe Books (2220 McGill College), for Aliens Adored - RaÎl's UFO Religion, by Susan J. Palmer, adjunct professor at Montreal's Concordia University and a permanent teacher at Dawson College. Palmer's research and ensuing book were supported by a grant from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council (SSHRC).
Aliens Adored is the first full length, in-depth look at the Raelian movement, a fascinating new religion founded in the 1970s by the charismatic prophet, RaÎl. Born in France as Claude Vorilhon, the former race-car driver founded the religion after he experienced a visitation from the aliens (the ìelohimî) who, in his cosmology, created humans by cloning themselves.
In 1976, he established his millenarian movement in Quebec and now claims adherents worldwide. The movement awaits the return of the alien creators, and in the meantime seeks to develop the potential of its adherents through free love, sexual experimentation, opposition to nuclear proliferation and war, and the development of the science of cloning.
Palmer has studied the Raelian movement for more than a decade, observing meetings and rituals and enjoying unprecedented access to the group's leaders as well as to its rank-and- file members. In this pioneering study she provides a thorough analysis of the movement, focusing on issues of sexuality, millenarianism, and the impact of the scientific worldview on religion and the environment. RaÎl's radical sexual ethics, his Gnostic anthropocentricism, and shallow ecotheology offer us a mirror through which we see how our worldview has been shaped by the forces of globalization, postmodernism, and secular humanism.
Palmer teaches religious studies at Concordia University and Dawson College in Montreal, Quebec. She is the author of Moon Sisters, Krishna Mothers, Rajneesh Lovers: Women's Roles in New Religions and coeditor of Children in New Religions.Her research into childrearing in controversial groups has resulted in appearances in court as an expert witness in France, England, the U.S. and Canada. She has been part of a team of international scholars who give workshops on apocalyptic and potentially violent groups to the FBI.
- 30 -
