Inside UFO doomsday cult 'The Seekers' that saw believers wait to be abducted by aliens while singing Christmas carols | The Sun
EACH year on Christmas Eve, millions of children eagerly wait for a man with a strange aircraft to drop out of the heavens and deliver presents.
Most adults leave practices like this in childhood, but in 1954 a cult spent Christmas Eve waiting to be abducted by aliens in suburban Chicago.
The Seekers, a religious group led by Dorothy Martin, believed that a catastrophic, world-ending flood was afoot.
They expected a group of aliens called the Guardians to come and abduct them ahead of the apocalypse.
Although the spaceship never came, the Seekers did leave their mark.
In the wake of the Roswell incident in 1947, the group was one of the earliest religions centered primarily on UFOs.
They were also an important early source for psychologist Leon Festinger, who created the concept of "cognitive dissonance."
That's the mental conflict that occurs when a person's beliefs or assumptions are challenged by new information, per Britannica.
MARTIN'S BACKGROUND
By 1954, Martin had come to view herself as an earthly messenger for the Guardians. But her occult tendencies began with the belief that she could speak to the dead.
Martin thought she could communicate with her late father by clearing her mind and holding a pen to paper to allow him to write through her, according to the podcast Cults.
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These claims were dismissed by her mother and husband but Martin's beliefs only grew stronger.
The then 54-year-old worked to develop her alleged gift but said her father's voice was replaced by another who named himself only as Elder Brother.
The power first said that he was aiding her father to speak to her but soon altered his tone and accused Martin's dad of being too consumed with Earthly things.
Elder Brother took over the conversation and Martin's dad soon disappeared.
However, the voice of Elder Brother was also taken over by a being named Sananda who claimed to be the reincarnation of Jesus.
Sananda, Martin said, was from the Guardians who had chosen her as a messenger as they planned to bring cosmic intelligence to the rest of Earth.
At first, Sanada's messages were vague and gave no cause for concern but began to turn dark as Martin earned herself cult followers.
The housewife had reportedly struggled to understand her meaning in life and had visited new-age events in an effort to find more purpose.
It was at one of these events that she came to the attention of Dr. Charles A. Laughead, who then worked on the student health staff of Michigan State and had an extreme interest in UFOs and flying saucers.
As he became a follower of Martin's and recruited others, Sananda's messages began to speak of the Guardians' arrival on Earth and how it would bring about a time of warfare that much of humanity would not survive.
Again, Martin felt that the lack of an exact date for this war prompted no need for worry until in July 1954 the messages became more certain.
Sananda began to say that on August 1, 1954, a spaceship would land at an airbase that would mark the coming invasion.
Martin had wanted to keep the information to herself but Laughead spread the word to followers who by this point had become known as the Seekers.
FIRST DISAPPOINTMENT
When they visited the airbase, the Seekers picked a spot to wait yet nothing happened.
Yet as the group went home disappointed, Martin then claimed that a man they had met close to the airbase was Sananda in disguise.
The messages she received began to get more serious with Martin claiming that an ancient civilization was to emerge from the ocean and kill millions.
Yet she said that the Seekers would be saved by the Guardians.
Again, Martin didn't want to risk failure by sharing the message but Laughead was the one to try to tell the world.
As she tried to stay out of the spotlight, more people heard about her message and schoolchildren began to come to the door, asking if she was the woman who believed in aliens.
When parents began to call the police, Martin knew she was on notice but Laughead continued in his quest to tell as many people as possible.
That was until he was asked to leave his job after the calls to the police and as he became more insular, allowing no new people to join the Seekers.
Martin also became paranoid and began to refuse to leave her home.
FOLLOWERS LEAVE JOBS & FAMILIES
It was at this point that her husband finally became concerned as her followers began to leave their job and families to ready themselves for the UFOs bringing them to safety.
The Seekers were now convinced that the Guardians were set to arrive on December 22 and they began prepping themselves for abduction by removing all metal from their clothes.
However, on December 17, 1954, Martin received a phone call from a "Captain Video" that told them to go out onto the lawn to wait at midnight.
While the call was likely a prank, the group emerged to wait and when nothing happened, convinced themselves that Sananda had carried out a drill to prepare them for the real deal in five days' time.
Martin readied the Seekers for the moment of truth at the strike of midnight on December 22.
By now, Laughead's efforts to get attention to their salvation had mounted serious media attention and the press was on hand to watch their coming ascension.
The group of a dozen followers waited until 3am in the cold before giving up and before once again being convinced by Martin that the end of the world was still coming and aliens would save them, this time on Christmas Eve.
CHRISTMAS EVE CAROLS
While the press had again given up interest, leaving Martin despondent that the Guardian had not given her enough time to rally people together, she managed to encourage the followers remaining that singing was key to entice their saviors.
As night fell on Christmas Eve, they emerged to wait once more – this time screaming carols to the heavens.
When a crowd of up to 200 people gathered to watch the commotion, the police were called once more and after only 20 minutes, the Seekers gave up hope.
Shortly afterward, Martin's husband was warned that there was a warrant out for her arrest over the crowd that had gathered outside the home and she fled to Arizona.
It is unclear if he went with her but the cult disbanded.
Martin's followers fell to the wayside yet Laughead still continued to push the belief at UFO conferences.
While Martin's premonition did not come to fruition,the Seekers contributed to one of the most important psychological breakthroughs in years.
The term "cognitive dissonance" was coined after a study was published by researchers who had infiltrated the group to explore how the followers had convinced themselves to continue, even when they were presented with evidence that Martin's statements were false.
Researchers also believed that Martin was not lying and truly thought that she was a messenger.
In Arizona, Martin went on to found the Order of Sananda and Sanat Kumara (the names of two of the Guardians), calling herself “Sister Thedra.”
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