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"I AM" Activity

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The "I AM" Activity is a religious movement founded in the early 1930s by Guy Ballard and his wife Edna in Southern California. It is an offshoot of theosophy and a major predecessor of New Age religions, especially the Church Universal and Triumphant.

The movement believes in the existence of a group called the Ascended Masters, a hierarchy of supernatural beings that includes Comte de Saint Germain, Jesus, El Morya, Gautama Buddha, Maitreya, and thousands more. These are believed to be humans who have lived in physical bodies, became immortal and left the cycles of "re-embodiment" and karma, and attained their "Ascension". The Ascended Masters are believed to communicate to humanity through certain humans, including Guy and Edna Ballard. The movement has been called a cult by the Los Angeles Times Magazine; the same article stated that he described himself as the reincarnation of George Washington, an Egyptian priest, and a noted French musician.

Ballard died in 1939. In 1942 his wife and son were initially convicted of fraud, later overturned, after a government audit allegedly found that they had received $3,000,000 from donations and an alleged retail racket "by false statements of their religious experiences which had not in fact occurred," based on their claims of "miraculous communication with the spirit world and supernatural power to heal the sick." A landmark Supreme Court decision overturned the conviction, ruling that the question of whether the Ballards believed their religious claims should not have been submitted to a jury. Subsequent legal battles over the fraud charges and tax-exempt status followed.

History

Founding

Guy and Edna Ballard

The "I AM" Activity was founded by Guy Ballard (pseudonym Godfre Ray King) in the early 1930s. Ballard was well-read in theosophy and its offshoots, and while hiking on Mt. Shasta looking for a supposed Esoteric Brotherhood, he said that he had encountered a man who introduced himself as Comte de Saint-Germain, a historical 18th century alchemist and a regular component of theosophical religions. Saint Germain told Ballard that he belonged to a supernatural hierarchy called the Ascended Masters, and that he had been searching Europe for centuries looking for someone worthy of being told the "Great Laws of Life". Finding no one, Saint Germain looked in the United States, and found Ballard.

The Ballards said they began talking to the Ascended Masters regularly. They founded a publishing house to publish their books and began training people to spread their messages across the United States. These training sessions were limited to members only after hecklers began disrupting their open meetings. Over their lifetimes, the Ballards recorded over 3,000 messages which they said were from the Ascended Masters. Guy Ballard, his wife Edna, and later his son Donald became the sole "Accredited Messengers" of the Ascended Masters.

Popularity

The Ballards' popularity spread, including up to a million followers in 1938. They began collecting donations (called "love offerings") from their followers across the country. The LA Times Magazine article alleged that these donations left many followers deeply in debt. The Ballards became wealthy.

According to the same LA Times Magazine article, in August 1935, the Ballards produced a gathering at the Shrine Auditorium in Los Angeles that drew a crowd of 6,000, to inaugurate their "I AM" movement. Guy Ballard spoke under the pseudonym he used in authoring his books, Godfre Ray King, and his wife used the pseudonym Lotus. The meeting included teachings they described as being received directly from the Ascended Masters. They led the audience in prayers or chants that they referred to as decrees, some of which were religious in character and some of which were prayers for individual prosperity.

Guy Ballard's death

In December 1939 and at the height of his popularity, Guy Ballard died of heart failure in his Los Angeles mansion. "Edna had the body cremated immediately and assured I Am-ers that Guy had 'ascended' – perhaps in the "Atomic Accelerator," a golden chair one could supposedly ride to the heavens." His death was a blow to the movement; Ballard previously said he had mastery over death, leaving many members feeling cheated, according to author David Barrett.

Court cases

After Guy Ballard's death, his wife and son were indicted of fraud, accused of collecting over $3 million from their followers on the basis of religious claims the Ballards knew were false. Their followers protested outside the courthouse. The court case included unusual arguments, such as claims that mysterious metaphysical intervention had helped the USA with the war effort resulting from Ballard's communications with the Ascended Masters, according to the LA Times Magazine, that also reported that Edna Ballard's son said as a trial witness "Whatever my mother wants, that's what St. Germain says."

The jury was instructed to convict if they found that the Ballards did not have a good faith belief in their religious claims. The Ballards were convicted.

The Ninth Circuit overturned the conviction and the state appealed to the Supreme Court. In United States v. Ballard, the Supreme Court in a 5-4 landmark decision, vacated the fraud conviction, ruling that the question of whether the Ballards believed their religious claims should not have been submitted to the jury. Interpreting this decision, the Ninth Circuit later found that the Court did not go so far as to hold that "the validity or veracity of a religious doctrine cannot be inquired into by a Federal Court."

The Ballards were subsequently convicted of fraud in a new trial that withheld from the jury all questions as to whether the Ballards believed their religious claims. The Supreme Court vacated the second judgment also, on the grounds that women were improperly excluded from the jury panel. No standing convictions resulted from the series of trials.

Relocation to Santa Fe

In March 1942, Edna Ballard moved the western branch of the Saint Germain Press and her residence to Santa Fe, where she recorded thousands more messages that she said were from the Ascended Masters.

Other legal battles continued: the IRS did not recognize the movement as "a religion", thereby giving it tax-exempt status, until a court ruling in 1957.

As years past, the popularity of the movement dwindled. Daniel Ballard, Guy's son, left the movement. In 1971, Edna Ballard died, and a board of directors took over the leadership. As of 1998, "a tiny remnant of the sect lingers in the shadow of Shasta, their own holy mountain."

Beliefs

The doctrine of the "I AM" movement has its roots in theosophy. It's teachings were not new, but the publicity the Ballards achieved spread their teachings into the developing New Age movements in the United States. Many New Age movements now involve the Ascended Masters in their teachings.

The Ascended Masters are religious figures who have left the cycle of reincarnation and now benevolently guide mankind through their human spokespeople, of whom Guy, Edna, and Donald Ballard are the only Accredited Messengers. The "I AM" movement calls itself Christian, because Jesus is one of the Ascended Masters.

The movement teaches that the omnipotent, omniscient and omnipresent creator God ('I AM' – Exodus 3:14) is in all of us as a spark from the Divine Flame, and that we can experience this presence, love, power and light – the power of teh Violent Consuming Flame of Divine Love – through quiet contemplation and by repeating 'affirmations' and 'decrees'. By 'affirming' something one desires, one can cause it to happen.

These "positive thinking" beliefs overlap with several other New Age movements, such as the Human Potential Movement.

References

  1. ^ Partride, Christopher, ed. (2004). New Religions: A Guide: New Religious Movements, Sects and Alternative Spiritualities. New York, NY: Oxford University Press. pp. 330–332. {{cite book}}: Cite has empty unknown parameter: |1= (help)
  2. ^ Saint Germain Foundation. The History of the "I AM" Activity and Saint Germain Foundation. Saint Germain Press 2003 ISBN 1-878891-99-5
  3. ^ Thompkins, Joshua (1997-04-01). "The mighty I Am: Cult led by Guy Ballard". Los Angeles Magazine. {{cite news}}: |access-date= requires |url= (help); Check date values in: |date= (help)
  4. ^ United States v. Ballard, 322 U.S. 78 (1944)
  5. ^ Barrett, David (1996). Sects, 'Cults', and Alternative Religions: A World Survey and Sourcebook. London: Blandford. ISBN 0-7137-2567-2.
  6. ^ Rasmussen, Cecilia (1998-01-25). "L.A. Then and Now". Los Angeles Times. {{cite news}}: |access-date= requires |url= (help); Check date values in: |date= (help)
  7. Cohen v. United States, 297 F.2d 760 (1962)
  8. Ballard v. United States, 329 U.S. 187 (1946)
  • Saint Germain Foundation. The History of the "I AM" Activity and Saint Germain Foundation. Saint Germain Press 2003 ISBN 1-878891-99-5
  • King, Godfre Ray. Unveiled Mysteries. Saint Germain Press. ISBN 1-878891-00-6
  • King, Godfre Ray. The Magic Presence. Saint Germain Press. ISBN 1-878891-06-5
  • Saint Germain. I AM Discourses. Saint Germain Press. ISBN 1-878891-48-0
  • J. Gordon Melton, An Encyclopedic Handbook of Cults in America (1992)
  • Charles S. Braden, These Also Believe (1949)
  • Robert S. Ellwood, "Making New Religions: The Story of the Mighty 'I AM,' " History Today 38 (June, 1988)

External links

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