Expecting the End: Millennialism in Social and Historical Context

Chapter Three

49 The Eschatology of Heaven’s Gate On March 26, 1997, the bodies of thirty-nine people, all dressed in identical black clothes, were found in a mansion in Rancho Santa Fe, an exclusive San Diego suburb. All of them were members of Heaven’s Gate, a new religion that had, up to that point, remained relatively unknown. It was immediately apparent to Rio DiAngelo, the ex-member who discovered the bodies, that they had committed suicide. It was later discovered that they had all willingly eaten applesauce laced with Phenobarbital, followed by vodka. Why? The answer is to be found in an obscure millenarian eschatology, which, while drawing on New Age ideas, science fiction,1 and the contemporary UFO subculture ,2 needs to be understood primarily as a vernacular and idiosyncratic form of fundamentalist premillennialism. Again, while Heaven’s Gate recruited members from the New Age subculture, to understand fully the tragic demise of the group, one needs to look away from that subculture and to the group’s particular development of Christian apocalyptic thought.3 The Advent of Ti and Do Originally known as Human Individual Metamorphosis and then as Total Overcomers Anonymous, Heaven’s Gate was founded by Marshall Herff Christopher Partridge Chapter Three Applewhite (1931–1997) and Bonnie Lu Nettles (1927–1985)—also known as “Pig and Guinea,” then as “Peep and Bo,” “the Two,” and “Do and Ti.” Applewhite, the son of a Presbyterian minister, had initially followed in his father’s footsteps and embarked on the path to ordination. However, he changed his mind and decided to study for a degree in music, which he was eventually awarded by the University of Colorado. After a brief period teaching music at the University of Alabama, he was recruited by Houston ’s St. Thomas University to establish a fine arts program. Although obviously successful, in 1970 he was dismissed following an affair with one of his students. This led Applewhite into much bitterness and resentment. Indeed, below the surface, he had been a troubled individual for many years. Although married with two children, he had had numerous homosexual relationships, which led to deep feelings of guilt about his double life. Robert Balch and David Taylor (two sociologists who infiltrated the group) have noted that he “confided to at least one of his lovers his longing for a meaningful, platonic relationship where he could develop his full potential without sexual entanglements.” However, “after getting divorced, [he] vacillated between homosexual and heterosexual identities, never feeling comfortable with either.”4 This is not insignificant because, as is argued here, Applewhite’s struggle with sexuality eventually contributed to the shape of the eschatology of Heaven’s Gate. Nettles, although brought up a Baptist, became fascinated with Eastern and occult ideas, eventually joining the Houston Theosophical Society. Following a chance meeting with Applewhite in a Houston hospital in 1972, where she was working as a nurse, the two quickly became inseparable. Nettles introduced Applewhite to the New Age subculture and, over time, “they withdrew from their friends, becoming absorbed in a private world of visions, dreams and paranormal experiences that included contacts with space beings who urged them to abandon their worldly pursuits.”5 Eventually , in 1973, they left Houston convinced that they were destined for an important mission, the details of which were yet to be clarified. Following several months of traveling and numerous odd jobs to support themselves, they discovered an isolated location near the Oregon coast on the banks of the Rogue River, where they could clarify their calling. After six weeks their mission was clear. However, whereas they initially seemed to have been principally inspired by easternized or New Age ideas— and scholars have naturally focused on these elements within their teaching6 —in fact, from the outset they understood their mission in broadly Christian terms. Strikingly similar in some ways to John Reeve and Lodowick Muggleton, two mid-seventeenth-century London tailors who founded the Muggletonians, a small, millennialist Christian sect,7 Nettles and Applewhite became convinced that they were the “two witnesses” spoken of in Revelation 11. The following passage was particularly important: 50 The Eschatology of Heaven’s Gate Christopher Partridge 51 And I will grant my two witnesses authority to prophesy for one thousand two hundred sixty days. . . . These are the two olive trees and the two lampstands that stand before the Lord of the earth. . . . When they have finished their testimony...