Thelemic Magic in America: The Emergence of an Alternative Religion by Gordon Melton

The Agape Lodge Smith and another Frater who was his co-worker at the Southern California Gas Company built up the Agape Lodge to include an active membership of over eighty devotees. Each Sunday evening they conducted a performance of a Gnostic Mass, the text of which Crowley wrote and to which the public was invited. […]

Birth of a Religion by Gordon Melton

Immediately after the war, in December 1945, but while still a commissioned officer and on active duty, Hubbard became involved in one of the most intriguing episodes in his long life, participation in the activities of the Ordo Templi Orientis. The OTO is a ritual magic group, then headed by the aging Aleister Crowley (1875-1947), […]