Description

The Process, or in full, The Process Church of the Final Judgment, commonly known by non-members as the Process Church, was a religious group that flourished in the 1960s and 1970s, founded by the Englishman Robert DeGrimston (originally, Robert Moor) and Mary Anne MacLean. It originally developed as a splinter client cult group from Scientology, so that they were declared "suppressive persons" by L. Ron Hubbard in December 1965. In 1966 the members of the group underwent a social implosion and moved to Xtul on Mexico's Yucatan peninsula, where they developed "processean" theology (which differs from, and is unrelated to process theology). They later established a base of operations in the United States in New Orleans.

They were often viewed as Satanic on the grounds that they worshipped both Christ and Satan. Their belief is that Satan will become reconciled to Christ, and together will come at the end of the world to judge humanity, Christ to judge and Satan to execute judgment. Vincent Bugliosi, the prosecutor of the Charles Manson Family trial, comments in his book Helter Skelter that there may be evidence Manson borrowed philosophically from the Process Church, and that representatives of the Church visited him in jail after his arrest. According to one of these representatives, the purpose of the visit was to interview Manson about whether he had ever had any contact with Church members or ever received any literature about the Church. As a result of a lawsuit, the publisher of Ed Sanders' book The Family agreed to remove the chapter about the Process from this book.

In April, 1974 Robert DeGrimston was removed by the Council of Masters as Teacher. They renounced The Unity, his exposition of the above-noted doctrines, and most of his other teachings. DeGrimston attempted to restart the Process Church several times, but he could never replace his original following. Following DeGrimston's removal the group underwent a significant change in orientation and renamed itself the Foundation Faith of the Millennium. Further changes in both name and focus followed, and the organization eventually became the Best Friends Animal Society, which is now one of America's best known animal welfare rescue groups.

A detailed account of the history of and life within the Process Church as told by a participant-observer is contained in William S. Bainbridge's book Satan's Power. (He employed a pseudonym for the name of the group, referring to it as "The Power", and disguised the names of people to preserve their identities, a procedure used for sociological studies of living groups to ensure privacy.)