Vanuatu cargo cult marks 50 years

Residents of the South Pacific island of Tanna worship an American "messiah" named John Frum who first appeared to them in the 1930s. According to a village elder quoted in a recent Smithsonian article, John promised to someday return and "he'll bring planeloads and shiploads of cargo to us from America if we pray to him. Radios, TVs, trucks, boats, watches, iceboxes, medicine, Coca-Cola and many other wonderful things." The cargo cult is celebrating its 50th anniversary this year.

From the BBC News:
The cult was reinforced during WWII, when US forces landed with huge amounts of cargo - weapons, food and medicine.

Villagers believe the spirit of John Frum sent the US military to their South Pacific home to help them.

Devotees say that an apparition of John Frum first appeared before tribal elders in the 1930s.

He urged them to rebel against the aggressive teachings of Christian missionaries and instead said they should put their faith in their own customs

weird as it seems

[Mantorp]

it's not more far fetched as some more popular religions

Re:

[Jeremiah Cornelius]

I tend to think of the organized religions as analogous to cargo cults. They were formed by people who recipients of transmitted tradition, derived generations before by disciples who were unable to comprehend the nature of the remarkable beings they came into contact with.

For instance, Jesus was taken literally as the "son of god" by pagan converts who actually came from a millieu which had Adonis and Hercules in their belief system. They missed the essential devine message intended for his immediate dis