I weighed in here because I really think it worth thinking about re your spouse. As far as I can make out every generation gets exposed to religious revivalism. My mother, as a teenager, was initiated into a spiritualist temple in Hampstead Heath before the war. She believed Jesus was 'special', that it was the churches that stuffed it up.

She got the bug afresh via the initiation into the temple, where she listened to words of wisdom from a red indian guide channeled via a medium.

Your spouse got the bug afresh via premies. He listened to words of wisdom from the Golden Child of the East, channelled at the beginning by a mixed bunch of mahatmas and fired by the enthusiasm of the premies.

It seems to me that we simply did a slightly more thorough job of blaming the churches and refreshing the infection by taking up with a living messiah rather than retaining the dead one of our culture. Rawat used to make a big point about how clever that was, how important it is to have a living messiah rather than a dead one. That is something your spouse believes presumably.

It got me, I believed it. I believed Rawat was the living messiah and that meant that I got to experience for real what jesus followers could only read about in the bible, poor ducks.

Ah well, youth does not last forever. And I now believe the big advantage a living messiah has over a dead one is that you can take a look at the creature, no messing around. You can even take yourself off and listen to that Sermon on the Mount firsthand. You can watch the game a messiah plays with his audience and draw your own conclusions as to what you think is going on.

And you can do a more thorough job of cleaning out that infection. I love where I'm at now, free of religious affiliation.. a bit like curiosity killed the cat, ah but satisfaction brought it back!

Of course the whole process is very unsettling for families who have evaded a fresh infection, who have managed to get those pesky messiahs down to a dull roar in their lives....

all the best, Lesley.