• Papua New Guinea
    2011 Yearbook of Jehovah’s Witnesses

    • CONFRONTING A CARGO CULT

      In 1960, two other Australian special pioneers, Stephen Blundy and Allen Hosking, moved to Savaiviri, a village about 30 miles [50 km] east of Kerema. After living in a tent for three months, Stephen and Allen moved into a small bush house on a coconut plantation surrounded by a vast swamp.

      Savaiviri was a renowned cargo-cult stronghold. How did this cult begin? During World War II, the locals marveled at the vast wealth, or cargo, that accompanied foreign soldiers. Then the war ended, and the soldiers packed up and left. Some villagers reasoned that since the cargo had come from over the horizon​—the direction of the spirit world—​their dead ancestors must have been sending it to them but that the soldiers had been intercepting it. To alert the spirits to their need, the people engaged in mock military drills and built sturdy wharves to prepare for the glorious day when a flood of new cargo would arrive.

      Before long, Stephen and Allen were studying with some 250 cargo-cult members, including its leader and some of his “twelve apostles.” “Many of these people came into the truth,” relates Stephen. “Indeed, the local government patrol officer later told us that our preaching was instrumental in bringing the Savaiviri cargo cult to an end.”