Rick Perry’s Cult Problem: What Is His Connection to the New Apostolic Reformation, a Powerful End-Times Cult Seeking World Dominion?

The Response: Rick Perry, left, with Rev. C.L. Jackson and Alice Patterson, an New Apostolic Reformation preacher who describes the Democratic Party as "demonic"
The Response: Rick Perry, left, with Rev. C.L. Jackson and Alice Patterson, a New Apostolic Reformation preacher who describes the Democratic Party as a "demon structure"

Is Mormonism a cult? Earlier this month, Rev. Robert Jeffress, a surrogate for Rick Perry, made headlines when he declared that it was. Pundits on both sides have also said so. Fox News host Mike Huckabee described Mormonism as a “satanic cult” when he ran for president in the 2008 GOP primaries. On the left, Bill Maher endorsed Jeffress’ view during an interview with him on Maher’s HBO show Friday night.

But if the Mormon Church is a cult, what would you call a small but powerful evangelical faction that believes in demons and witches, that performs exorcisms on a regular basis and whose belief that apocalypse is nigh compels them to overthrow national governments worldwide through “spiritual warfare” and replace them all with a single, global Iranian-style theocracy, with themselves in charge?

These are, in fact, the beliefs and objectives of the New Apostolic Reformation, a dominionist, end-times cult to which both Rick Perry and Sarah Palin have very public ties.

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