Russian doomsday cult holed up in cave

Russian police stand guard Thursday on the hillside
where cult members, who include four children, are
hidden inside a snow-covered cave in the Penza region.

29 members threaten to blow selves up if officials try to remove them

Officials were talking Friday with more than two dozen doomsday cult members holed up in a snowy forest near the Volga River to await the end of the world, which their leader says will come in spring.

The cult members have threatened to blow themselves up with about 100 gallons of stockpiled gasoline if authorities forced them out of what officials described as a cave or bunker near the village of Nikoskoye, about 400 miles southeast of Moscow, said regional spokesman Yevgeny Guseynov.

"Any forceful action is dangerous," Guseynov said, but he added that doctors and rescuers were nearby and trying to coax the cult members to leave.

Self-declared prophet Pyotr Kuznetsov, who established his True Russian Orthodox Church after he split with the official church, blessed his followers before sending them into the cave earlier this month, but he did not join them himself.

He was undergoing psychiatric evaluation Friday, a day after he was charged with setting up a religious organization associated with violence, Guseynov said.

The 29 people — including four children, one only 18 months old — had stocked the cave with food and other supplies.

Authorities arrest stepfather after girl found dead in cave

The stepfather of a 9-year-old girl whose body was found Friday in a hillside cave in southwest Missouri was arrested in her death, authorities said. Newton County Sheriff Ken Copeland said David Spears, 24, was arrested in the death of Rowan Ford. "The stepfather was a possible suspect," Copeland told The Associated Press. "I will confirm that he has been arrested, as well as one of his friends." Copeland said a 24-year-old man from Wheaton was also arrested. Charges had not been filed Friday night.

Source: Orlando Sentinel

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NUg Speleologists Assist Exploration of Private Underground Catacomb

Following the destructive earthquake in the Naples area in 1980, many ancient churches in the city were closed because of fear of structural damage. One particular church with a fascinating history was among those shuttered and abandoned. Located in the very center of the original city, this church, which will remain unnamed for reasons of security, has a long and mysterious history. It stands where a large private palace once stood in the 17th century. A noble Marquise owned the palace, and had decided to move to a newer part of Naples. A religious order bought his palace for 600 Ducats in 1601, and converted it to a small chapel and convent. Historians and archeologists knew that the elaborately decorated church was built incorporating parts of a grand old private palace, beneath which a private burial catacomb had been used dating at least to the mid 1500's. In 1640 the religious order acquired an adjoining palace and an atrium between the two buildings. An elaborate Rococo church was constructed over the site of the private underground cemetery. For the next three hundred years the elaborately decorated church and convent used the old cemetery for burial of clergy and members of the order.

After the earthquake of 1980 the church, like hundreds of other ancient buildings in Naples, suffered structural cracking and damage. The church was closed and abandoned. Pieces of the ornate facade and exterior began to crack off and plummet to the narrow street below creating a public hazard. Priceless paintings and ornamentation had been removed from the church and placed in museums and stop-gap measures were taken to shore up the exterior the church. The once famous church and convent with its mysterious underground burial chambers faded from memory as the once glorious structure faded into the background melding with the facades of the other centuries old buildings on the street.