The Sons of Sam: A Descent Into Darkness introduces viewers to The Process Church of the Final Judgement, but a lot gets left out about the movement and its roots in Scientology. Netflix's docuseries is largely told from the perspective of journalist Maury Terry, who dedicated his life to the Son of Sam case, hoping to prove that David Berkowitz didn’t act alone.
Terry’s research into alleged cult members John and Michael Carr — who Berkowitz claimed were co-conspirators to his crimes — revealed a past link to the Church of Scientology and an offshoot branch known as the Process Church. Terry believed that the New York branch of the Process Church spawned a satanic cult called The Children — and Netflix’s true-crime documentary examines Maury Terry’s theory that several members of the cult were behind the 1970s killing spree attributed to The Son of Sam.
There's more to the Process and its connections to Scientology than what gets explained in The Sons of Sam. In the early 1960s, newly married Scientologists, Mary Ann MacLean and Robert DeGrimston used the skills they’d acquired while training to become auditors for the Church of Scientology — along with L. Ron Hubbard’s ’E-meter’ — to create a rogue offshoot of the Church originally called Compulsions Analysis. The group's initial ideology blended together therapeutic processes — hence the name — borrowed from Scientology and ideas from psychotherapist Alfred Adler — who helped establish the field of psychoanalysis alongside Sigmund Freud before breaking from the movement to found the Society for Individual Psychology in 1912.
Eventually, Compulsions Analysis formed its own theology centered around four gods: Jesus, Jehovah, Lucifer, and Satan — which has led some religious scholars to define the Process as a form of Satanism as seen in The Sons of Sam. By 1966, the Process had become a legitimate church with chapters established in at least four countries, including the New York chapter covered in the Netflix documentary. As the Process became increasingly evangelistic, it began issuing a glossy magazine, also called The Process — a surprisingly groundbreaking example of independent publishing of the time with frank issue topics. Like Scientology, the Process also garnered attention from celebrities during the height of the movement in the 1960s and ‘70s, including Mick Jagger and Marianne Faithful.
It’s also true that as the Process Church grew, members began to create new, offset factions of the movement, which is where Maury Terry’s theory about The Children came from, though the connection remains difficult to prove. The so-called “Processeans” also denied any connection to The Manson Family despite the fact that many people believed Manson was influenced by the Process as Netflix’s The Sons of Sam: A Descent Into Darkness portrays. Process magazine editor, Malachi McCormick explained how the Manson rumor got started. According to Artforum, McCormick claimed that the Church of Scientology spread the rumor because, according to McCormick, “MacLean and DeGrimston had stolen the tech (the E-meter) and were considered apostates by Hubbard.” The rumors hurt the movement, which declined in popularity after the Manson murders. If what McCormick claims is true, in this way at least, the Process never did quite manage to escape its Scientology roots.