People Unlimited, also known as People Forever, the Flame Foundation and CBJ, is a group of primarily 30 to 40-year-olds based out of Scottsdale,
Arizona which entices members with the promise of
eternal life. Its leader's first names create the CBJ title, at the head of the group are Charles Paul Brown, BernaDeane (who appears to dislike the notion of a
last name and also insists on capitalizing the 'D' in her first), and James Russell Strole. All three of these people claim to be
immortal.
How the explain this phenomenon is by a process called "cellular awakening", which, apparently, is when your body's cells are reprogrammed to regenerate indefinitely. Most creditable scientists would say that this is highly unlikely to be the case, and that's if they were feeling charitable. However, you can't just become an immortal on your own. You need to attend the groups seminars if you want any chance whatsoever of escaping the ravages of the fourth dimension. And once you do become immortal, you still need to keep in touch with other immortals, lest your immortality 'wear off'. The groups leaders claim that immortals require regular "cellular intercourse" with one another. Now, don't jump to conclusions, this does not imply actual sex acts, merely shaking hands and embracing can do the job just fine, although the three illustrious immortal leaders are fairly candid about the bed they all share. So how exactly are we to attend these meetings of the immortals? Well, it's a pretty simple process if you have an extra 650 dollars lying around. They hold them all over the globe, and currently boast over 30,000 members from 18 countries. No one wants to get old, after all.
A financial audit of the group showed that the three leaders made $431, 597 between the three of them in the 1992-93 fiscal year., and the event revenue was over 1.1 million dollars. Who knew that immortality could be so lucrative? But is there any proof that members are in actuality immortal? Well, there is some pretty solid evidence against it...at least two "immortal" members of the group (members who had received their cellular awakening, and were acknowledged by the leaders as ready to live until the end of time), have died. One joined the group after being diagnosed as terminally ill, and, to the shock of the rest of the group, died. This was written off as a product of too much bacon. The leaders warned the person to not eat bacon, and his love of salty breakfast pork products ended his immortal life. I don't know about you, but I'd just as soon get old and die if the alternative involved not eating bacon. I mean, come on, vampires can eat bacon, can't they? The other immortal who died joined the group after testing positive for AIDS. He died. The leaders of the group claimed that he had been clipping obituaries out of the local paper. This, like bacon, can have a profound and negative effect on your immortal life, it would seem.