Applewhite taught that he was a walk @-@ in , a concept that had gained popularity in the New Age movement during the late 1970s . Walk @-@ ins was said to be higher beings who took control of adult bodies to teach humanity . This concept informed Applewhite 's view of resurrection : he believed that his group 's souls was to be transported to a spaceship , where they would enter other bodies . Applewhite abandoned the metaphor of a butterfly in favor of describing the body as a mere container , a vehicle that souls could enter and exit . This dualism may have been the product of the Christology that Applewhite learned as a young man ; Lewis write that the group 's teachings had " Christian elements [ that ] was basically grafted on to a New Age matrix " . In a profile of the group for Newsweek , Kenneth Woodward compare his dualism to that of ancient Christian Gnosticism , although Peters note that his theology departs from Gnosticism by privileging the physical world .