Love Has Won: The Cult of Mother God

• Directed and Produced by Hannah Olson
• November 13, 2023 to November 27, 2023
• HBO

The life and strange circumstances around the death of Mother God (Amy Carlson) who was the leader of Love Has Won.

Work sometimes provides suggestions or at the minimum convinces me to watch something that I have seen advertised. While discussing weird documentaries we had seen a coworker mentioned Love Has Won: The Cult of Mother God-something that had been popping up on my Facebook feed. When I had the time and I was not feeling like a film, I gave it a watch.

What it showed is difficult to describe. Not because it is so harsh or jarring but it’s so unusual. “Unusual” barely does it justice. I won’t even begin to try to explain in detail the beliefs of the culture of Mother God with any depth. I guarantee anybody would find those beliefs confusing and perhaps laughable. Even the most religious of people will have a hard time following the belief system.

And this documentary keeps such discussions brief mercifully. Going into their belief system would’ve taken a whole other documentary. To give you a peek into their thinking they believe there is this galactic council of beings who communicate with them and guide them after they have passed-usually. Who are these people? Count of St. Germain, Robin Williams, and then in physical form Donald Trump among many others. Not making this up. 

They focus on interviews with members as well as news footage to illustrate what happened. It then shifts the discussion from a certainly unusual set of beliefs to how lost individuals will find mechanisms and belief systems to cope with the trauma in their lives. You see how people who are missing something will grab onto anything that appears to provide the answers even if it can be damaging. 

Mother God who was and I guess you could say still is the leader of the group started out life as Amy Carlson. Though they don’t come right out and say it they do show that Amy had a great many demons inside of her. She was a young mother who was never quite secure in her appearance. And one day shortly after taking some psychedelics she up and quits her entire life and eventually founded a religion where she was the embodiment of truth and wisdom and God and she would go around and occasionally pick a individual anointed as Father God who became her lovers.

Director and producer Hannah Olson is not seeking to mock or humiliate anyone. The people behind this have set out to show the reality of the situation. It’s jarring and shocking and bizarre. This is a look into human psychology and how personal wounds can not just affect the person carrying them but can reach out and have effects on those that care about them. Your problems are not just your own but of ones that love you as well. 

This is something that once you start watching, you will have difficulty walking away from. It’s real-life absurdity. It happened but on the same token you can’t believe it happened. It’s the most bizarre of human stories.

Love Has Won: The Cult of Mother God is a fascinating documentary. It will pull you in and not let go. It is something that you will be thinking about long after you’re done watching. This is most certainly must-see documentary.