You better be damn sure about your religion—because if you’re wrong, you’re not just wasting your Saturdays and Sundays. You’re walking into a furnace and calling it a sanctuary. People say, “My religion gives me hope, it gives me purpose.” But so did Charles Manson’s cult. And his version of “hope” ended in butcher knives and blood-slick floors in the Hollywood Hills.

A real faith should be an anchor in a storm. It should tether you to something greater than yourself. God is supposed to come through for you. Jesus is supposed to save. But let’s not pretend everyone who chants his name is on the side of light. Manson twisted that same book. He said he was the second coming. He sang Beatles lyrics like they were gospel and used them to justify Helter Skelter—the apocalyptic race war only he believed in.

Sharon Tate was eight months pregnant. She wasn’t just murdered—she was ritualistically slaughtered. Jay Sebring, a celebrity hairdresser with a career, a life, and a beating heart, was stabbed and bound beside her. They died because someone followed a man who said he had the truth. A man who didn’t swing the blade himself, but whispered enough madness to turn others into butchers.

So yeah, you better be right. Because false prophets don’t come with horns and smoke—they come with scripture and charisma. They smile. They bless you. And sometimes, they leave you bleeding on the floor of your own home while your killers write on the walls in your blood.

Don’t assume the difference between faith and fanaticism is obvious. It rarely is—until the bodies start piling up.

Choose wisely.