Founding and Leadership
Endeavor Academy was founded in 1992 by Charles Buell Anderson (b. ca. 1926, d. 2008). Amongst those who follow his teachings, Anderson is referred to as "The Master Teacher". Anderson described his 'Spiritual Awakening' as a spontaneous experience he had in 1979. A certain pair of earlier extraordinary experiences Anderson had, may offer some insight into Anderson's later experience of 'Spiritual Awakening'.
The first of these two earlier extraordinary experiences was Anderson's World War II experience in Nagasaki, Japan. Anderson's Nagasaki experience appears to have made a deeply profound and formative impression upon him. In a letter to the Atomic Veteran's History Project, Anderson described how, with the Marines 6th Regiment, he was one of the first to land at Nagasaki after the atomic bombing of that city in 1945, where he was faced with a vast and overwhelming feeling of the devastation he was witnessing:
On "one particular day", at "one particular moment in time", I found myself standing directly in the center of this unspeakable, indeed unthinkable, devastation that had to have been caused by someone or something. At "that one time" I was filled with complete rage, a wrenching, seething, frustrating, insatiable need for revenge. But against what or whom? It had no point of location, no focus of causation - in effect, no one to blame, no one to hold responsible. It became a passion of intense revulsion for myself, for this world and for any and all members of the human species - a contained certainty from deep within me that all of us, everyone on this earth, all were totally guilty together. And then at "that one moment in time", the light of an inner peace enveloped me. It became "a space in time" where a new resolution appeared, and with it, the message, "Look at this as a new beginning."Anderson wrote that his second such experience came 26 years later in 1971, during a certain 'Near Death Experience' he had. Anderson wrote that during this second such experience, he had a certain "space of peace and happiness" while lying on what he presumed would be his deathbed, and that also during this second event, he received a spontaneous healing from cirrhosis of the liver.
In an interview with CBS News, Anderson denied having followers, teaching that "the Light is in everyone" and that "You are the light of the world." He claimed to be "returning to heaven" "shortly", and said that "everybody" will be going with him. "There's nothing dangerous about me," Anderson explained, "I am the danger of eternal love."
Since Anderson's passing in 2008, the Academy and its affiliates have so far continued to remain active, and have continued to produce and disseminate instructional materials teaching Anderson's views of the Course in Miracles study program.
Following Anderson's passing, the nature of, and names of, the ongoing leadership of the Academy is unknown.
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