"Messiah" by Gore Vidal is a satirical novel published in 1954. In this darkly prophetic tale, an American undertaker named John Cave founds a new religion that teaches followers to embrace death rather than fear it. As Cavism spreads across America, it systematically displaces Christianity, erasing cathedrals and rewriting history. The story unfolds through the memoir of Eugene Luther, one of Cave's earliest disciples, who witnesses how the movement's leaders betray their founder and transform his teachings into something far more sinister than he ever imagined. (This is an automatically generated summary.)