Mithras: Mysteries and Initiation Rediscovered Book

Unfortunately this was the only book about Mithras available through my library. I was excited to get it, but when I started reading, I began to wonder just how scholarly it was. It isn't. It's written by someone with a degree in politics, not religions. He is otherwise the "head" of his own pagan cult and also appears to write sci-fi and comics (don't get me wrong, I love sci-fi and comics, my point is this isn't written by an academic). There are a lot of statements that begin with "I believe." Not citing any reference, not stating "the theory is...", just this guy's personal assumptions. Many of which are made by comparing Mithrasism, thousands of years old, to rituals of Golden Dawn (from the 1800s) or the Freemasons. Just because the Freemasons or Golden Dawn does something two thousand years later, I'm sorry but I DON'T think we can "conclude" or "believe " the Mithrasians "probably" did the same. There are also completely inaccurate statements, such as people think Christianity is the largest religion, but it's not, it's Buddhism. Even at the time this was published, Christianity was/is the largest religion, followed by Islam, then Hinduism. Basic research would tell you this. It's also pretty obvious from the tone he has a bias against Christians and Christianity. When other religions are mentioned or compared, he does so with more detachment than any reference or comparison to Christianity. This only matters because if you're going to make claims or comparisons, for a non-fiction writing the author should maintain a neutral tone in presenting facts. He was clearly unable to do this. There are also many occasions where he states "academics say this, and, no disrespect, but I believe this." Again, this goes back to the author claiming personal ideas without sources saying WHY he believes it or that it's a theory. He just presents his beliefs as true because "they're only academics, not an occultist like me." Belonging to a religious or pagan group does not make him an expert or authority (just like many Christians do not exactly practice what Christ taught, or Muslims perverting the teachings of Allah and Muhammad, etc.) It left me doubting how much of what I read is based on fact or theory actually based on what's available to historians, sociologists, and archaeologists, and how much was this author's claims of his "beliefs".