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About six weeks ago in a quiet community where little children were playing and mothers were going about their daily tasks of love and nurturing something absolutely absurd and uncalled for happened. Seven hundred armed personnel, accompanied by tanks and helicopters, broke into the peace of this community and ravaged it in the space of minutes. All of this because of a hoax phone call by a 33 year old woman with a history of making false accusations who claimed to be an abused 16 year old on the ranch (Interesting side note: Rozita Swinton is a delegate for Obama). I want to state at the outset that I do not believe in polygamy or child abuse or women as doormats. That said, I also do not believe that America's Founding Fathers had the Gestapo-like tactics of the Texas CPS in mind when they declared that we all had a right to "life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness". I have hesitated voicing my opinion because so few are talking about this travesty of justice and the few who have been speaking out on the behalf of these innocent (they have not been proven guilty) people have often not been warmly accepted but I just can not keep silent any longer. I know that the vast majority of people have been brainwashed to associate pervasive underage marriage and child abuse with this group but I implore you to look at the facts. Nearly six weeks into this mess not a single man or women has been charged with abuse of any sort. On the contrary there is more and more evidence that the worst abuse these children have ever experienced is what has happened to them at the hands of the Texas government. There is the inhumane way that these women and children were herded into a space much too small for that many people, fed poisons (that is how their bodies took the preservatives and refined sugars they were not used to), that caused wide spread diarrhea and gastrointestinal upsets, and were denied basic cleanliness, even when willing to do the cleaning themselves! After these little children had been mercilessly torn from the loving arms of their mothers, a baby was neglected in his stroller for 24 hours and ended up in the hospital for dehydration and there was a little three year old boy who pleaded for someone to rock him while CPS workers callously followed him around with their clip boards taking notes, the little boys eight year old brother eventually heard and rocked him. Nursing babies 12 months and older were forced to wean cold turkey on top of losing their mothers. One of the mental health workers who was working at the scene in San Angelo said that in 20 years of working with domestic violence and sexual assault cases she had never seen woman and children treated so badly or their basic rights ignored so callously. Another worker mentioned that all of the children were initially healthy when they were taken from their homes but after being herded into such extremely crowded living spaces with no fresh air, sunlight, or decent rest many became sick, even to the point of requiring hospitalization.
Many believe the media sensationalism of a "pervasive pattern of underage marriage". But where is the proof that this is so? After six weeks of investigation what facts give Texas the right to no longer treat these people as people but rather as pawns in their hands? Aren't these people made in the image of God as well as we? Should we have just sat back while the Jews were carted away because they refuse to accept the Messiah? Doesn't the American right to due process and the "right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects" apply to these people too? And why does America find polygamy so bad (a practice even the patriarch Jacob lived, the twelve tribes came from four different mothers) and yet it is "legally" acceptable for men to have multiple children by multiple mothers as long as they don't contract with that mother to actually support her physically and emotionally, etc. as she raises those children? Should every person who has ever committed adultery have their children taken away? I am not trying to condone polygamy, I am merely trying to point out the hypocrisy of our thinking in America.
There are professing Christians sitting comfortably in their houses today who are barely even bothering to pass on to their children their own false "feel-good" gospel who are looking down on these people who are at least truly trying to live purposefully for the good of their children. Read the daily schedule of the children here, can you imagine the impact the Church could have for God's glory if we lived as diligently? Please understand, I am not saying they have everything right. It pains my soul grievously to know that these people have been deceived and are leading their children to follow the false prophet Joseph Smith, Lee and I talked about the irony last night that they only allow the children to read true stories as a prerequisite of following their false religion, but this is not the way we deal with that. Jesus said to "teach all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost: Teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I have commanded you", not to go into communities and kidnap their children if they aren't teaching the ways of The Christ exclusively. Besides, do we really think that the majority of the children would really be better off even spiritually, let alone physically, in foster care than they are at home? I pray that some of these children are being exposed to the True gospel and will take it to heart, perhaps one of them could be the spark that starts a revival and return to True truth in the FLDS community. But that said, we can't let this go on! Who will be next? Should we go into the homes of Catholics and take their children en masse? After all, according to the Catholic church "The marriageable age is fourteen full years in males and twelve full years in females, under penalty of nullity, (unless natural puberty supplies the want of years)". Would we carelessly stand by and watch the Amish be herded up and held on no charges for several weeks only to eventually have their children torn from them and sent home empty? Then why these people? What about the fundamentalist Christians who some feel are living a life of legalism, is that enough of a spiritual guffaw to get their children taken away? If you take the false prophet Joseph Smith and his like out of the picture our family lives very much like these people. We teach our children to follow Yeshua (Jesus of Nazareth), the True Prophet, Priest and King. We don't vaccinate, we home birth, we home educate, we wear modest clothing (skirts or dresses for women and girls), we are trying to implement a more and more natural diet in our home, we do not plan to limit our family size but rather to accept children as gifts from God Himself in His timing, we teach our children that the secular world is immoral and, yes, even full of evil and in desperate need of a Savior. We teach our children that marriage and child bearing are wonderful callings from God, we teach biblical submission to fathers/husbands as our family leaders. We have no problem with marrying young (within the legal limits, of course) the whole idea of calling a 16 year old a "child bride" and speaking as if a 16 year old couldn't possibly want to be married comes across as ludicrous to us (in Texas the legal marriageable age with parental consent is 16). I was 16 and Lee 19 when we were legally married without parental consent. I knew what I was doing, I was not a "child". Historically Mary was likely 14 (and possibly younger) and Joseph could have been 40 years old when Jesus was born, the Bible sets no limits on age differences, so even a large age difference shouldn't be perceived as an automatic sin.
So on what grounds have we as a nation tried and convicted these people of... what? On what grounds are we allowing 24 year old women to be held as minors because CPS doesn't think they "look" old enough regardless of the fact that they have produced government documentation that proves otherwise? On what grounds are we silently standing by while women are held as "children" until their babies are born and CPS has custody of the newborn and then suddenly decides to believe her? How can we allow children who have been raised in a moral environment to be "thrown to the wolves" without speaking out? The President himself who is so concerned about the mistreatment of people in other countries has been notified of the situation and to my knowledge has yet to do anything about it (whether or not he personally received it from his staffer, he knows of the letter and it is available for anyone to see online here).
As you read the accounts of this situation in the media, read with open eyes and discernment. For instance while the media was crying "41 of the groups children have had broken bones!", what they weren't making clear was that 41 children is only 9% and the national average is over 10%! The average in some families (who do not abuse their children) is 100%! Or the headline "31 of 53 teen girls are pregnant or had children" which was plastered on every news service failed to just as boldly point out that 26 of those "girls" were actually saying they were 18 or older. One of the young women has finally been believed and released, after having given birth to her baby and the baby being taken into custody by CPS as the "child of a child", what do you bet that happens here too? There are only five girls under the age of 18 who may be pregnant or already mothering, and don't forget that in Texas the legal age limit for marriage is 16 with parental permission!
Please, please read the accounts of people who were there, You can read the personal accounts, like this one or this one, of the mental health workers through the links in the article linked to above listed in the section titled "The floor was literally slick with tears...", read them and weep for the heartless injustice of it. Pray for these mothers, children and fathers. Pray for the people who are in charge of this mess. Pray for eyes to be opened and justice to prevail. Pray for the Salvation of all involved. And pray that America would once again become "one Nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all."
"In Germany they first came for the Communists and I didn't speak up because I wasn't a Communist.
Then they came for the Jews, and I didn't speak up because I wasn't a Jew.
Then they came for the trade unionists and I didn't speak up because I wasn't a trade unionist.
Then they came for the Catholics and I didn't speak up because I was a Protestant.
Then they came for me and by that time no one was left to speak up."
~Pastor Martin Niemöller
Some great blogs to watch to get the latest news on this fiasco:
http://heartkeepercommonroom.blogspot.com/
http://gritsforbreakfast.blogspot.com/
http://www.flds.ws/
Here are videos of the mothers and fathers in their own words (please note, there may be a very immodest razor commercial play before the video loads in the first two links):
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/21134540/vp/24577612#24575095
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/21134540/vp/24577612#24577612
http://www.flds.ws/2008/04/28/dateline-nbc-inside-private-world-of-polygamist-ranch/
Here is a website set up by the FLDS themselves with timelines and videos:
http://www.captivefldschildren.org/index.php
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