Revolution--For Jesus!

© March 1993 by Edward Priebe.
Printed & distributed, with permission, by No Longer Children.

This is the account of how two former top teachers and editors of the Children of God walked into a large COG Home, the only one left in the Philippines, took it over for one month in the Fall of 1992 and started a genuine Revolution For Jesus. The two ex-members were Daniel Welsh (aka Samson Warner) who joined the COG in its very beginning in Huntington Beach in 1969, and a pioneer of "Mo Education" in the '70s who worked on many of the first classes in the "Basic 144" green book. After years as a True Komix artist, he left the group in 1986, went to Bible School and joined a charismatic church. The other ex-member was myself, Edward Priebe (aka Hart Inkletter or Eduardo) who joined the COG in August 1971 with the Jesus People Army in Vancouver, Canada. As an artist, I came to be in charge of the COG's True Komix art ministry for two years. I then spent six years as one of the COG's top editors and doctrinal "apologists", over four of these together with Apollos from 1985 to 1990. I worked on scores of projects such as "The Endtime Bible" and "Word Basics". In 1990 I left them, began doing creative writing and joined a charismatic church.

BACKGROUND

Because the most amazing and illegal things that I knew about the COG had happened in the Phillippines, I decided to return there to do some investigative reporting. I had been in the Philippines between 1984-88, first in an elite publications production unit just under Mo Maria's unit and later with Mo and Maria themselves on their farm compound outside Manila. The COG had already been in the Philippines for over ten years, FF'ing government officials, lawyers, politicians, etc. But when the People Power Revolution occurred in the Philippines, Mo and Maria saw the opportunity to infiltrate the newly-reformed Armed Forces. They sent their top musicians in to sing and teams of pretty girls to give out devotions of "Doily Food" to top generals and officers. At this time, I was assigned to write many of these Bible stories and classes for the new converts.

Under a Filipino pen name (Y.S. Flores) Apollos and I began writing a series of articles to promulgate Mo's political and economic views, which were printed in the largest newspaper in the Philippines. Mo's goal, as strange and absurd as it may seem, was nothing less than to incite the military to overthrow the government of Corazon Aquino, so that he himself could rule the Philippines as their guru, the power behind the junta. Another blatant example of his uncontrolled lust for power.

In June 1987, a couple months after bad publicity about their sexual practices forced most COG to leave the Philippines, Mo & Maria went to Japan where they turned their energies to developing PR around their "international school" there. A few months later, the Publications unit I was in followed them there which is where I left the group in 1990. By 1992 I was in contact with other ex-members and heard that an year-old COG disciple, Benjamin Farnsworth, after having spent years in COG detention centers as a "problem case" had committed suicide. I had known Ben as a young boy and though he had his problems, his main problem was that he was a highly intelligent teen who did a lot of thinking and asked questions, both of which are tops on the list of "sins" in the Family. Infuriated at the horrible oppression that had driven Ben to his death, I felt intense anger for the first time at the corrupt system the Family had become and decided to expose them.

There was another reason to go to Manila: For over two years I had been praying for an Asian wife. I also wanted her to have once been in the Family so she would fully understand me. Now that plans were firming up to return to the Philippines, I remembered that there was a girl in Manila who fit the description perfectly: Ruthie, a Filipina sister I had met years ago and with whom I'd once had very loving correspondence with for a long time.

I arrived in the Philippines and by September 24 when I had done as much outside research as I could, I prepared to try and enter the COG Home. I knew it would take an absolute miracle to get me through the COG's intense security measures. With the help of a friend of the COG, I explained that I was coming to teach classes and sort out some problems and he gave me the COG's street address and phone number as well as the names of the shepherds. I phoned Dan in America that night and the next morning, September 25, Dan called the COG Home and in a voice that sounded like Mo (but not actually saying he was Mo) told the shepherds to pick me up at the airport. They were to tell no one that I had come, not even their direct overseers at ASCRO (Asian Central Reporting Office).

God had miraculously prepared the way for my arrival. They had received a message some weeks earlier from ASCRO telling them that an important visitor (who wasn't named) would be coming to see them sometime soon. In their minds, hers I was.' When the shepherds James and Joy picked me up, I casually asked, "Is there a sister named Ruthie here?" "Yes," they replied, but informed me that she had been going through many "trials" recently and two weeks earlier had actually made up her mind to leave the Family. They had barely talked her out of it at the last minute. ("Whoopie.'" I thought, "You've prepared her heart, God .' ")

Ruthie's story was truly heartbreaking. Her parents had recently lost their jobs at the Dole pineapple canning factory and were in financial straits. Ruthie's mother had asked her to please come home, get a Job and help support them. Ruthie had been deeply moved and had nearly left. Because of her "problem" in "not putting God and the work first, she was under close scrutiny. I informed James and Joy that I'd be happy to have private talks with Ruthie and counsel her, and they gladly agreed.

When I arrived at the Home, Ruthie had been gone all day on an outreach team and when she returned at 11 p.m. that night, her worst fears were realized when James told her to "go into the den" because "someone wanted to talk to her". "Well, this is it," she thought, her heart sinking. "Oh God, give me the grace to accept the rebuke that I surely deserve," she prayed. Mustering up all her courage to face whoever had flown in, she knocked quietly on my door.

"Ruthie?" I asked as he came around the rattan divider. I hadn't remembered her being so beautiful. She looked at me with a blank expression. I had been reading by a small lamp and the main light wasn't on. Also, I had a moustache. When I told her my name, she let out a joyful cry of recognition. Never in my life did I receive a hug like the one she gave me then. For nearly two hours we talked, and most of what I spoke to her was comfort. A fever was currently sweeping across Manila and many tens of thousands of people were sick with it, including half the thirty-some children in the Home. As Mo and Maria had made clear in many writings, it was always some adult's fault when the child got sick. Ruthie and several other girls in the Home were involved in childcare fulltime, sacrificially giving their lives day in and day out to care for the children, so the blame naturally fell on them. Ruthie had been told to "search her heart for sin" and was under a lot of condemnation.

"That's ridiculous!" I told her laughing. "Half of Manila is sick with this fever. Are you responsible for all that too? I mean, Just how bad are you?" Even she had to laugh at that one. I reminded her from God's Word that the condemnation being foisted upon her was not of God.

During the next few days, as we renewed our former friendship and romance, I began feeling a tremendous love for Ruthie. On Sunday, Ruthie and I went to a nearby park -- so far as the Home knew I was taking her for a "walkie-talkie" to counsel her about her problems. But the truth of the matter was that we were deeply in love. If, as planned, I had only a few days before I was out of the Home I had no time to lose. So as we sat beside a tree-lined pond, I proposed to Ruthie and she accepted. We prayed together afterwards and Ruthie described a vision that she'd received of us together with a house and children in a cool, tree-filled country. I was astonished! The scenery she was describing was Canada!

As I only planned to be in the Home a matter of days before exiting again, I immediately instructed James and Joy to write reports of the entire Family security set-up in the country, mentioning all the officials, both private sector and government, who were friends and who could be counted on to use their position to help the Family in the event of persecution. It became clear that one of the key COG disciples in the Philippines was Joy's "baby"* a lawyer named X. X was a longtime friend of the Family and involved to the hilt in everything the COG was doing. (*A baby is a man who gets sex, together with spiritual teaching on a regular basis from a Family woman who is therefore his "mother" or "mommy".)

Unknown to his own wife, X had three children by his Family mistress Joy and because he tithed 20% of his income to the Family, was the Home's chief benefactor who paid a huge chunk of the rent for the mansion on 24 Canton Street. He was one of the top lawyers in the Philippines, had very close relations with key men in the investigative bureau and was friends with scores of other men in powerful positions, all of whom at his behest would move legs/and politics/wheels to help X's "friends" in time of need.

To my surprise, James told me they were storing a whole container full of COG lit -- trunk after trunk of Mo books and other Family publications that had been left behind when the Homes had closed down and moved hastily out of the Philippines in 1987. I had them bring the trunks over to the house where James put two disciples to work preparing completely updated trunks of lit for me. I had hoped to get some FF volumes but was told that, following a COG advisory they had burned all their FF books Just a few months earlier. In fact, quite a bit of "hot" lit had been destroyed in "crumpling parties". To my delight, however, there was one box of "hot" lit that had been spared.

James also let me know that when Music With Meaning had left the Philippines in 1986-7, they had left behind severe/trunks full of videos, reels end video masters. I asked if there were any "hot" videos amongst them (such as nude dance videos or of people having sex) and I was given the inventory list. I found some titles that looked pretty explicit and had them pulled and brought to me. These I removed to use as evidence with authorities.

On Tuesday, September 29, I had a dream that I had removed the MWM trunks from storage and was telling Family leadership, "I have something that belongs to you." And then I added, "And you have something that belongs to me: my children." That led to a new thought that had not occurred to me before -- using them as a means of exchange for my two children I had fathered while in the COG and who were still in it.

Originally, I had planned on getting the evidence out of the Home, leaving with Ruthie, then releasing the information to the Philippine media and authorities. But by this time, my conscience began to bother me. I realized that James and Joy, because of their deep involvement in everything they were revealing to me, would be in personal danger once it went public. The Philippines is a rough country, and it was not hard to imagine them either getting killed by disgruntled contacts-turned-enemies, or at the very least being imprisoned or suffering in some way.

Despite the fact that they were leaders -- and rather harsh, extravagant and oppressive leaders, as the Home members later informed me -- I felt compassion for them. After all, they were simply pawns operating under the Family's mind control. They had fifteen children between them and would have trouble leaving the country on short notice should they have to. I knew that for their own safety, I had to get them out of the country.

From living at Mo's house back at the time where I heard the whole inside story -- and from having recently re-read the 1987 articles I'd dug out of the newspaper files -- I knew that over five years earlier the Family had publicly promised the authorities that all foreign leaders had left the Philippines or would leave in a few days. Yet, Joy and James had never left! They'd been in the Philippines the whole time! -- From even before the 1987 COG exodus! Sending them out of the country was merely helping them comply, albeit belatedly, with the COG's own agreement with the Philippine authorities as documented in government records and many newspapers.

On the morning of Thursday, October 1, I called James and Joy into the den and informed them that they were invited to go to California for some meetings. (As a matter of fact, I planned to fly there a week later to meet with them at which point I planned to tell them the full reasons why they'd had to leave the country. I would leave the choice with them whether they wanted to return to the Family or not, but the point was I had to get them to safety. )

One of the last things Joy did was to turn over computer disks of Family "Security Notes" to me. These were file after file detailing exactly how the Family conceals "hot" materials, hid from authorities and does whitewashing "PR" work to hide their infamous doctrines and illegal practices. It made for some pretty incredible reading! She then told me the ultra-secret password that had to be used to decrypt any modemed files and gave me the secret Family programs which enabled their offices to encrypt and decrypt and "ZIP" their modemed messages. Joy told me smiling, "These programs are government-proof", meaning that not even government computer experts could crack them.

On the morning of Tuesday, October 6, Joy, James and his Filipina wife Lily and their combined fifteen children flew out of the Philippines. I arranged for a friend in Los Angeles to arrange accommodations for them. I suggested they take a few days off to take their children to Disneyland, Sea World and other places of interest, as a much-needed vacation, to which they happily agreed.

With James and Joy gone, the day-to-day running of the Home was in the capable hands of Philippine nationals Tim and Aura. Though they checked most decisions and schedules with me, I told them I had confidence in them and let them operate on their own faith as none of what they suggested was illegal or immoral, and I saw no reason to interfere. The members of the Home began opening up and telling me of all the abuses that they had been suffering, including poor food, psychological torture which left them with suicidal wishes, and "silence restrictions" in which husbands and wives were forbidden to talk with one another! I still have the letters they wrote me in their own handwriting which verify the abuses they mentioned.

The very morning James and Joy left, something pivotal occurred. I was walking to the den when I noticed a chart on the communal bulletin board. To my surprise, I saw that it was an "Adult Demerit Chart" in which members were receiving public exposure and demerits for such trivial offenses as dropping a dish, wearing outside clothes in the house, or stepping across the "red line" in the kitchen. Disgusted by these childish, legalistic attempts to control adults' behaviour through public shaming, I ripped the Demerit Chart down and went to my room. The idea came to me to give a class to the Home called "Legalistic Laws? - Or Loving Disciples?"

The whole time I had been in contact with friends as well as other ex-members who were praying for me, including Dan Welsh (Samson Warner). As I was thinking of giving classes to the Home and Dan had been one of the early teachers of the COG, the idea unfolded to invite him to come and help me. Besides, at this point I was so involved in the day-to-day running of the Home that I barely had any time left to expose them!

Dan was excited about the idea and after talking it over with his wife, agreed to come. So, I told the Home that in a few days a powerful teacher, one who had joined in the earliest days in Huntington Beach, was going to arrive. I wasn't sure what name Dan wanted to use in the Home; but because he was a huge bear of a man, I simply referred to him as "the gentle giant". On Sunday, October 11, Tim and I went to the International Airport to pick Dan up. It had been many years since I'd seen him. In fact, the last time we had been together was in the Artists' Home in Tenerife in 1978. It was good to see him again.

As we later sat in the Den discussing strategies, I explained to him that the Reporting Office ASCRO was getting very suspicious. We realized that they would soon send someone to investigate. We decided our best hope of preventing that would be to visit them before they visited us and put their communications out of commission. The airlines had recently given me $500 in payment for my baggage which they had lost. It would be just enough to cover my round-trip ticket to Bangkok.

I envisioned ASCRO as a giant evil spider, with its many "legs" being the lines of communications from its office to all the Homes on this side of the world. What I would attempt to do was to "kill the spider"; by my very presence there, I hoped to induce unprecedented paranoia causing the office personnel to scatter and bringing down the lines of communication as ASCRO went into hiding. ASCRO was, by now, beginning to call the Home more frequently, demanding to speak to the shepherds James and Joy. We decided to get the two most complete trunks out of the Home and shipped them away.

A day later I had Tim drive me to the airport where I caught a flight to Thailand. In the meantime, however, ASCRO called Dan and demanded to know what was happening. On the spot, he told them that he had a message for them: "The enemy has unZipped all our files." This sent ASCRO into a state of red alert. They could hardly have heard worse news. As a result, their paranoia was running so high that no one came to the airport to pick me up.

I decided to call them anyway and told them that I knew they were the Children of God, the Family of Love. I knew from living in Mo's Home that true to form the entire office would immediately begin packing and preparing to move. They very likely stayed up all that night packing and making "flee preparations". They had many illegal and sensitive documents there and to their horror, their security had been breached!

To understand the absurdity of this, try to imagine any legitimate Christian organization in the world going into "red alert" and scrambling to hastily remove files, papers and personnel simply because someone calls them up and says he knows who they are! Doesn't it give you the impression that the Family have something to hide? Remember, all I did was call them. I wasn't even hinting that I would visit them. Unable to visit ASCRO, I took a flight hack to Manila the next morning.

When ASCRO called the Manila Home, knowing we could no longer keep the matter from them, Dan boldly informed them that we had started a Revolution for Jesus in the Philippines. Referring to the Family he said, "This outfit began as a revolution for Jesus, and it's going to finish as one!" Dan then proceeded to go on a five-hour teaching marathon and, when I returned from Bangkok later that day, was just finishing a powerful class against legalism. He poured out his heart to the members, wept, challenged them, imploring them to return to the Bible as the basis of their Christianity and to break free of man-made rules and laws. The Home members had never seen such an anointed teacher and responded with enthusiasm, literally dancing for joy as his teachings shattered the chains that had been binding them.

Shortly thereafter, ASCRO called the lawyer X, asking him what was happening. In a private talk with me the next day X mentioned the fact they had called. Concerned about them calling the Home's contacts behind our backs, Dan and I derided to call COG leadership that night and tell them to keep their hands off the Philippines. As ASCRO's phone was no longer in service, we called the office in Hong Kong. Hong Kong had officially deported the COG in 1986, and their very presence there was extremely illegal, in flagrant violation of Hong Kong law. Dan told them to "tell Adam at ASCRO to lay off the Philippines or we'll begin calling all the secret addresses we have, and lots of people will have to move!" For good measure, we decided to call the phone number in Tokyo, giving them the same instructions: "If you don't want us to start exposing every Home we know, tell Adam at ASCRO to keep his hands off the Philippines." The next day, none of the phone numbers we called were in operation.

Although they were in a temporary state of disarray, scattering like cockroaches when the lights come on, we knew it was only a matter of time before they would reorganize and move against us. We had a choice: We could either move out immediately the dozens of lit trunks full of incriminating evidence against the Family -- a day-long operation -- and leave, or we could continue to give classes to the members there and try to set them free. It was either the people or the materials.

By now the members were becoming very liberated and were opening up and telling us incredible stories of the bondage, mistreatment and abuse they had been suffering under their former shepherds and the "DTR". If we left at this point, we felt we'd be abandoning them just as they were coming to the birth. As we had the two complete lit trunks out already as well as the MWM trunks and all kinds of files, we decided we'd stay and help these poor kids and try to free them from the horrible bondage they'd been suffering under. We had been two of the top doctrinal experts of the Family. No one knew either the Bible or the Mo Letters better than we did. We would stay. Now began the real battle.

The Family has a policy -- in the name of "security" -- of destroying all photos of their parents, of burning love letters and anything which might be "used as evidence" or cause them to think of their "system" parents. But I told them that instead of going around with boxes of matches burning innocent letters and photos of loved ones, they ought to burn every Mo Letter and Family policy that caused this worldwide persecution and had made such paranoic "security" necessary in the first place.

One of the first classes I taught was "Honour Thy Parents". On the whiteboard behind me I wrote Exodus 20:12 "Honour thy father and thy mother, that thy days may be long upon the land". Then I asked them, "Do you want your days to be long in this land? Or do you want to be deported, as the Family has been repeatedly, from Hong Kong, Indonesia, China and India -- and as they almost were from the Philippines in 1987?

I pointed out that one of the main reasons the Family were suffering persecution and deportation was because of the Fami!y's sins, because of such horrible policies as not "honouring our fathers and mothers". I asked them how long it had been since they'd seen their parents who were right here in this country. Some said three years, some said four years. "And how long since you've written them?" Most said it had been a year. (This was a direct implementation of the Family policy to cut off "unfruitful relationships".)

In the case of Marie, it had been four years since she'd seen her parents, even tough they lived Just across the city. In fact, they had no idea she was even in the country, believing she and her husband were in Thailand. And Marie's own mother didn't even know she had another baby -- and they were in the same city! "Is that honouring your parents?" I asked. They all shook their heads. "Then how can you expect God to bless you and keep you 'long in the land'?" I asked. "You have so much security and secrecy and so avoid your parents, no wonder you make so many enemies and have so much persecution!"

I told all of them to immediately get in contact with their parents, to write or call them and start inviting them over.

One of my very next classes was an expose of Mo's doctrine of holier-than-thou exclusivism. He taught that the Family were the most dedicated, on-fire, hundred-percent Christians on earth, more "special" to God than any other Christians, and that they were serving God better than anyone else in the world. He even wrote a letter entitled "We Are It!"

"That's a lie!" I told everyone, "We are not it. Jesus is 'it'." I quoted John 12:32 where Jesus said, "And I, if I be lifted up, will draw all men unto Me" and explained that thinking we are it is pride and leads to legalism. "After all, if we are it, then we are the only place on earth you can truly serve God. if you want to serve God you have to stay in the Family. You can't go somewhere else and still be serving God." I then quoted facts and figures on how many millions of souls other Christians were leading to the Lord around the world and told them that the Family could hardly be more than a small insignificant part of what was happening. Realising that Jesus was "it", and that He worked through many different Christians worldwide, and that we weren't "the only ones" would free people to serve God as they felt led, even if they wanted to go to another Christian fellowship.

Over the years Mo had declared one "revolution" after another -the '"FF revolution", the "health revolution" , the "honesty revolution", the "obedience revolution", etc. etc. ad infinitum. Now Dan declared that we were going to have a Bible revolution! "We're going to forget all the foolish policies and doctrines of man that have caused us nothing but trouble and persecution and get back to the foundation of the unchangeable eternal Word of God, the Bible:" he shouted. "We're going to get back to what the Family started out as: a revolution for Jesus!"

"REVOLUTION;" he shouted. "For JESUS!" the Home responded. It had probably been years since they had been challenged with that cry. At that moment I came walking in with a huge banner I'd printed up on the computer saying, "Revolution For Jesus!" and we immediately hung it up on the wall and it stayed there to remind the members what was happening. This was a revolution, a metanoia, a complete turnaround to get back to Jesus.

Then I taught a three-hour class on scriptural marriage. I compared FF'ing to an "experiment" but informed them that the experiment had, unfortunately, "blown up in the laboratory".

"And what do you do in a case like that?" I asked. "Keep on trying to operate amidst the rubble? Or do you clean out all the damage and junk, get back to the foundation and start over?" Obviously, that was what to do. Then I asked, "If FF'ing was the will of God and the truth of God, then why did we turn around and burn all the FF books? If it was the truth, we should have been willing to die for it! Yet we burned them all. Why?" I looked everyone in the eye, then answered the question: "Because it was wrong. It was a mistake."

I then held up my Bible and told them that since there weren't any more FF books to go by, they'd have to return to what the Bible says about sex and marriage. Regarding the practice of "sharing" (members having sex indiscriminately albeit in a regulated fashion with one another), I asked them why, if Mo was right in saying that sharing was the "pure love of God" and we were "the most liberated Christians in the world", then why after having sharing "dates" did they feel such loneliness and emptiness? And why were they all crying for a husband or wife? No one argued. They knew from years of experience that I was telling the truth.

Because of the persecution happening in various countries of the world at the time, World Services had recently ordered all Homes to on a three-day fast, one entire day of which was to be spent doing nothing but cursing their enemies. So I gave a class based on Matthew 5:44, reminding the Home members that Jesus had instructed his followers, "I say unto you, Love your enemies, bless them that curse you and pray for (not against) them that ... persecute you."

"No matter which way you turn that verse, or how you try to interpret it," I pointed out, "Jesus said plainly 'curse not'. And it's in red letters in my Bible, which means that Jesus Himself said it. So are you going to believe and obey Jesus?"

I called on them to repent of such unchristian practices and explained that the Family was suffering worldwide persecution not because of their righteousness but because of their sins. slowly but surely the members began to get the point, and many were moved to tears. This happened repeatedly; and often in private counseling sessions, they would weep in my arms.

When Home members began seeing that we were serious about setting them free in Christ; and as we taught them day after day to be honest and to speak out against the injustices they'd been suffering, the whole "can of worms" began spilling out.

The Family had recently produced several public relations "Statements" which they were now distributing worldwide, denying abuses, claiming what good Christians they are. But, as the members of the Manila Home told us, these "Statements" were such obvious lies and so blatantly different from the reality of everyday life in the Home, that many of them refused to even read them.

For example, one "Statement" insisted that all Family members eat nourishing, healthy food. Yet members informed me that it was only the leaders who were getting really good food. The rest of them ate a lot of rice and beans. Also when Joy was pregnant, she get the best of food with a special shelf in the kitchen just for her. But poor pregnant Lilyjoy had no such privileges.

Dan and I thought we already knew how bad the Family system was. Of course, we thought things had probably gotten a little worse since we left, but basically we thought we had heard it all. But now, day after day, as members began being honest and telling us of the horrible injustices being perpetrated on them as part of the "DTR" we were shocked.

For example, all members were required to write OHRs ("Open Heart Reports") several times a week. In addition to reporting what Mo Letters they had read, they had to report whether they had a bowel movement or not, what work they'd accomplished, if they'd had sex and with whom. They were also required to report on themselves and "confess their sins", what doubts they were having, what they were thinking, "lessons" they were learning, etc. The shepherds would then deal with them about their "sins", rebuke them for their faults and give them Mo Letter reading lists to help them "overcome their weaknesses".

It doesn't take much to see that the entire point of the OHRs is to enable leadership to control the lives, actions and even thoughts of those under them. Forced to report on even the tiniest variances from accepted behavlour, people effectively blackmail themselves. Constantly rebuked for even tiny, innocent mistakes and flaws, members end up in a state of demoralization, fear and trepidation, constantly trying to modify their behaviour to please their leaders and avoid a rebuke. This state of man-pleasing, of doing "good works" to gain approval, turns them into total victims of manipulation and mind control. How opposite from the freedom in Christ that believers are supposed to enjoy!

In addition, reporting on others was expected. Husbands and wives were required to report on each other. This caused bickering, divisions and fear. As a result of the oppressive implementation of the "DTR" people began developing problems. As Aura said, "I never had all these problems before-"' Two married couples, Peter & Praise and the undershepherds Tim & Aura were on "silence restriction", meaning they couldn't talk to one another about anything more important than the weather. Why? Because their marital unity was threatening to become a "god" and cause them to be more loyal to one another than to the Family. With them being forced to report on each other, it was no wonder they had serious marital problems!

Four women confessed they had often thought of dying. Three of them had been very sick recently and during that time had begged God to let them die and "take them home" so that the hell of their existence in a Family Home would finally end. (At least if they died and went to Heaven, they wouldn't be accused of "backsliding"!)

Horrors! Horrors! Horrorsl HORRORS! As we began finding out just how demonically legalistic and unloving the system had become, we were completely floored! We were more determined than ever to set these dear brothers and sisters free from the corrupt COG system!

Meanwhile, the outside Family leadership continued contacting X, the lawyer/disciple and his partner. It was not difficult to win them back over. After all, hadn't we sent Joy, X's "mommy" out of the country? And under our reform, none of the sisters in the Home were "taking care" of either X or his partner.

Besides X had never had to live in a Family Home and suffer the oppression that regular members did. Because he gave financial gifts and offered legal aid and political protection, he was treated like royalty and wined and dined and bedded by his lover. Unconcerned about (and perhaps ignorant of) the horrible repression that their actions would bring upon the poor members, X and his partner began working hand in glove with outside Family leadership. The COG flew in "Angela" to help organize the counter-revolution. A top Filipina FF'er, Angela had been the Family's chief spokesperson at their 1987 news conference in the Philippines defending FFing and sex practices and was the Family's chief Liaison with the military, having been a secret lover of a top general.

Dan and I thought we could win the battle by simply telling the members the truth and winning them over to our side. This we did. But we didn't take into consideration that even though the Family hadn't had a strong presence in the country for several years, nevertheless the entire country, via X, was a literal minefield of contacts, ready to explode.

In the Manila Home, the Revolution For Jesus was now in full force, but behind our backs the Family was moving swiftly to pull off a counter-revolution. In the tradition of blind religious intolerance they began moving to crush the poor disciples' bid for personal freedom. The Family of course in their own works-oriented self-righteousness didn't see things that way. They were, as Mo had said, indeed "it" and saw no reason to repent. Repent of what? They had no sins they were aware of. After all, how could they have sin? Hadn't Mo told them they were the best, most righteous Christians on the face of the earth? Weren't they faithfully following every Jot and tittle and law that proceeded out of Mo and Maria's mouth? Weren't they proving their love for Christ by their blind, unquestioning obedience to leadership? "Get back to the Bible?" What? Had they ever departed from it? Simply because they exalted Mo's letters above the Bible as "God's word for today"? No, as far as the Family was concerned, they were not the ones in the wrong. It was these enemies" and "backsliders" who bad taken over the Manila home who were wrong, who were "totally inspired by the Devil". Why would anyone in their right mind object to their wonderful new DTR dictatorship anyway?

It had been planned to have the entire Home spend a weekend out X's farm north of Manila, and now the time had come. We would be out in the country surrounded by God's creation, and Dan and I prepare to give them our final, most liberating classes. We would prove to the from the Bible and from Mo's own writings that he was not God's prophet.

Most regular Family members do not know that Mo (David Berg) because he is old and sick and largely because of his horrible mercurial policies -- poorly thought out and too quickly implemented -- is no longer in charge of the Family. Mo's "wife" Maria and her right-hand Man Peter Amsterdam, in an effort to keep the Family from self-destructing, have taken over and are in charge.

I gave testimonies from the eight months I'd lived with Mo and Maria which proved beyond any doubt that Mo was being cordoned off and eased into retirement. While he puttered about the yard directing handyman work and giving a few classes, Maria and Peter were running the show. "Why did this happen?" I asked them. I began explaining how Mo had made a "lot of mistakes" down through the years and they'd had to take over or he'd have destroyed them. This didn't surprise anyone. I'd already explained how FFing was a mistake.

Now they were in for another shocker. "What would you do if I told you that Jesus was not the Son of God?" I asked them. I made a point of looking everyone in the eye. One brother was the only one to answer: "I'd say you were a liar!" he answered. "Good for you!" I told him.

Then I asked, "What would you say if I told you that there were Mo Letters which say that Jesus was not the Son of God? Would you believe them?" Everyone shook his head. It was, after all, only a theoretical question as far as they knew. "Well, those Mo Letters have already been written," I informed them. Several gasped and looked shocked.

I then read quotes from Mo's Letters "Huntington Beach 1968" and "The Vespers" in which Mo declared -- based on a lascivious interpretation of Luke 1:28 -- that when the angel Gabriel "came in unto Mary", that it meant he had sexual intercourse with the virgin Mary and that Jesus was conceived of the angel's semen. According to Mo, Jesus was not the divinely-conceived Son of God, but the result of an angel having sex with Mary. I proved to the Home members from the Bible, however, that Mo was wrong, dead wrong.

To show just how far Mo had fallen away from God, I read them most of his letter "A Prayer For the Poor" in which he repeatedly denounced and practically cursed God for not answering his prayers immediately. After saying that he "didn't have a God any more" and that he was "sick of God", Mo made the shocking statement, "Hail evil! Hail Satan:" Everyone was stunned. There were so many Mo Letters in existence that, like the letters containing the Gabriel doctrine, they'd had no idea that Mo even said these things.

At this point, I said, "I think it's important that everyone prays a prayer renouncing the goddesses doctrine, the Gabriel doctrine and Mo's statements in 'Prayer For the Poor'." One person after another began praying powerful prayers of repentance, asking God to forgive them for having ever followed a man instead of Jesus, and clearly and unmistakably renouncing Mo's doctrines. One girl even went so far as to denounce these teachings of Mo as "doctrines of devils". This, mind you, from people who only that morning had considered Mo to be "God's anointed", the greatest man of God who had ever walked the face of the earth.

Now Dan read a class he had written several years age and quoted from a Mo Letter called "The Playground" in which Mo described a horrible dream he'd had about a nice clinical "operation" in which a head was being removed from a body! Dan then quoted Col. 2:18,19 which says, "Let no man beguile you of your reward in ... worshipping of angels ... not holding the Head. (Christ) from which all the Body ... having nourishment ministered, and knit together, increaseth with the increase of God." Dan than went on to show that this dream of Mo's had been fulfilled in the Family, in the COG itself! Mo, through his heretical doctrines, had literally been removing the Head, Christ, of our Body, the COG.

Dan's final class summed up everything we had been teaching them for two weeks and completely blew the lid off the legalism of the new Family system. In an old Mo Letter called "The School", Mo related a dream about how the U.S.A. was going to be taken over by a hard-line, fascist dictatorship and how all the youth of the nation would be sent to "the school" where they would do long hours of manual labour and be given endless classes on the glories of "the wonderful new parental regime".

Dan pointed out how this dream had been fulfilled by the Family itself, with Mo and Maria (known as "Dad" and "Mama" or "Mommy"), were the heads and how the "victors" program had begun in the Japan school where member after member had been sent for "retraining" and to go through the "thought-reform" program in chilling fulfillment of Mo's dream! Even in the tiniest details, this nightmare had been fulfilled in the Family!

Dan compared going to "the school" or victors program to receiving a lobotomy in which the frontal lobe of a disciple's brain, the part which does the thinking, was removed by Family leadership. No longer allowed to think for themselves, doing only what their leaders tell them to do, Family members are being turned into meek, submissive, unthinking zombies.

"These dreams are real!" Dan exploded. "I believe God gave these revelations to Mo! Do you know why I believe that?" He then quoted 2 Thess. 2:10-12, "Because they received not the love of the truth (the Bible), that they might be saved ... for this cause God shall send them strong delusions, that they should believe a lie, that they all might be damned who believed not the truth, but had pleasure in unrighteousness." Incredibly, the Home members received this shocking statement.

Completely liberated by this time, the members were shouting for joy. When we shared our vision with them of exporting our "revolution for Jesus" to different Family Homes around the world to liberate them as well, several members were literally jumping up and down with excitement. It had been a hard battle, but they were liberated! It was Sunday evening, October 18.

Two weeks earlier I had made contingency plans in the event of a COG counter-attack. I had left a computer diskette containing all the reports on Family contacts and all the illegal things the Family and X had done, as well as print-outs of these with an outside friend, telling him to immediately take these files to the highest Philippine authorities if the COG tried anything. On October 20th, when we learned that "Angela" was indeed in the Philippines, I phoned a friend to ask him to immediately take the incriminating print-outs to the government. I had one last print-out fully disclosing X's relation to the COG as well as the power he exerted through his many friends and derided to leave the Home to fax it to the government.

While I was out, Dan talked with the Filipino members, asking them to make a choice. One after another they affirmed their faith in everything we had taught them. Tim, however, pretended to be unconvinced so Dan carefully explained to him that if he didn't stand for the truth but went back to the legalistic Family system, leadership would not spare him but would put him through intensive "retraining and thought reform". Tim cringed because he knew what Dan was saying was true, but he'd already made his choice and it was too late for him to change his mind ...

Just as Dan was talking to him, the door of the den opened and in walked several National Bureau of Investigation (NBI) officers with guns as well as a female "reporter" who turned out to be Angela. "Who brings an accusation against this man?" the chief Inspector asked. "I do:" Tim said, leaping to his feet. The investigator informed Dan that serious charges had been laid against him including being part of a conspiracy to "kidnap" James and Joy. Tim then insisted that the NBI make Dan open all his suitcases and briefcases so they could search them, and in the process the COG seized several of our personal possessions including my computer disks I had asked Dan to keep in his brief case.

It turned out that Angela wasn't the only Family leader to enter the Home. In violation of Philippine law, the Family had also flown in foreign leadership including top leaders from ASCRO who immediately commandeered the house, put the members in fear and refused to permit any of them to leave, at first shooing them into a side bedroom. Although after a while they were allowed to leave the room, they couldn't leave the house.

(Ruthie:) "I arrived back at the house after a long day out witnessing. Then Angela and Aura instructed us to go into the master bed room and not to come back out but to stay here. Everyone, including the children, were there. I remembered what Dan and Ed had told me." (The night before we had fully explained to Ruthie, as well as a couple others, that we'd been out of the Family for a while and were no longer "members" but had felt God calling us back to teach the truth to set people free.) "Thank God for that talk, as I was able to understand the whole thing. So I told Aura that I'm going to stand up for the truth and my convictions. I went to everyone in the room and looked each of them in the eye and asked them, "Where is the truth in your heart?! Where is the conviction you had when you were being freed and liberated? Why aren't you proclaiming it? C'mon you guys!

Where is your conviction to stand up for the truth?"

"Then a 'brother' began guarding me and I noticed that of all the adults, I was the only one not allowed to go out of the room. At one point, I tried to step out but was pulled back inside and sternly rebuked for 'disobeying'. I was informed that I'd better obey Angela. In an angry voice, I answered, 'Who is she that I should obey her? She has no right to stop me and my conscience.' After that, my every action was watched. I kept pacing back and forth trying to get out. God's still, small voice whispered to me to go into the adjoining nursery room and climb out the window. So I did!

"The brother, realizing I was gone, came to get me. He secretly grabbed my arm and whispered sternly to go back inside the room. Instead, I pulled my arm away and sat down on the couch to join the conversation with the NBI officers and some other Home members. One officer asked where I came from and when he learned I was from Mindanao, where he was from, we became friends; so my guard couldn't do anything. The Chief Inspector asked why I was the only one on Dan's side and the others weren't. I said, 'Because, sir, I believe that what Dan and Ed said about the Bible is true.' So he said I could go with Dan.

"I went to the changing room to get my shoes, but my "guard" wouldn't open the door. Forced to leave without my shoes, I went to the gate and opened it. He slammed the gate on me and pulled and twisted my arm so hard I lost the strength of it and it still hurt hours later. He tried to yank me back, but I shouted at him until one of the officers came over. 'This man won't let me out of the gate!' I said. At once, he meekly backed off, then opened the changing room door so I could get my shoes before driving off in the NBI car."

(For the COG, it was vital that no one leave the house to tell the other side of the story, plus they didn't want to "lose disciples", which is why they resorted to such strong-arm methods to keep Ruthie from leaving. But she insisted on being taken with Dan, preferring to be arrested and even thrown into jail rather than remain under the Family's repressive control.)

(Ed:) About an hour late I arrived back at the Home. When I saw an unfamiliar. car outside the gate, it struck me as odd. I barely stepped into the house when two NBI officers asked me if I was Edward Priebe. "Come with us," they ordered. Both Angela and Tim started taking photo after photo of me. As I'd never met Angela before, I took her for the police reporter she was impersonating. Tim, in a ridiculous attempt to redeem himself, was also dressed like a reporter, even holding a cigarette in his hand although he, of course, didn't smoke.

"Let's talk," said the Chief Inspector as he sat me down in a chair, in front of him and began loading bullets into his revolver. This was a deliberate scare tactic and I refused to be bullied. Instead, I insisted "I want to talk to the Canadian Embassy before I talk to anyone." He, assented. The Embassy was closed for the day and I couldn't reach anyone at any other Embassy number. So I called my outside friend who had been helping us and explained everything to him. He advise me not to worry, that the NBI Director had bean informed of the situation. After the call, Tim and Peter insisted I dump out all my trays bag and immediately began pawing through it. For the next half hour I fought for every piece of paper that belonged to me, and finally insisted, "I am a Canadian citizen, and my rights are being violated in the Philippines!". They were a little less pushy then.

At last, the NBI led me out of the den and I suddenly remembered Ruthie! One of the Filipina sisters, who-had been tremendously liberated by our classes, walked by and caught my eye. Knowing what was thinking, she said quietly, "She got out." With hardline COG leadership around, she didn't dare say any more than that. But it was enough. Somehow, somewhere, I knew I would find her again.

In the car surrounded by three NBI men I wondered what was to happen to me. Would I be imprisoned? Tortured? Taken out to deserted field and shot? "God," I prayed, "what's going to happen?" His still, small voice answered, "I'm going to turn this situation around." To be honest, I had trouble believing that. But every time I asked Him, He told me the same thing. Little did I know that when I had phoned my friend, he had contacted my brother and members of my church back in Canada. I belong to a praying church, and in the d of the night, prayer warrior after prayer warrior fell to their knee and began to pray. They would pray until sunrise.

At NBI station, someone shouted my name and came racing between the desks and threw her arms around me. It was Ruthie! Dan was there too, eating a plate of rice and fish, smiling my way. Away the COG and X, the NBI officers became almost pleasant. I was allowed to read the two-page "complaint" which had resulted in our arrest. This document was not a formal charge but merely a complaint which was later dropped, since it had served its purpose of getting us out of the house.

The complaint was that Dan and I had kidnapped James & Joy and their families. "If you'll just give these people their MWM trunks back, they'll overlook this," the NBI official said. Imagine, saying that if they give you back some video trunks you'll be so kind as to overlook "kidnapping" their friends! Absurd! It goes to show that (a) the COG's accusations were merely fear tactics to pressure me into returning the trunks, (b) how "hot" and incriminating the material in those trunks is, and (c) how expendable it appears James & Joy were. I didn't give in; and an hour later we were out of the station, free!

Things were in a state of turmoil for the next few days. By this time, we knew how powerful the COG were through X and his many contacts and wouldn't have thought it strange for a lower level friend of the COG, fearful of being exposed, to have us "eliminated". Concerned for Ruthie's safety, I petitioned the Canadian Embassy to try to bring her with me to Canada as my wife but due to regulations and the shortness of time there was no way. Ruthie and I wept in each others' arms while friends told us that she would be safe, but that I definitely needed to leave.

Upon reaching Los Angeles, I never had an opportunity to talk with James and Joy. They obviously had gotten in contact with COG members in L.A. who persuaded them to go with them. The COG in L.A. have numerous Homes and have made moves to get legal recognition and approval under the front name "Urban Outreach". That James and Joy chose to join a COG Home does not surprise me. I only hope that leadership will not unwisely order them to return to the Philippines, as the situation there is volatile and their names will be on record as being foreign COG leaders. As I mentioned earlier, my primary reason for sending them to the U.S. was for their own safety.

Once back in Canada, I sent a five-page fax -- via X's law office -to top Family leadership (Mar!s, Peter and Apollos -- all of whom I knew personally), letting them know that I was more than willing to hand back the trunks to a designated representative of the Family as soon as possible and that I would hope that my children, as well as Daniel Welsh's son, would be allowed to visit and talk with us. There was no reply, until ....

The day before Christmas I received a package in the mail from some lawyer in California. It contained a three-page document demanding that I unilaterally return the trunks and pay the COG tens of thousands of dollars which they accused me of stealing. They also insisted that I sign a six-point declaration agreeing (amongst other things) to never again say a word to "defame" either the COG or any person in it and to never again try to persuade anyone to leave the group. If I didn't comply fully with all demands, the document threatened they'd "vigorously" press criminal charges against me. There was not a single word about either Dan's or my children.

Over the next couple of days, I gave the matter a great deal of thought. I realized that the COG was not going to give me my children -- they were confident that I didn't have enough of a legal claim to them and could never find them. I tried to think of the best way to settle this matter peacefully. Should I simply return the trunks? I considered it. But return tens of thousands of dollars that I hadn't taken? Agree to never again say a word to expose all the evil that the COG -- or even Berg personally -- was involved in? Outrageous! If they hadn't thrown in such ridiculous demands, I might possible have agreed to a truce, but they had gone too far! Alone, forced to make a decision, I prayed desperately. It was one of the lowest points in my entire life, and certainly the most miserable Christmas Eve I had ever spent.

Then, just after midnight in the first hour of Christmas Day, the phone rang. It was Ruthie: She had received the money I'd sent her for an engagement ring, had bought the ring and was now waiting on the other end of the line for me to propose to her again so that she could put the ring on, making our engagement official. It was an incredibly bright, tender moment in my darkest hour.

In the next few days, I sought legal counsel and the advice of the police. I was advised that the COG were merely calling my bluff. Then I began to find out what was actually on some of those videos and why the COG wanted them back so desperately! They were HOT alright! One video, for example, contained footage of a lesbian sex scene; a little later on the same video, young pre-puberty girls were doing strip-teases and nude dances for 70-year-old Berg, at his request -- things the COG deny ever having sanctioned, yet this was proof positive that they are lying!

By the time you read this, Ruthie should be with me and we'll be married. A love that began many years age and whose future has been declared sure by both prayer and prophecy will not be frustrated.

Daniel and I are still concerned about our children growing up in such a cult and becoming Mo's followers. I don't want my daughter Susana, now 13, to end up as a single, unwed mother on a "sharing (sex) schedule", eating poor food, and staying up all night to report her "sins" to her leaders. I don't want my son Jason -- who I trust is an intelligent boy who asks questions -- to end up in a "thought form" victor's camp, his will and spirit totally broken.

What of the members of the Manila Home? For a few precious days, they were totally set free of the legalism and oppression of the COG system ... until hardline leadership, using fear tactics, managed to "snap" these newly-liberated disciples back into the COG mind-set of unquestioning obedience. Though such a reversal may seem inexplicable to some, psychologists and cult mind control experts will hardly be surprised. Moreover, in continued violation of Immigrations Department orders, I'm informed that Joy has returned to the Philippines; several additional foreign members have arrived as well.

My main consolation is that the members of the Manila Home have now heard the truth about the COG and have renounced Mo's most blatantly evil teachings as heresy, and I believe that those who sincerely love Christ, His truth and His true freedom, eventually will leave the cult.

In addition, Dan and I learned a tremendous amount about the COG that we can now use around the world to expose illegal activities, abuses, and mind control. We will tell the truth of what happens inside Family Homes to Family members, which all their whitewashing PR pushes are desperately trying to cover.

NO LONGER CHILDREN
c/o Sword of the Lord Ministries
3316 Lynette Dr.
Amarillo, TX 79109-4510

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