The story is pretty damn worrying, apparently a member of the Fundamental Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints (FLDS for posterities sake) tipped off the police about the alleged child abuse going on there. The authorities then raided the compound and took the children into protective custody along with their mothers, many of who were married to the same man because the church is a part of the Mormon religion.
A little background: the FLDS is one of the largest sects of Mormon practitioners today, with around 10,000 members. It split from the mainstream Mormon organization (the LDS) when the LDS decided to denounce polygamous marriage, seeing as it's against state and federal laws in the United States. The church itself is run by a man named William E. Jessop, but before him it was run by Warren Jeffs, who had been on the run from the FBI before he was arrested in September of 2007 and found guilty for two counts of rape.
The raid was carried out after the police got a call from someone claiming to be a 16-year-old girl who had been sexually abused by members of the Church. Without further ado, the police raided the church only to discover that they could not find the person who placed the call. So where was the girl? Truth is one Rozita Swinton had placed the call and impersonated a 16 year old. She was later arrested for false reporting to the authorities. Nevertheless, the police and child-protection agencies searched the compound and concluded that the children "had been abused or were in danger of being abused in the future". The children are now in State custody until it is decided where they will go. The control of the Church has now been given back to the FLDS.
The Waco Siege of 1994 has now become synonymous with the concept of fundamentalist Christianity. I am of course talking about the infamous siege of the Branch Davidian compound in Waco, Texas that lasted for 51 days and ended in the compound catching fire, leaving around 80 dead. The first thing I thought after reading the source article above was that we could have very nearly seen another Waco.
The Waco siege was exceptionally badly planned, and one could even say it was rushed. But when you take a look at the Branch Davidian beliefs, it becomes evident that the whole siege could have been easily avoided.
Interestingly enough, David Koresh said it best himself during the siege in a recorded tape he sent out:
You guys could have arrested me when I was running down the path outside of the compound, when I was buying groceries... so why did you have to choose now?The documentaries "Waco: A New Revelation" and "Waco, Rules of Engagement" explain that the Branch Davidians viewed the ATF siege as a sign of the "end times", as many of the things that they saw colluded to their scripture's descriptions of Armageddon. For them, the American government was viewed as the tyrannical kingdom of Babylon, who would strike against the righteous (I.E. the Branch Davidians). They would do this with chariots of fire, which were interpreted as the tanks used during the siege.
Anyways, I'm going off on a slight tangent here. I'm saying that had the authorities not better prepared for their raid of the Mormon church, it could have all gone horribly wrong. And this is what annoys me with Christianity today; the Bible is so loosely interpreted (usually deliberately), so that the various offshoots of the religion can point at any scripture they choose and say "this is the word of God, he's telling us to do this!", even if it means going out there and killing everyone with an automatic weapon. It also apparently doesn't matter if your interpretation of the bible contradicts every other sect out there. This makes it incredibly easy to start your own branch of Christianity.
For example:
“This is the confidence we have in approaching God: that if we ask anything according to his will, he hears us. And if we know that he hears us—whatever we ask—we know that we have what we asked of him.”John I, 5:14-15
This means that God is that rich uncle you know who's always trying to buy your love and affection. Ask and ye shall recieve. One positive side, is that it also makes things very easy if you want to piss off your average fundie who claims to know the Bible off by heart. Why not challenge their interpretation of the Bible with your own? As long as you come up with logical arguments to support your theory, what's stopping you?
Peace out ;P
Peace out ;P
