Heaven's Harlots: My Fifteen Years in a Sex Cult (11 page)

We decided to split up and go to homes in Europe—the new mission field.

That would be a big change for everyone, but for me it did not matter, since I believed that the life of a revolutionary was always changing, always growing, and always moving forward. The money we had was used for plane tickets, and anything left over was given to other families who wanted to leave for Europe. Most of the band members decided to go to Italy or France. Because I had a German mother, Cal and I decided to go to Germany with our son Thor.

We planned to fly out of New York in the fall of 1973, when Thor was barely three months old. Again, I never saw any money or even documents, unless I had to sign something. Cal and the leaders took care of the paperwork, and I just followed the instructions like a good soldier. We were asked to obtain as much money and goods as we could from our relatives before leaving. I had stayed in contact with my mother through frequent letters and less frequent phone calls, such communication was being encouraged by our leaders now because Mo had recently advised disciples to write their parents and relatives. I believe it was suggested because of the persecution and investigation that had followed when irate parents and relatives went to the authorities seeking to learn the whereabouts of their children. In my case, until I lived in the band colony, I never opened a letter from my mother without a leader looking over my shoulder. If she sent any money, I was urged to give it to the leader right away, to be put to use in God’s work. What good would money do for me anyway—I could not go out and spend it. I soon learned that most disciples asked their parents for things, like clothes and pens and paper. Cal had learned to increase his few personal belongings with help from his parents, and before we had our baby, they had supplied us with all the baby clothes we needed and a beautiful handmade cradle. Since Cal’s parents lived relatively close by, in upstate New York, we visited them before we left for Europe. Having an upper-middleclass income, they could afford to buy us new clothes and camping gear. They also paid for our visits to a dentist, it was my first visit since I had joined the COG. While we were at Cal’s parents’ house, one of my sisters, Marlene, and her husband and new baby brought my mother to see me before I left. I had not seen my mother since I had “forsaken all” in 1971. It was now 1973, but I was not nostalgic. By now my natural feelings had been buried so deep, I could think only about witnessing to them. My sister asked Jesus into her heart and told me about the difficulties of parenthood and work. I told her,“That’s life in the system. ” Unfortunately, I showed barely any affection to the sister closest to me, less than two years younger in age, and the one who had gone to the peace march in Washington with me. She was only eighteen, and before she reached her twenty-first birthday, she died in a car accident. I never saw her after this day in New York.

Cal told me that we had been given enough money to get through the borders in Europe and three-month visas. We landed in Amsterdam and had to race for a train to Germany, arriving in Essen on a wet, cold evening. No one had come to pick us up as planned, and after hours of waiting and many phone calls, we finally arrived at the Essen colony.

Essen, a large industrial city in northern Germany, is not known for its scenic beauty. It is a factory-fueled city, and in the middle of the winter, the gray from the smokestacks was lost in the gray of the skies.

What I remember most about the German houses is the stark white lace curtains in every window. I thought there must have been a law in Essen that everyone must have lace curtains, but I later saw them all over Germany. They looked pretty, and for some reason the curtains made the gloomy feeling I felt, living the winter in Essen, a little more bearable.

Our new home turned out to be an old three-story schoolhouse inhabited by over a hundred disciples. Mo had written a letter about letting the nationals take over the leadership of the homes in Europe, since they knew the culture and language of the land. Therefore, power-hungry older brothers were quickly marrying national sisters, usually barely three months in the Family, so they could keep their leadership positions.

That seemed to be the case in Germany anyway.

The colony leaders were Samson and Naomi, who together ruled the home with Gestapo-like authority. Naomi was a pretty German girl whose father had helped the Family when the group first arrived in Essen.

Wealthy or influential friends of the Family were called “kings,” and Naomi’s father, a respected Christian businessman, saw our group as dedicated young Christians. He later changed his attitude about us, as most of our kings did. Samson, a suave, clean-cut looking young man, was one of the early pioneers from America, and he savored his leadership power. Everything ran like clockwork in the large home, the disciples were kept constantly busy cleaning it, begging for food and supplies, or going out onto the streets witnessing.

The nursery was located in one of the larger classrooms on the second floor, near the girls’ bathroom, and I was immediately put to work.

There were already a dozen small babies in the house and a dozen more on the way. Since we were forbidden to use any form of birth control, and babies were considered God’s blessing, they kept coming. Any one who knew about child care could be sure of a twenty four-hour job.

Naomi had never been trained properly in child care, in fact she was not trained in anything, which left her with a huge complex to overcome.

Most leaders’ wives had been in the Family longer than Naomi, and had received some form of training from elder sisters in areas of office work, kitchen supervision, housecleaning, or child care. However, Naomi had joined the home as a sort of “princess,” her father being a king of course, and she had received the typical pampered treatment allotted those who were somehow special. That really rubbed my communistic ideals the wrong way, but as always, I knew there was a lesson for me to learn here. Maybe I needed to be more humble. Maybe I would learn to love Cal here in Essen.

Naomi suggested that Cal and I sleep in the nursery, which meant being awakened all through the night. Furthermore, she did not relieve Cal of any work or witnessing responsibilities, and I had to participate in other work duties as well, which contributed to a chronic feeling of tiredness.

The Germall home existed mainly from the donations it collected on the street and by “litnessing,” now the most popular method of raising money in the Family. It involved “selling” our Family News and Mo letters on the streets. I had been out litnessing a few times in the United States, but since we had kept some of the money the band earned playing at clubs, I was never pressured to bring in a certain amount.

Here in Germany, I learned that everyone had a quota of literature to hand out, and of donation money they were expected to bring in. The literature was translated into the language of the land, and in this way, these pieces of paper became the witness. Mo had been writing a series of letters on how to witness with his “wonder-working words” and recently he suggested that all the disciples “sell” them to people on the streets, in airports, shopping centers, or wherever else they could get people to stop for a minute. Ideally, the method included witnessing about Jesus to anyone who looked interested, but many times we were so busy trying to get money, we did not have time.

The German leadership had set quotas for literature that had to be sold by each disciple every day. The quotas were determined by the amount of time that the leaders thought a disciple could devote to this method of witnessing. For example, the lowly disciple who worked in the kitchen early morning and late evening supposedly had all day to spend on the streets litnessing, so his quota would be high, maybe a hundred letters a day. However, the leaders, who had to spend many hours reading the Word, praying, and making important decisions about colony life, would usually have a low quota, or no quota at all. Cal and I fell somewhere in the middle.

Since Cal was a musician, he thought he could use his talent in the colony band, but music was not highly valued in the German home, so Cal was given no practice time and a pretty high quota. Since I was a nursing mother, and spent many hours day and night in the nursery, my quota was lower. Still, it was never easy to make.

“What do I say?” I asked a sister as I stepped out the door on my first day carrying a pack of lit, Thor tucked snugly into a Cadillac of a baby buggy, bundled in everything I could find to keep out the cold north German winter.

“Just hand them a pamphlet and say, ‘Konnen she itte eine spende geben?’” answered the American girl, who had been here for three months.

“It means, Can you give a donation, please?”

“Won’t they ask what this is, and why I want a donation?”

“It’s better if you don’t know what to say. These German businesspeople will just argue with you anyway. So just say, ‘lul, icht Perstehe,’ and move on if they don’t reach for their pocket. Believe me, it’s not worth trying to talk with them.”

“What if I find someone sheepy? Do you know enough German to witness?”

“No, I never learned much more than to ask for a donation. You don’t have to. If they are sheepy, they’ll probably know English. All the young people here know English.” She was right in her assessment. Businessmen either gave a donation right away, or started yelling something like “Hrbeite, arbeite!” which meant “Go work!” The young people knew English very well, and they were the only ones who were interested in talking with me. I never learned more German than how to ask for a donation.

Even though it was cold and very difficult to make a quota in that tough and dreary city, I loved to go out litnessing. It meant being away from the nursery, away from the colony, and most of all, away from Naomi. I had the distinct impression that she did not like me, but perhaps everyone felt that way about her. She always had some command for me whenever she abruptly entered the nursery.

“Don’t you think the babies should be patted to sleep?” she snapped one day when she found me sitting down reading the Bible while a few babies were stirring before taking their naps.

From then on, we had to pat babies to sleep, which was not a good habit to encourage when there are twelve babies and only two adult patters.

“Why don’t you write verses on this big chalkboard,” she questioned on another day. “Then you can memorize out loud while you are working with the babies. I am sure it will help them in the Spirit to hear the Word.” After that, we always had verses written across the huge blackboards, which had to be changed daily, of course.

Still, I felt fortunate to be working in the nursery instead of in the kitchen or office, where Naomi made many more demands on the poor workers. Cal would often come up from the kitchen in a rage over the stupid suggestions made by Naomi.

“And it’s not like you can talk to her about anything,” he complained. “She won’t allow anyone to question her suggestions.” It was evident that Cal wanted to leave the country, but it was hard to get out. In the band colony in Boston, Cal always was allowed to keep a little spending money, maybe twenty dollars or so, but here in Germany, every mark was handed in, and if it looked like you did not make enough, you might be accused of holding some money back. The story in the Bible of Ananias and Sapphira, found in Acts, Chapter 5, was constantly held over our heads in the typical Big Brother fashion. I heard this story when I had my first “forsake all” doubts. It seems two of the early disciples did not hand in to Peter all the money they had earned from land they had sold, and they were immediately struck down dead by God as a warning to all. I really doubted that God would do that for a few bucks, but even so, where could we go if we had money to get there?

To live at another home anywhere in the world, one needed clearance first, which involved a series of letters to the colony leaders and recommendations from your present colony leader. It was like getting a job. And I suspected that Naomi would not want me going anywhere since I had become her only stable nursery worker. She thought I was dedicated to the work, but actually, I just wanted to stay near my son as much as possible, and my plan worked. As a musician, Cal had no talent to offer the litnessing colony in Germany. To make matters worse, he was used to the musician’s life with a less disciplined structure. The tension of hating where he was and being incapable of changing his situation weighed heavily on his mind, body, and spirit.

Our bedroom area in the nursery was situated in a loft overlooking the cribs full of babies. We had a mattress on the floor, but, being in the nursery, it was one of the warmest spots in the cold, drafty building. Interrupted often by the babies’ cries, Cal never could sleep very well, and his lack of sleep, combined with the stress he was experiencing, caused him to become physically weak. One day he could not get out of bed. He had developed a terrible case of dysentery, and I began to take care of him, as well as the babies. Some time *** make it to the bathroom, which was located far down the hall. Caring for Cal brought me closer to him in an emotional way, but I don’t think he recognized this at the time. His single-minded intention was to get out of that colony in any way he could. Hardships are said to often bring a family closer, and the unhappiness we both felt living in Essen made me feel a sense of camaraderie with Cal. It was short lived.

The chance for Cal to escape from his less than joyful situation came when he heard that Jeremy was in Paris starting up another band. Cal sent him a letter, and our leaders received word from Hopie, who was Mo’s daughter, that Cal should be sent to Paris immediately.

Although there was not room for me and our baby, Cal accepted the invitation and was gone within days. He was told that he might be staying in Paris for a short time only, but that if he stayed longer, he would do what he could to get us there quickly. I was truly happy for Cal, and I did not think much about our separation. Also, I knew that he had a better chance of getting me out of here from Paris than he did in Essen.