Heaven's Harlots: My Fifteen Years in a Sex Cult (9 page)

Due to the number of babies that had recently come into the nursery, I did not have much time to go to inspiration and listen to the band play.

We had between six and ten babies ranging from newborns to age two being watched in the two nursery rooms. Mothers were encouraged to leave babies at the nursery all day and night, since we were supposed to be one big family and their children were everybody’s children.

Only the nursery workers cared for them, however, and since there were few nursery workers, I was often up day and night. Therefore, it took me by surprise when Jeremy came into the nursery to see me. I had only seen him before from a distance, and I was surprised at how short and frail he was. He had brown curly hair that hung lightly on his neck and friendly-looking eyes that were almost merry. I had not seen such a cheery look for a long time, since humor was discouraged at the camp.

“Hi. You’re Jeshanah, right?” he asked in his strong English accent.

“Yes. That’s me.”

“Would you like to help us in a skit tonight? We have this little play planned, and we need a sister. You seem to be right for the part.”

“Oh, I never acted in a skit before,” I protested. Surely there were dozens of girls better suited for acting than myself, I thought.

“No, no. You are just right for the part.”

“Well, do I have to come and rehearse?”

“Just ad-lib as the skit goes along. You’ll pick it up, I’m sure.” Jeremy left me wondering what I was to do, but a crying baby interrupted my thoughts.

That evening, my tribe leader made sure I went to inspiration. She personally found another girl to stay in the nursery. I felt honored to be able to participate in a skit with the band. They were always treated as special, and I was somewhat in awe of their talent and fame.

Now here I was in front of the entire colony, acting in a skit in which I did not even know the story line. However, it soon became apparent that the skit was about the drummer, Cal, marrying me. It depicted his life history, from a lost hippie to a drug addict in New York, then hitching out to California and meeting the COG, and finally becoming part of Jeremy’s band and marrying a sister in Ellenville. My face turned bright red, and I could hardly look Caleb in the eyes. Did he know about this, or was he in the dark too?

Later in the evening we had some time to ourselves, and he informed me that he had requested me to be his mate. How did I feel about that?

A new letter had just come out from Mo saying that couples were being married too quickly, and they should be given three to six months courtship time. I asked if that would apply to us.

“I don’t know,” he said hesitantly, his blue eyes shining like sapphires on his handsome face. “You see, we have to go to Boston soon, an I would really like you to come with me.” I thought about living in Boston, in an apartment away from the colony.

No more babies. No more big leaders. It seemed too good to be true.

Serving the Lord would be so easy, I might start feeling guilty.

“Yes, I would like that.” I said, thinking more of the apartment and freedom than getting married.

Caleb and I were allowed to spend some time together every day for the next couple of weeks. He was the first boy I had come to know emotionally since I had joined six months ago. Cal, as most of us called Caleb, was only twenty, a year older than myself, but he had already been in the Family for over a year, so he was definitely an older brother to me. It took awhile not to relate to him with the shyness and deference reserved for older brothers, but Cal was very easygoing, and he did not demand respect. I grew to like him very much.

His long blond hair hung loosely to his shoulders, which reinforced the impression that he was an independent and unrestrained musician. Most of the boys who joined the group had to have their long hair cut, but musicians were usually exempt from this outward proof of commitment.

Cal not only represented freedom, but he was also a basically nice guy.

Before the required three months of courtship were finished, we were married in a Family ceremony performed by a leader before the entire colony. Because of lack of space, most married couples, except for the leaders, had to share bedrooms, however we were allowed use of a couples’ cabin alone for three nights. On the first night, Cal was euphoric. I was scared. This was marriage! What the hell did marriage mean in this group? We lived communally. Nothing belonged to us privately. Marriage usually entailed making a home and family— starting a life together. However, when I joined the Children of God, I relinquished my right to have my own home, and my family included anyone else who gave up worldly goals and possessions to follow God in this group. Even though I had been living this life for a relatively short time, I knew that everything was temporary. Perhaps marriage was also.

Cal seemed to understand the significance of marriage—having access to sex. I guess that was explanation enough for him, but not for me.

That night, after we had made love a few times, I could not sleep.

There was enough light from the moon shining through the curtainless lone window for me to see my honeymoon environment. The cabin was empty except for a mattress on the floor and a wooden box next to the bed, which held a small lamp and the two wineglasses, now empty. Cal’s and my small suitcases, holding all of our personal belongings, were Lying open on the floor in a corner. It was a sparse room, and the moonlight only accentuated the fact that my wedding night was far from dyllic. I lay awake most of the night wondering what I had done and why. Cal was a very nice person, much better looking and better groomed than most of the boys at the camp, but I did not think I loved him. Romantic love was one of the lies of the devil, I had been told by an older sister. God will give you love for him. Well, I didn’t feel it yet, and I didn’t feel like making love again. I got up early in the morning and dressed in my nursery work-clothes quietly, trying not to wake Cal.

“Where are you going?” asked Cal, waking up as I opened the door.

“To the nursery. That’s where I work.”

“No you don’t. You don’t have to work for three days. We have them off, and I’m going to use those three days to stay in bed with you,” he said with a sleepy smile.

He pulled me back into bed. My new husband might be kind, gentle, and loving, but he did not understand me. I felt as if I had just wounded my inner emotional being past repair. I had married someone without first consulting myself.

Having been indoctrinated by Mo’s teaching that whatever is within us is evil and should be rejected, and that the truth is out there somewhere—always beyond my reach—in a perfect unity with a transcendent God, I did not even try to understand my feelings. Not being able to explore this terrible emptiness that I felt inside me, how could I explain it to Cal or anyone else? I knew only one thing— there was no turning back.

Sharing One Wife

I had been cutting vegetables for the chef salad all afternoon, but at least it gave me relief from watching the children. In the kitchen I could have time to think, which was something we were not supposed to do. Mo wrote in one of his letters that if you thought too much, it was like inviting little devils in for tea in your mind. “You pull up a chair and invite them over and start agreeing with them…it’s cause you get your eyes on yourself instead of the Lord—introspection instead of heaven-spection” (“Dumps” 33, 3). Therefore, I felt like I had to be involved in some sort of action constantly, or I might be accused of thinking.

“You’re not supposed to cut the vegetables so small,” yelled Martha from behind, startling me. I dropped my thoughts and imagined they had broken into pieces as if they were precious china. Looking up into the cherublike face of Martha, I wondered if she could see the pieces of my thoughts scattered on the floor as well as I could.

“I told you that when I gave you the instructions for chef salad. Stay in tune with the Spirit, Jeshanah.”

Martha was the wife of the lead guitar player in the band, and she liked to consider herself the lead singer also. However, like all the wives, she also must have a house duty, and she chose to be in charge of the kitchen. She planned the meals, went shopping, and made sure someone else cooked and cleaned. Our band colony, in the suburbs of Boston, had only a dozen members. We each took turns with these chores, however, Jeremy and most of the band were usually relieved of their duties because of practice. They also began playing at local clubs,“to keep in with the music scene” we were told.

The band members looked and acted like the stereotypical musicians of the time. Any Fleetwood Mac fan would recognize Jeremy on stage, with his short stature and curly brown hair, delighting the audience with his Elvis Presley impersonations. The bass player, Sam, a tall nineteen-year-old Californian with dark, ethnic coloring, was distinguished by a gap in his smile where his front tooth had been knocked out. The rhythm guitar player, Enoch, was a tall young man in his early twenties whom we jokingly called “the Pope,” since he encouraged everyone to be religious. Martha was a chubby girl with an angelic face, however, she was as tough as the devil on me. I had become the gofer of the home, since everyone else was busy in their calling.

Jeremy’s wife, Emma, often could not work in the kitchen because she was caring for her newborn, and Bart, our leader, and his wife, Tirzah, would only cook or clean when they felt like it. That left only the wife of the bass player, who had a baby to care for, our single brother, Abashai, the roadie who did most of the driving, and me. My main job was to help Emma with her children, but I often helped Abashai do all the practical and dirty work of keeping a home running. Abashai was also our provisioner, the person who visited stores and factories asking for free stuff.

Even though Jeremy and the band had received a lot of money to make the album, Bart, who held the highest position in our band colony and was manager of the band, thought we should live as much as possible like other COG homes. I was never informed where the money went at that time, but I was aware that we were living relatively better than other homes in the group.

From what I heard from my husband, the drummer of the band, they had signed a contract with Columbia Records for $50,000. Most of the advance went into buying new instruments and equipment for the band and paying for the recording at a studio in Marlborough, Massachusetts.

The rest of the money was used for living expenses for the band families while they were recording, but the upgrade in our living conditions was relative to normal COG standards. No one had personal bank accounts, and I never even bought any clothes but continued to wear hand-me-downs.

We had rented two attached apartments in Sudbury, a suburb of Boston.

There were a total of five rooms, two kitchens, and two bathrooms for the twelve adults and six children. Bart and his wife and child took the whole apartment upstairs, Jeremy and his family of five lived in the master bedroom downstairs, Martha and her husband, Obadiah, and their baby were in the other bedroom, and Cal and I shared the living room with Sam, his wife, and their baby. Abashai and Enoch, the rhythm guitarist, whose wife was in England, stayed in the garage, where the band also practiced. In our room we divided the space with a sheet.

After spending my first months of marriage with other married couples in the crowded couples’ dorm back at Ellenville, I was grateful to have this private area. Always self-conscious of noises made while engaged in sex, I had learned to muffle any sounds.

Having lived with two to three hundred people for the past six months, I felt like this living situation was luxury. In addition, the food was much better, since we actually bought most of it, and I could leave the home on trips to the stores with Abashai to shop and provision, which I really enjoyed. I should have been very happy about my fortunate position, however, my marriage with Cal was terrible. Even worse, it was my fault. Cal loved me. He was proud to be my husband.

He treated me nicely, and even tried to make sure I was not overworked, a common dilemma for those on the bottom of the COG hierarchy, such as I was in that colony.

But I knew it was all so wrong. Nothing had changed since the first night I spent with my husband. At that time, I thought that Cal and I were just not meant for each other, but in retrospect, I believe I was not capable of loving a man as a husband. In the Family, love for your “mate” was supposed to be a gift from God, however, there was no special loving feeling in my heart for Cal. Jesus said we should love everyone.

Loving “everyone” was easy for me, it was loving my husband that was so hard. Having no clue as to why I could not love the man I had agreed to marry, I thought that maybe that happened to everyone. Maybe love would eventually grow. I did not take this situation lightly, and every day I would invent new causes, reasons, and excuses for not loving Cal as I should.

Mo wrote that he wanted all the complaints about marriage to stop. In a letter called “Get It Together,” he told husbands to be nice to their wives (which Cal was), but he also wrote, The next time I hear of a wife that is not willing to submit to her husband—after being admonished in the presence of a few witnesses— we’ll take her in front of the whole congregation and make her submit to her husband…if you won’t do it in the privacy of your own bedroom, you will do it in front of us! …Do you believe in the Bible? Then why don’t you do it? You’re breaking the commandment of God every time you refuse! You don’t have to feel like it…How are we going to have a Revolution for Jesus if you can’t even love your husband or wife, your brothers or sisters, whom you have seen? [123, 17-20]

In other words, how could I be a missionary—my one single goal in *** missing text *** Mo often denied that he had ever encouraged anyone to marry, and for many years I believed it was only a few of the top leaders, who were eventually demoted, who indiscriminately practiced pairing couples.

However, years later I heard the tearful story of Rose, a sister who was present at a mass marriage performed by Mo and his personal secretary, Maria. After Mo had just betrothed a couple, he asked if anyone else wanted to get married. A brother, who liked Rose, stood up and tapped her on the shoulder. Rose knew Mo and Maria personally, and she looked to them for help. Instead, she was told by Maria that Mo thought it was the Lord’s Will she marry this brother. They were betrothed in a few weeks, at which time, she later told me, she felt like her life had ended. Not all couples were so badly mismatched, but the majority of us were told that God’s Love can extend to anyone. In reality, couples that actually did love each other romantically were usually separated by leaders.