Open Letter to President and Mrs. Clinton on "The Family Singers"
This letter, sent from former member and anti-cult activist Samuel Ajemian to then President Bill Clinton and his wife Hillary Clinton, informed the Clintons that The Family Singers were representatives of The Family International, and described past and current Family doctrine in graphic detail. At the time this letter was written, The Family Singers had performed at The White House every Christimas or Easter for several years.
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April 12, 2000
The White House
1600 Pennsylvania Avenue
Washington DC 20502
Phone (202) 456-1111
Fax (202) 456-2461
Dear President and Mrs. Clinton,
A group by the name, the "Family Singers" has performed at the White House for every Christmas and/or Easter season for the last seven or so years. The reason for this letter is to inform you that this singing group is part of "The Family". The Family is a more recent name for the "Children of God" or COG, a Bible based cult founded by David Berg. David Berg was a known alcoholic and pedophile who sexually molested his own daughters and granddaughters, had countless sexual encounters with his female followers both adult and under aged and was so perverted as to claim that he had sex with the Holy Spirit, the third person of the Holy Trinity in the Bible.
The Children of God shocked the world in the mid-seventies with their "evangelistic technique" of using prostitution to get converts. By the time they restricted this practice in 1988 they had committed close to a quarter of a million sex acts with outsiders, as their own statistics show.
Even some teenagers were involved in prostitution, including one of Berg's granddaughters, who at age 13-14 were going out to hotels with her mother to find men to go to bed with. The following tells of another such story: "Former Children of God member Kristina Jones, 23....had sex with her stepfather, many other members, and, at the age of 11, with government officials in India to try to secure visas for Children of God devotees. Kristina suffered appalling abuse under the cult's strictly disciplinarian regime). (Lynne Wallis, "Cult Recruitment Goes Into Orbit," Associated Newspapers Ltd., [1/28/2000]).
Child sexual abuse, including incest, has been the biggest concern of outside observers. The following are taken from "The Story of Davidito," a book published by the group. These quotes describe sexual activity between the young son of the group's present leader, Karen Zerby, and his nanny Sara. The Family has tried to destroy all copies of this book but some copies have survived.
"[Davidito at 20 months old] gets quite excited when I wash his bottom and his penie gets real big and hard. I kiss it all over...he gets so excited he...spreads his legs open for more....When playing on the floor he'll oftentimes spread his legs open for me to kiss his penis. He got to where he liked it so much he'd pull people by the hand down onto the floor and would spread his legs apart for 'the treatment.' " (TSOD, pp. 334, 335). "His usual...approach is, 'Let's go wash penie', and then I know what he really wants!" (TSOD, p. 426). "We had a nice picnic lunch...right by the riverside near our house. [Davidito] wanted to bring a blanket and a scented candle so that we could make love, but there were too many people around so we didn't quite get to the climax." (TSOD, p. 464). "While on the airplane [Davidito] said, 'Hey! Let's love-up!' I said, 'David, we can't do that here!' and he said 'Oh, I know why! Because we'd probably break the chair!'" (TSOD, p. 551).
Judge Ward of the High Court of London, England, after investigating the Family for over three years came to the following firm conclusions. "I am totally satisfied that there was widespread sexual abuse of young children and teenagers by adult members of The Family, and that this abuse occurred to a significantly greater extend within The Family than occurred in society outside it." (Judgment p. 111). "I am furthermore satisfied that a significant number of children...had masturbation and even sexual intercourse forced upon them by adults." (Judgment p. 282). "There is overwhelming evidence that the high leadership within the Family has been guilty of child sexual abuse." (Judgment p. 120). "Berg bears responsibility for propagating the doctrine which so grievously misled his flock and injured the children within it." (Judgment p. 112). "Not all children were engaged in sexual activity but far too many were. That was directly the result of growing up within the 'sexy Family.' " (Judgment p. 78).
In addition to the above the public needs to know that many female members of this Christian missionary group were for years working as common prostitutes in escort services. Because one of the female members died of AIDS, prostitution was greatly restricted, and evidently there is hardly any of it going on in the Family at present. They are still, however, very proud of their past prostitution. They are very open about their still practicing free sex with one another's husband and wife. Included in the free-sex pool are teenagers as young as 16 who are allowed to have indiscriminate sex with adults up to several years older than themselves. The group claims they hear from dead people including Elvis Presley and Marilyn Monroe. Marilyn Monroe is promising to give the cult members sex when they get to heaven.
Because of legal problems and several traumatic police raids into their communes, they have stayed away from some of their most controversial practices. Contrary to their claims however, the group has not changed. They recently received a new revelation from their "Jesus" encouraging them to masturbate to him. The male members are to imagine that they are women, that they have vaginas and they are to fantasize they are having full sexual intercourse with Jesus Christ. Boys as young as 14 are also subjected to this. In my opinion telling a 14 year old boy to imagine he is a woman, has a vagina, and Jesus penetrates him sexually is one of the worse kinds of sexual child abuse. Steve Kelly, the group's number two man after Zerby, has said that he considers himself Jesus's vagina and in the group's literature he has been recorded as saying: "I wanted [Jesus] so badly, and told Him so. He held me, loved me, caressed me. We made love together through the words we shared. Our lovemaking was passionate, erotic, exciting." (As quoted by Cancion, Newdaynews.com, 4/11/2000). This man is the leader of thousands of impressionable young children and youth. I think he is in need of therapy and psychological oversight. I think he should also get a visit from his local police station.
The Family is very deceitful in its dealings with unsuspecting outsiders and potential donors, many of whom would never support them if they knew of these things. The group in most cases does its best to keep its benefactors from ever finding out about its most controversial beliefs and practices. They try to hide instead behind their missionary facade and their good works.
The way the group justifies keeping things secret from others is by using the Biblical injunction that "heavy meat" is not to be given to "babes." Among the many problems with this group is a delusional kind of pseudo-spirituality that makes them look at outsiders as being on a lower plane than themselves. In such classification of babes are included even pastors of churches, Christian professionals, mature businessmen and in this particular case I would suppose the personnel at the White House. The group gets enough provisions not only to satisfy their needs but to also give to others in need. They also volunteer their time during natural disasters and other such emergencies. I am sure their doing so is motivated by their desire to help. I am also very sure that they try to get all the PR mileage possible out of such good works.
I don't know all the details and how it came about, but the group was invited to sing at the White House as a result of their helping victims of a natural disaster in Florida during the early 90's. There is a TV clip showing them performing at the White House with Barbara Bush in the audience. I am sure the group must have shown pictures of their performances at the White House to multitudes of businessmen and others and it must have helped them tremendously to make major inroads into the world of big corporations, as well as other places of influence.
What has puzzled me for years is if you at the White House know who these people really are, or if you know what they really believe. I feel very strongly, and I hope that you will agree, that such a group has no business singing at the White House. I think that most people in this country and particularly those who hold to the Christian faith would be horrified that a perverse cult as this has been participating in such festivities.
Due to some internal changes in the Family, members other that the Family Singers may came to perform this year, if they come to sing at all. I hope you will take the time to do the necessary checking, so that this group does not get the undeserving honor of singing in the name of Christ at this most prestigious House in the world. In closing, let me be so bold as to suggest that rather than having these young people come to sing, the White House should be more interested and concerned in rescuing them from the clutches of this group.
Respectfully,
For more information and materials please contact: COUNTERCOG
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