For Your Consideration

I was planning to write a post about the huge mistake the courts are making in releasing the Fundamentalist Latter Day Saints (FLDS) children back to their parents.
However, I think the pictures above say it better than anything I could ever come up with. Here you see Warren Jeffs, prophet of the church and 49 years of age at the time of this photo, celebrating his one year anniversary with his child "wife", Loretta.
For more on this, go HERE.

Breaking News

CNN is reporting that the Texas 3rd District Court of Appeals has ruled that the State should not have removed the more than 460 children it took from a polygamist sect's ranch. The Court found in favor of 38 women who had appealed the removals, as well as a decision last month by a district judge that the children will remain in state custody.

"The existence of the FLDS belief system as described by the department's witnesses, by itself, does not put children of FLDS parents in physical danger," the three-judge panel said.

The state's Department of Family and Protective Services "did not present any evidence of danger to the physical health or safety of any male children or any female children who had not reached puberty," the judges ruled.

The mothers of the children argued the State should have proved that the children's health or safety was in danger; that there was "an urgent need for protection" that required immediately separating the children from their parents; and that the State made "reasonable efforts" to avoid removing the children.

Because the State failed to provide such proof, the mothers further argued, the District Court -- which backed the department's seizure of the children -- "was required to return the children to their parents and abused its discretion by failing to do so."

You can read the ruling here. (warning: pdf file)

Under The Banner Of Heaven

"Smile for the Camera"

The recent raids in west Texas at the FLDS (Fundamentalists Latter Day Saints) compound known as "Yearning For Zion" ranch reveal more than just an isolated incident of some obscure cult gone wrong. The FLDS has been in existence since at least the early 1900's after they abandoned the Mormon Church over the controversial decision to ban polygamy in the late 1800's. The Mormon Church's reason for banning the practice of polygamy had more to do with gaining statehood (The U.S. said "No Way" until Utah disavowed polygamy) than with any divine revelation, but it was sold in a divine way to their followers, which eventually resulted in the split by the FLDS. They (the soon to be formed FLDS) weren't buying it.

The FLDS eventually set up shop in Hilldale, Utah and the cross border town of Colorado City, Arizona (at the time known as Short Creek).
There they flourished, arranging "marriages" between barely teen-age girls and men as old as 60, as they have continued doing so for more than 75 years, and no one has been be able to stop them.
Hilldale and Colorado City also happen to have the world's highest incidences of fumarase deficiency, an extremely rare genetic condition which causes severe mental retardation . This is a result of the blood relative arranged marriages that conflict with nature's requirement for diversity in the gene pool.

In 1953, the Arizona State Police tried to shut down the FLDS with a raid at Short Creek, Az.
The aftermath proved to be such a public relations nightmare that it eventually caused officials to back off, and allowed the church to continue unabated.

I have been to Hilldale, Utah and it is one strange place to visit. There are no markets or gas stations along the highway, as if the town just wants you to keep moving, as if to say "nothing to see here". And yet, there is so much to see, even if you don't catch it at first glance. The homes in the foothills are enormous and mobile trailers housing additional wives and their offspring dot the properties. You would probably, like I did, see no one on the streets, as if some silent alarm warned the residents of your arrival, causing them to shutter themselves inside their over sized homes and nearby trailers. It's pretty eerie.
Revelations coming out from the recent raid in Texas sadly tell of a generation of kids raised to believe that outsiders were evil, and the only safe place was within the compound, in the "sanctity" of the whims of much older men.

How a group like this can not only survive but flourish in the U.S. of the 21st century is hard to understand.

There is so much more to this story than is possible to make in a single post. It is an incredible tale, an epic journey through American history, how a contained, distant, and past way of life manages to find a way to thrive in a relatively enlightened future.

My heading, "Under The Banner Of Heaven", comes from an excellent book of the same title, by Jon Krakauer, that
details the history of this church, the Mormon Church, and how it all went incredibly wrong.