Not Without My Sister
Page 1
Table of Contents
Title - Not Without My Sister
Dedication
Quote
Prologue
Introduction
Part 1 - Celeste's Story
Chapter 1 - Daddy's Little Girl
Chapter 2 - Loveville
Chapter 3 - Come Union
Chapter 4 - Behind Four Walls
Chapter 5 - Indoctrination
Chapter 6 - Torn
Part 2 - Juliana's Story
Chapter 7 - A Broken Family
Chapter 8 - The Odd One Out
Chapter 9 - The Rod Of Correction
Chapter 10 - Adopt Me, Please
Part 3 - Kristina's Story
Chapter 11 - Living A Double life
Chapter 12 - A Gypsy Missionary
Chapter 13 - Abusive Love
Chapter 14 - Escape
Part 4 - Journey To Freedom
Chapter 15 - Hide and Seek
Chapter 16 - Searching For Celeste
Chapter 17 - On Opposite Sides
Chapter 18 - Bittersweet Reunion
Chapter 19 - A Deceiver Yet True
Chapter 20 - A tale Of Two Fathers
Chapter 21 - Rehabilitation
Chapter 22 - House Of The Open Pussy
Chapter 23 - Anorexia
Chapter 24 - A Dream Come True
Chapter 25 - Is Justice A Dream?
Chapter 26 - Pearl Of Africa
Chapter 27 - Breaking Free
Chapter 28 - The Chained Eagle
Chapter 29 - The Power Of Love
Epilogue
Celeste Jones, Kristina Jones,
and Juliana Buhring
To our sister, Davida
To my sister in sorrow:
Too well did I understand
The look in your haunted eyes;
Pain and disillusionment.
You fought a losing battle,
And lost.
And died.
I will shedfor you the tears
Of a lifetime you will never live.
The tears you will never more shed.
Madonna of suffering,
Wrapped in the cold shroud of death.
I wept with you.
I weep foryou.
For I still can.
The tide of tears has turned.
Sleep, my sister,
Ad weep no more.
(Written on Davida's tombstone, Juliana 2005)
Lies written in ink cannot disguise
facts written in blood.
—Lu Xun (1881-1936
In January 2005, our sister Davida died from a drug overt dose. She was twenty-three. The shock of Davida's death affected us deeply though we understood her pain and despair. Each of us in our own way has struggled with painful memories of abandonment, neglect, and abuse as children born and raised under the malign influence of a religious cult, the Children of God.
We were systematically abused, physically, mentally, emotionally, and sexually; from the earliest age. We were separated from each other and our parents and raised communally in this organization, which was also known as the "Family."
Unlike our parents who had burned their bridges and left their former lives, we were never given a choice over the paths our lives would follow. Isolated from society, we were controlled by fear—fear of the government, police, doctors, and social workers, and the even greater fear of God's wrath if we ever left the protection of the Family.
Our childhood was dominated by one man: David Berg—a man we never met, but who was like an invisible ghost that was with us at all times. He was the warped and manipulative force behind the Children of God. David Berg liked to see himself as a benevolent parental figure, and called us, his followers, the "Children of David." He saw himself as the successor of King David and the Prophet Moses—calling himself Moses David, or Mo for short. The children were taught to call him "Grandpa." He was the head of our family, the prophet, the leader, our "light in the midst of darkness." The rules we followed were dictated by his words. We read about every detail of his life, his dreams, his likes and dislikes, and the women he slept with and the children he abused. From a very young age we memorized his words and hours of every day were dedicated to studying his writings, called Mo Letters. "Word Time"—which was the time spent reading these letters and studying the Bible—was an important part of daily life. It would be difficult if not impossible to write about our life without acknowledging the dominating influence of David Berg on our lives.
From birth, we were conditioned to obey and follow the way of the cult. We had no choice, and knew no other way. We never heard our father express an opinion that was his own; it was always, "Grandpa said..." If we were punished it was because we had disobeyed Mo's rules; if we were rewarded it was because we were "faithful followers." Our father's devotion to Berg and faith in his prophecies and predictions was unwavering. If he questioned if any of it was real, or if it was a chimera—smoke and mirrors—he never showed it, not even behind closed doors.
Berg taught that birth control was rebellion against God, so within a few years there were thousands of children born into the group. He boasted that we were the "hope of the future"—a pure second generation untainted by the outside world. We were told it was the highest privilege to be born and raised in the Family, free from the shackles of the "System," as the outside world was called. It was our destiny to become God's Endtime soldiers, and to give our lives for the cause. Berg predicted the world would end in 1993, and we would become the leaders of the New Millennium. As our lives on earth would be short, we were never allowed to just be children. Our individuality was suppressed, and we were simply commodities used to further the collective goals of the group.
The belief that damaged us the most was Berg's "Law of Love." God was love, and love equaled sex. Sharing your body with someone else was considered the highest expression of love. Age was not a barrier in Berg's Law of Love and Family children were made to participate in his warped, pedophilic philosophy. His own children and grandchildren suffered from his incestuous predilections.
In this book we describe the emotional journey we undertook from our earliest years, through to our teens when we secretly, then more openly questioned it—and finally, when we struggled to break free, like butterflies caught in a spider's sticky web. This is a story of darkness and light, of imprisonment of the soul, of redemption and freedom. We survived—many didn't. Thousands of the Family's second generation have had to deal with the devastating consequences of their parents' blind faith in a leader who claimed he was the voice of God on earth. Those who have bravely spoken out about their suffering have been vilified and slandered by their former abusers. Our hope is that in telling our story, you will hear the voices of the children they tried to silence.
Celeste Jones, Kristina Jones, Juliana Buhring England 2007
The Children of God started in Southern California in the late 1960s, among the hippiesdropouts of Huntington Beach. The founder, David Berg, was born in 1919, in Oakland, California. His mother, Virginia Lee Brandt Berg, was a celebrated evangelist with the Christian Missionary Alliance. In 1944 Berg married Jane Miller, a young Baptist youth worker. After the birth of their second child, Berg became the pastor of a Christian Missionary Alliance Church in Arizona. However, after only three years he was expelled, reputedly for a sex scandal. His expulsion began his life-long bitterness and disillusionment with organized religion.
In December 1967, Berg moved his family—his wife Jane (later known as Mother Eve) and their four children, Deborah, Faithy, Aaron and Hosea—to Huntington Beach, California, where they stayed with his eighty-year-old
mother. She had started a small ministry from a coffee shop called the Light Club, distributing sandwiches to the hippies, surfers, and dropouts who congregated on the pier. But when the Light Club's clean-cut image failed to attract the longhaired hippies, Mrs. Berg saw the opportunity for her son and grandchildren to minister to the youngsters with the music and fervour of their own generation. In a short time, David Berg and his family began attracting the youth in droves with the free food and anti-system, anti-war message they endorsed.
The group traveled across the United States gathering more young disciples as they went, and soon opened communities across the country. They attracted a substantial amount of media coverage, and in some articles the writers referred to them as the "Children of God," a name that the fledgling group subsequently adopted.
After a string of illicit affairs with some of his young female members, Berg found a devoted companion in his young and ambitious secretary, Karen Zerby, aka "Maria." Publicly branding his estranged wife Jane and late mother the "Old Church," Berg endorsed Maria and the Children of God as the "New Church," and himself the last prophet of the Endtime. He also started using the pseudonym "Moses David," identifying himself with King David of the Bible and the prophet Moses, who had led the Children of Israel out of captivity in Egypt (the "System") to the Promised Land. Berg decided to start a royal dynasty. His series of residences were designated "The King's House" and he crowned himself and Maria, the King and the Queen.
For many years a council of ministers ran the cult, mostly members of Berg's extended family, referred to as the Royal Family. He expected Family members to obey him and the other leaders without question. The only contact between Berg and his members came through his many writings, detailing policies, beliefs, and instruction on how the communes were to be run, as well as prophecies and revelations he claimed proceeded directly from God.
In the early 1970s, the Children of God fell under the close scrutiny of the media and law-enforcement agencies, as parents of recruited children witnessed complete personality changes in their offspring after they joined the cult. More worrying was the fact that all contact between them was severed, some of their children disappearing in the night not to be seen again for years.
Evading negative publicity and a court summons, Berg fled to Europe, advising his followers to get out of America. The group left the USA in 1972 in a mass exodus to evangelize and recruit in other countries, beginning with Europe. Berg and Maria arrived in England in 1972.
Increasingly paranoid for his personal safety, he gradually withdrew from his followers, keeping his whereabouts secret. While in seclusion, Berg and Maria experimented with a new controversial method of using sex to win converts and supporters, infamously known as "Flirty Fishing." Berg gradually introduced the idea of Flirty Fishing to his members through a series of letters documenting their own encounters. He also promulgated a new revelation called the "Law of Love." Berg told his followers that the Ten Commandments were now obsolete. Everything done in love (including sex) was sanctioned in the eyes of God. Adultery, incest, extramarital, and adult—child sex were no longer sins, as long as they were done "in love." He demanded loyalty to his radical message of the Law of Love and Flirty Fishing and every member was required to actively put them into practice or leave. Consequently, two-thirds of the group left, marking the end of the Children of God era and the beginning of the Family of Love.
In 1979 Berg wrote a letter called "My Childhood Sex" in which he revealed that a nanny had performed oral sex on him as a young toddler, which he said he had enjoyed. He said that it was normal, natural, and healthy and that there was nothing wrong with it, which gave anyone so inclined carte blanche to follow suit. In the following years other Mo Letters and Family publications reinforced the idea that children should be allowed to enjoy sexual contact among themselves as well as with adults—and many adults in the Family embraced and carried out these suggestions.
* * * *
Christopher Jones was born in December 1951 in a town near Hamelin, Germany, to Glen, a British military officer and Krystyna, a young Polish woman he had met while stationed in Palestine. He was educated at a public school in Cheltenham, and studied drama at Rose Bruford College. He dropped out after the second year and joined the Children of God in 1973. He has fathered fifteen children, including Celeste, Kristina and Juliana, by seven different women and remains a member of the cult.
Rebecca Jones was born in March 1957 and had a secure middle-class upbringing in the south of England. Her father, Bill, was a civil engineer and her mother, Margaret, a devoted housewife. Her parents were not religious, but they sent her to the local Sunday school at the age of five. She became a Sunday-school teacher when she was twelve and two years later she was baptized. Rebecca was recruited from her school by the Children of God at the young age of sixteen, and met and married our father in 1974. They had three children together, including Celeste and Kristina, before they were separated. Rebecca left the cult in 1987.
Serena Buhring was born near Hanover, Germany in October 1956. Her father was an architect and her mother an accomplished musician, playing the piano, violin, and the cello. Serena traveled as a hippie in India where she joined the Children of God. She met our father after he separated from Rebecca and had three children by him, including Juliana. Serena is still an associate member of the cult.
Part 1
Chapter 1
I was playing alone in the front garden of a white house near the small fishing village of Rafina, in Greece. Our garden had three olive trees, as well as an apricot, fig, and peach, all ripe with fruit. I sat under a large, old pine tree that cast deep pools of shade. The ground was bleached and bone dry from the sun, and I amused myself by drawing pictures on the parched earth with a white rock. I was five years old.
I had little recollection of my mother, only a brief memory of her playing guitar and singing, "Jesus loves me, this I know, for the Bible tells me so," as I played with my little sister Kristina on a bunk bed in a small room in another land. But I was fiercely loyal to Mum and talked about her every day, even though I had not seen her for two years. I still missed her and my sister, and barely remembered my baby brother David. I clung desperately to the hope that Mum would come back. Like a record that never stopped spinning, I'd repeatedly ask my dad, "Why did she leave us?"
Dad would hug me and explain. "Mum decided to be with someone else, and I couldn't let you go. You were the oldest, and we've always been close, haven't we?"
I nodded. I loved Dad just as much as my mum, but I thought it was unfair to have to make a choice between them.
"What about Kristina and David?" I asked.
"They were too young. They still needed to be with their mother."
Dad worked long hours in a makeshift recording studio set up in the basement of our house, producing and acting as DJ on a radio show, Music with Meaning. Because of this I had a nanny, Serena, a young German woman. I resented her, and made life as difficult as I could for her by not cooperating or even acknowledging her. Serena had long, straight dark hair and brown eyes magnified by a pair of thick glasses. Poor Serena. Whatever she did to try to win me round, I was determined not to like her. I thought her German accent sounded funny, and she was constantly trying to give me wheatgerm with unsweetened yoghurt and spoonfuls of cod liver oil, which I hated the smell and taste of.
We belonged to the Children of God, a deeply secretive and religious organization with tentacles that spread across the world. The leader and prophet was named David Berg. We knew him as Moses David; my Dad called him Mo, and I knew him as our "Grandpa." He ordained everything we said, did, thought, and even dreamed. Everything in our lives, even the smallest and most insignificant detail-including the food we ate was regulated by Mo. He had said that our diet should consist of healthy food and no white sugar, and Serena enthusiastically embraced Mo's healthy eating policy. "It will give you strong bones and teeth," she would tell me-but it didn't make it taste any bett
er. She was never cruel, but she was strict, and I saw her as an unwelcome intrusion into my life. Originally, Dad had told me she would be staying for three months, and I had been counting the days until she left.
That sunny day as I played under the pine tree, I glanced up to see Dad and Serena walk out on to the front veranda. They were standing very close together and, instantly, I sensed a kind of electricity between them.
"Honey, I have something exciting to tell you," my father called to me. As he spoke, my tall, handsome Dad, whom I adored more than anybody in the world, turned and embraced Serena.
As I walked towards them, I noticed their faces were lit up with beaming smiles. Oh no, I groaned. This did not look good.
"We've decided to get together, sweetheart," Dad pronounced, in a far too happy tone of voice for my liking. "Serena is going to be your new mother."
"Not her!" I shouted. "I hate her!" I could not even bear to speak her name. "I want my mother. Why can't she come back to live with us? It's not fair!" I sobbed. I turned and ran off to a corner of the garden and stood with my back to them.
Dad followed me and bent towards me, concerned. He put his hand on my shoulder. "Sweetie, you know your mother has gone for good. She's not coming back."
"But I want my sister and brother here. It's not fair." I stuck out my bottom lip in a pout.
"But you have so many brothers and sisters here you can play with," Dad said.
"It's not the same," I complained.