Matthew had warned me that they might try to kidnap me, but despite what I had been told, my true, flesh and blood family that stood before me did not seem the type of people who would have thugs around the corner ready to jump on me. I wanted to get to know them better and I agreed to meet them again.
Chapter 18
Kristina
As we parked outside Eileen Barker's home, another car pulled up across the road and Celeste stepped out with her chaperone, Matthew. We watched her walk into the house, looking drawn and very thin.
A few minutes after she disappeared inside, we piled out of the car. Mum, David, and I were excited and nervous to finally see her after all these years. I knocked on the door. It opened sharply.
Professor Barker was surprised to see that Mum was not alone and that she had brought a pastor for moral sup-port. Matthew, the Family spokesman, who had been waiting indoors with Professor Barker, freaked out—ranting and raving and accusing the pastor of intending to kidnap Celeste. To calm the situation our friend left. My baby had started to cry and for a moment things were tense and con-fusing. Professor Barker told us that only Mum could stay in the house. We were welcome to wait in the garden. Having no choice, we walked outside and waited impatiently, wondering how Celeste and our mother were getting on together after all this time. Mum had been so nervous that morning she could barely speak. Perhaps I had built it all up in my mind after so long, but it wasn't as I'd imagined it would be like. I thought we would get together as a family—and talk and cry and catch up. Experience should have warned me that cult members were so conditioned to be suspicious of outsiders that it was hard to break through their defenses.
We waited for over an hour while they had their lunch. When Professor Barker finally came outside and said we could meet Celeste, she told us, "Don't talk to her about the Family. Keep it light."
"I haven't seen my sister for fourteen years and I will talk to her about anything I like," I said, nettled.
Celeste came out with Mum and she smiled weakly, as one by one we gave her a hug and a kiss. She started to relax a bit. I had a few moments alone with her at one end of the garden. As much as we both wished to stay off the subject, it was inevitable.
"I'm not lying," I assured her. "Everything I've spoken out about is true."
She nodded. "Joshua has been excommunicated, you know."
"It wasn't just him—" I started to say, realizing that she had been given the impression that it was only Joshua who was responsible for everything that had happened to our mother and me—and not the policy of the cult. "You must remember what Berg did to Mene."
Celeste became uncomfortable. "Mene? She's crazy!"
"But she was your friend!" I was saddened by the fact she could dismiss her friend's agony so flippantly. "Why do you think she's turned out that way?" I said.
We both stared at the ground. There was so much to say and not enough time in which to say it. I sighed; it seemed insurmountable. We had Celeste at last—but she was like a ghost. Instead, I looked down at baby Jordan resting on my hip and smiled. He was real.
Taking my lead, Celeste relaxed. "I haven't congratulated you, Nina," she said, using my old, familiar name. "He's lovely—really cute."
When Matthew and Professor Barker said our time was up, I quickly told my sister I loved her and had always missed her. There was so much more to say but I wanted her to know that much at least. As we all said goodbye, we were desperate to know when we could meet her again.
Soon after this first meeting, Mum phoned Celeste to arrange another meeting, asking if Jonathan could come as well. We took the train down to London and knocked on the door of the Media Home on Finchley Road. A "sweet auntie" opened it with her best "Hi, God Bless You" smile. Eventually Celeste came down, but they refused to leave her alone with us. This time, she seemed much more relaxed and happy to see us. She talked with David and Jonathan and played with baby Jordan. Mum and I just watched, glad to be there with her.
While we waited for lunch, Celeste put on lots of Family PR videos for us, and we gave her the gifts we had brought. My present to her was a bound diary with the names, phone numbers, addresses and birthdays of all her family. Mum had a plan and before leaving home, she had enlisted me as her accomplice. I was to distract Matthew so Mum could have a few moments with Celeste. She wanted to read her a significant Bible verse to give Celeste a new perspective.
Berg always said that you should judge someone by their "fruits" and interpreted fruits to mean the number of souls they'd saved. But Mum wanted to explain that the correct interpretation of "By their fruits you shall know them" was very different. Jesus meant the fruits of the spirit: love, joy, peace, longsuffering, and temperance. On the other hand, the works of the flesh were adultery, drunkenness, wrath, and hatred (Galatians 5:19-23).
She wanted to say more; but hard as it was to leave her there, the Home made it clear our time was up.
"I'll write or telephone—" Celeste said hurriedly as we left. As we half expected, she didn't do either.
I desperately wanted to see my sister again and the next time I was visiting my friends in London, Eman and I plotted over a game of chess to visit Finchley Road together. The next day, we turned up uninvited to the Media Home. Eman knocked on the door as I stood nervously behind him. The curtains twitched and eventually the door was unlocked. Begrudgingly, we were let in. As we sat down in the front room, we noticed that a baby monitor on the coffee table was turned on. It was not the half that parents use to listen—it was the half that listened in on the baby. We were not surprised they would try and eavesdrop on our conversation with Celeste.
After a long wait, in what felt like the Lion's Den, a rattled-looking Celeste came downstairs. I gave her a hug and kiss and introduced her to Eman. People were hovering around us and I was surprised to see Solomon, my old boyfriend from India. We asked Celeste if she and Solomon would like to walk with us to the local garage three doors down to buy some treats.
They did everything to avoid leaving us alone with Celeste. Finally, Solomon was allowed to go with Eman, while I stayed with Celeste. We ended up having dinner there, but it was stiff and difficult. Before we left, Matthew, the Family spokesperson, made an extraordinary request. He asked me to write an affidavit, basically saying everything was "hunky dory" in our meetings with Celeste—that we hadn't been refused or restricted access.
I stared at him and my mouth must have fallen open with surprise. Quickly, I said, "I'll contact Gillian Duck-worth's solicitor."
In the end I agreed, and gave my honest opinion in the affidavit. I said that our communication was monitored and Celeste was not allowed to go out unsupervised, even for one minute to the local shops. The group might be smiling but not everything was fine. After this, we heard nothing more from Celeste and soon discovered she was no longer at Finchley Road.
I started to appear on talk shows and in newspaper and magazine interviews. I was also interviewed for BBC news. I learned that Celeste had been moved to a mansion in Dunton Bassett and I turned up at the Home's doorstep with the BBC reporter, cameraman and soundman. Matthew stormed out, ranting, "You traitor! We trusted you, welcomed you into our home! Under no circumstances are you coming inside! You'll only tell more lies in an affidavit."
"You asked me to write one," I calmly replied. "And I'm not going to lie!"
This sent him into a hopping frenzy and he could barely string a coherent sentence together. He was right in my face, so the reporter stepped in.
"Woa! Steady there. She just wants to talk to her sister."
Angry as he was, Matthew realized he could not afford to look like a maniac on TV and eventually agreed to fetch Celeste. Tears in my eyes, I sat on the wall shaking and trying to recover myself. We waited, and waited, and waited. When Celeste came out over an hour later, she looked tired and on edge. She gave me a wan smile and we strolled around the grounds with arms linked. The BBC crew put themselves between us and Matthew, who was hopping about like
a cricket.
I bared my soul to my sister and explained why I had to speak out. I told her I did not believe she had not been sexually abused. I ended by saying how great it would be if every now and again we could meet up for a movie or a meal. All our numbers were in the diary I had given her.
She nodded. "I'll be in touch," she said. I knew she wouldn't; she wasn't ready. On the way home I felt that the visit had been worth it, that the cult knew we were "watching" them—I hoped it made a difference—but it also haunted me as I turned to leave.
Chapter 19
Celeste
Matthew arranged for a lawyer to help me draft an affidavit, stating that I wasn't abused. However, I was not on the list to take the stand as a witness in the custody case of Gillian Duckworth's grandchild. The leaders were well aware of what went on at Music with Meaning, and it would be too risky to put me on the stand. I was not prepared to lie outright about my past. It was one thing to sign a document drafted for me, but I neither would nor could say on oath in court that I had never been sexually abused.
Matthew took me out to lunch to introduce me to the lawyer. During the meal, the lawyer looked directly at me and asked, "Have you ever been abused sexually?"
I shifted uneasily in my seat and looked down at my plate. "No, I haven't," I replied.
"You know," he said, half-jokingly, "they say that if you look away when you answer a question that it's a sign that you're lying."
I looked at Matthew and then at him, and we all broke out into a laugh. Mathew said something about me being nervous and shy and we continued our conversation. The lawyer never again questioned me on the matter. I only wish that I had been pushed a little further, because I was nearly ready to break.
What was important about my affidavit is not what I said—that I had a fun, happy childhood, and that I had never been abused—but what I did not say. I never stated specifically that no adult men ever touched me in a sexual way. This hair splitting on the definition of "abuse" was a successful tactic that Family leaders used to convince us that denying abuse was not "lying." I had been brainwashed for so long to accept that even our worst sexual experiences were "loving" compared to the real abuse that System children suffered.
One day I sneaked a peak at Kristina's affidavit when I went into Matthew's room. He had left it on his desk along with an affidavit from Mene, Mo's granddaughter. I felt sick at the things Joshua had done to my sister, and I knew she wasn't lying. I had gone through similar things. But Matthew hark told me Joshua had been excommunicated. I wanted to believe the Family had changed. This was the only world I knew, and I was terrified that if I spoke up my friends and Dad would have to turn on me and I would be cut off like my mother and sister had been. Dad had told me on the phone, "I'm so proud of you, honey, for standing up for the faith." Isn't that what I had always wanted? His love and approval? I had it now, but my conscience nagged at me.
I also read parts of Mene's affidavit—it was horrifying what she had endured—but Maria had said in a Letter to the Family that Mene had gone crazy and talked to demons, and that her word should not be believed. After I saw Mene in Macau, she had a complete mental breakdown and was finally sent back to her grandmother, Jane Berg, in the States for treatment. Maria did not tell the Family the full story, how-ever—how her breakdown was due to years of solitary confinement and physical and mental torture. Part of me was angry at how her life had been destroyed, and secretly I hoped her testimony in court would do some good. By denying publicly that any abuse had occurred, I felt like I was betraying my sister and childhood friends who had suffered terribly, and the mental struggle was relentless.
Over the next year and a half, I appeared on a number of television programs, including Sky News and on the BBC, to deny the stories my mother and Kristina were openly talking about. Police raids on communes in Argentina and France had put the Family in the news, and a Home was set up especially for the purpose of interacting with the media and dealing with public enquiries. I was asked to stay and help Gideon and Rachel who were the Media Spokespersons for Europe, and I did their secretarial work. Every time I was requested to appear on television I found it nerve wracking. I dreaded having to give some lame explanation of how I felt about dancing nude when I was six.
My memorized line was, "It was like a hippie commune in Greece by the beach and everyone walked around naked. It was no big deal." Of course, it was rubbish and I hardly gave a convincing performance.
Then Lord Justice Ward, the High Court judge, made a key request. He could not allow Gillian Duckworth's grand-son to remain with his mother unless the Family denounced
the teachings of Mo that promoted child sex and incest. Everything was done to avoid it, but when it was clear that the boy's fate depended on this, Peter Amsterdam and Maria wrote a very carefully worded letter to the judge.
As spokespersons, we were briefed on this letter and held a press conference where it was read to journalists. However, Matthew stressed to us, "We're not really denying the teaching of the Law of Love, but this is just another case of Deceivers Yet True." The Family could not afford to lose the custody case, but they also could not afford to allow their members to think that the prophet might be wrong. I am sure there would have been no repudiation if it had not been for this pressure from the judge. For the first time I saw that our leaders were not just accountable to God alone.
Then one day, I snapped. My body and mind had been destroyed. I couldn't lie anymore. I felt so low that I even contemplated suicide. I had struggled with severe depression for the past five years, sometimes not speaking for days at a time, but now I reached breaking point. But it was too much to face the truth, and instead I decided to run away from it all.
I went to Matthew's partner, Joan, who was second generation and only a few years older than me. I could talk to her and I knew she would understand. I burst out, "I've got to get away from this place, or I'll explode. I've got to go now—today!"
She heard how desperate I was and arranged for me to go to a commune in Liverpool uninvolved with the media and court case.
Then in late November, the shocking news came that Moses David, our prophet and leader, was dead.
Maria told us in a series of letters that he had passed over to Heaven. But we were not to feel abandoned because he would be leading us from the Spirit World through the voice of prophecy. I did not feel sad; rather, I hoped that the Family, finally free from his fantasies and whims, would change for the better. I was sure that the now Queen Maria—as she had been crowned by Jesus in prophecy—would be different and more reasonable.
The drama of the court case had overshadowed the fact that 1993 had come and gone and Jesus had not yet returned. All the prophecies we had been indoctrinated with had been left unfulfilled. Queen Maria said that God had given the Family more time to win the world for Jesus, before the End-time. Many speculated that Jesus would return in the clouds to rescue us in the year 2000.
In the middle of all my confusion and agonizing over what I really believed and what I wanted to do with my life, I received word from Dad. He was coming to England for two months to sort out his passport situation. I desperately wanted to see him after five long years.
In London I arrived at a young people's home headed by Ricky and Elaine, my former teen shepherds from Japan. Dad and my sister Juliana had arrived from the Heavenly City School the day before. I was so happy to see them again. "Dad, it's been so long, I was wondering if I was going to see you again," I said as I gave him a hug.
"I'm sorry, honey," he apologized and gave me a kiss on the forehead. "I had to overstay my visa, so I was hiding out at the school. It was a risk for me to leave and I was needed to work on projects." Dad was now blacklisted, and had to change his name and passport to have any chance of returning to Japan.
"Look at you," I said, as I touched his hair. "You've gone gray since I last saw you."
"I know," he chuckled. "It's part of getting old—but I still feel young at hear
t."
"And Julie, look how tall you are! You're taller than me now." Julie was at least 5 ft 9 in and her hair had grown longer since I had last seen her.
I was excited to hear about the projects that Dad was working on. He had been scripting for the children's video shows Family Fun and Treasure Attic. My eyes lit up. "That is just the sort of thing that I'd love to do," I told him. "I'd love to go back with you to Japan."
Dad liked the idea, but did not have the authority to grant me permission. I had to write to the leaders directly and I would have to raise the money for the plane ticket. He told me he would put in a good word for me when he got back. That gave me hope.
Before Waving, Dad decided he wanted to meet Mum and Kristina before he left.
"Are you sure?" I said. "I hope you're not going to argue with her. Her version of events on your separation is very different. I think all she wants really is understanding and an apology."
But he refused to apologize. "I have no reason to. She decided to go with Joshua and I waited two years. I did nothing wrong," he insisted.
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