Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints

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Image:Flds Temple Small.jpgThe Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints (FLDS) is a denomination of Mormon fundamentalists within the Latter Day Saint movement, and may be America's largest polygynous group. The church is not affiliated with the more prominent Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, from which it splintered in the early 20th century. The current leader of the church is Warren Jeffs, who became leader on the death of his father Rulon Jeffs in 2002. The headquarters has been, for nearly the last century, in Hildale, Utah, which is a twin city with Colorado City, Arizona, although recent news reports indicate a shift of the church's main headquarters to Eldorado, Texas, where a temple has been built.


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Membership and headquarters

The number of members of the church is unknown due to the very closed nature of their religion; however, their population is estimated at between 6,000 to 10,000 in the twin communities of Colorado City, Mohave County and Hildale, Washington County. After purchasing land now called the Yearning for Zion Ranch or YFZ Ranch in Eldorado, Texas, there appears to be a shift in the headquarters of the church along with a large exodus of Warren Jeffs "most faithful" church members to the new, and rapidly growing, YFZ Ranch. This has left a large sense of uncertainty among the FLDS members in Colorado City and Hildale with a majority of their property rights and general livelihoods now in the hand of the Utah Attorney General's Office who filed a lawsuit freezing the assets of the United Effort Plan, the property holding and financial wing of the FLDS church. The church also has a colony in Bountiful, British Columbia. In the Arizona/Utah and British Columbia towns, the church is the primary influence and reason for being.

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Distinctive doctrines

The Church believes a man must marry at least three women to enter heaven. The sect appeared to be in turmoil in June 2005, after reports it had excommunicated between 400 and 1000 young males in order to make more young women available to older men. Its assets were frozen and a warrant issued in Arizona on Friday 10th June 2005 for the arrest of its leader, Warren Jeffs, for arranging a wedding between an underage girl and a 28-year-old man who was already married. Jeffs is now a most wanted fugitive by the FBI.

The FLDS is considered polygynous, not polygamous, as only men are permitted to take more than one spouse.

The church teaches plurality of wives, who are required to be subordinate to their husbands, as a general requirement for the highest eternal salvation of men, Godhood. It is generally believed in the church that a man should have three wives to fulfill this requirement. Leader and Prophet Rulon T. Jeffs married 22 women and fathered more than 60 children. Critics of this belief say that its practice leads unavoidably to bride shortages and likely to child marriages, incest, and child abuse.

The church currently practices "The Law of Placing" under which all marriages are assigned by the prophet of the church. Many outside of the church, and some inside, view this practice as unduly authoritarian though it helps address by edict the problem of wife shortages. Under the Law of Placing, the prophet elects to give or take wives to or from men according to their worthiness.

In its spring 2005 "Intelligence Report," The Southern Poverty Law Center named FLDS to its "Hate Group" listing because of the church's racist teachings. Prophet Warren Jeffs has said, among other things, "The black race is the people through which the devil has always been able to bring evil unto the earth." [1]

Critics claim that Warren Jeffs has indicated his desire to implement the 19th-Century Mormon doctrine of "blood atonement", in which serious sins can only be atoned by the sinner's death. Former church member Robert Richter reported to the Phoenix New Times that Jeffs repeatedly alluded to this doctrine in church sermons. Richter also claims that he was asked to design a thermostat for a high temperature furnace that would be capable of destroying DNA evidence if such "atonements" were to take place [2].

The FLDS Church also commonly prevents its members from owning property, instead being entirely held by the church itself. This is most notable in the United Effort Plan (UEP) which held all FLDS church member's property, homes, and most jobs in the Colorado City and Hildale areas. There is an ongoing lawsuit brought by the Utah Attorney General's Office to protect the UEP for the current residents of Colorado City and Hildale, reassigning all assets of the UEP and its trustees, ultimately removing Warren Jeffs and the FLDS Church from control of this multi-million dollar asset. The FLDS Church did not defend this trust when seized by the Utah Attorney General's Office.

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History

The area of Hildale and Colorado City have a long history of polygyny, dating from the early decades of the 20th century. According to FLDS accounts, Brigham Young visited the area and stated that "this is the right place [and it] will someday be the head and not the tail of the church [and]...the granaries of the Saints."

The cities were once known as Short Creek, founded in 1913 as a ranching community; however, it soon became a gathering place from polygynist members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. In 1935, the LDS Church excommunicated Short Creek's polygynist residents who refused to sign an oath renouncing polygyny, after which the Fundamentalists became more organized under the direction of John Y. Barlow. The location on the Utah-Arizona border was ideal because the group could avoid raids by one state by moving across the invisible state line to the other.

In 1951, Joseph White Musser, the leader of the group following the death of Barlow, raised controversy with the call of Naturopath Rulon C. Allred to the presiding Priesthood Council (which governed the spiritual affairs of the Fundamentalists). This, along with his objections to the growing practice of arranged marriages to underage young women in Short Creek, led to a split between those loyal to that community and those loyal to Musser. Those who followed Musser are today known as the Apostolic United Brethren, and Rulon C. Allred became their leader upon Musser's death, at which point the group in Short Creek instead followed LeRoy Johnson, a Priesthood Council member.

In 1953, Arizona police authorities organized what became known as the "Short Creek Raid", in which numerous leaders were arrested and taken to Kingman, Arizona. However, public sentiment turned against the authorities after newsreels showed children being taken from their mothers and fathers being thrown in jail. This turn in public support thus doomed the political career of Governor John Howard Pyle. Template:Citeneeded

In 2003 the church received increased attention from the State of Utah when police officer Rodney Holm, a member of the church, was convicted of unlawful sexual conduct with a 16- or 17-year-old and one count of bigamy for his marriage to and impregnation of plural wife Ruth Stubbs. The conviction was the first legal action against a member of the church since the Short Creek Raid.

In 2003, Under the Banner of Heaven by Jon Krakauer was released, a piece of investigative journalism revealing inside details about FLDS. Specifically, Krakauer looked at the practice of polygyny among fundamentalist Mormons and placed it in the context of the history of the Mormon religion as a whole, with heavy focus on the Lafferty brothers, who murdered in the name of their faith.

In November 2003, church member David Allred purchased "as a hunting retreat" the 1,371 acre (5.5 km²) Isaacs ranch 4 miles northeast of Eldorado, Texas on Schleicher County Road 300 and sent 30 to 40 construction workers from Colorado City-Hildale to begin work on the property. Improvements soon included three 3-story houses--each 8,000 to 10,000 square feet (740 to 930 m²), a concrete plant and a plowed field. After seeing high-profile FLDS critic Flora Jessop on the ABC television program Primetime Live on March 4, 2004, concerned Eldorado residents contacted Jessop. She investigated and on March 25, 2004 held a press conference in Eldorado confirming that the new neighbors were FLDS adherents. On May 18, 2004, Schleicher County Sheriff David Doran and his Chief Deputy visited Colorado City, and the FLDS church officially acknowledged that the Schleicher County property would be a new base for the church. It has been reported in the media that the Church is building a temple at the YFZ Ranch, which has been supported by evidence including aerial photographs of a large stone structure (approximately 88 feet wide) being built. Recent pictures now show the temple in a state of relative completion. A local newspaper, The Eldorado Success, reported that the temple foundation was dedicated January 1, 2005 by Warren Jeffs. The FLDS is now the fifth Latter Day Saint denomination to build a temple, and the fourth outside of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints to operate a temple for live ordinances besides baptism.

On January 10, 2004, the church suffered major upheaval when Dan Barlow, the mayor of Colorado City, and about 20 men were excommunicated from the church and stripped of their wives and children (who would be reassigned to other men), and the right to live in the town. As a result, a few teenage women reportedly fled the towns with the aid of anti-polygyny advocates. Two of the young women, Fawn Broadbent and Fawn Holm, soon found themselves in a broadly publicized dispute over their freedom and custody. They fled state custody together on February 15, and have been on the run in multiple states since.

In October 2004 disaffected members of the church reported that David Allred purchased a 60 acre (240,000 m²) parcel of land near Mancos, Colorado (midway between Cortez and Durango) about the same time he bought the Schleicher County property. Allred told authorities the parcel is to be used as a hunting retreat.

Allegations of welfare fraud, tax fraud, incest, statutory rape, physical, emotional and psychological abuse--hidden by a veil of secrecy, isolation, and deprivation--in the FLDS dominated communities have been widely reported in 2004 throughout United States media. It has been estimated that 33% of the men, women and children in the group are receiving state and federal aid, though 0% unemployment was reported in the 2000 census.

Allegations also have been made that in the four and a half years ending in 2004, the FLDS has excommunicated over 400 teenaged boys, some as young as 13, for seemingly trivial offenses, such as dating and listening to rock music. Former members claim that the purpose of these excommunications is that in a polygynous society these young men present competition to the older men for multiple wives, and that the boys must go. Six such teenaged boys have filed a conspiracy lawsuit against Jeffs and Sam Barlow, a former Mohave County deputy sheriff and close associate of Jeffs, for a "systematic excommunication" of young men to reduce competition for wives.

On July 11, 2005, eight men of the church were indicted for sexual contact with minors. At least some of them surrendered to police in Kingman.

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See also

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References

  1. Southern Poverty Law Center. In His Own Words. Intelligence Report. (Spring 2005)
  2. Dougherty, John. Wanted: Armed and Dangerous. Phoenix New Times (10 Nov. 2005).
  3. Information on Utah Attorney General's Lawsuit against the United Effort Plan [3][4]
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External links

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News Articles

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