From Celeste DiMattina

The setting of this tragic happening vaguely reminds me of a movie I once saw… I won’t get into critiquing the movie itself and the morals and message therein (seeing as I did not agree with them), but the sick feeling I had for days after watching that movie is almost as bad as the feeling I experienced at receiving news of Angela and Ricky’s deaths. – Probably because I knew the movie was fictional whereas I knew both Angela and Ricky and could not believe I had actually read that notice correctly.

It just didn’t seem right, and it still doesn’t! Angela was such a loving person! There’s no way anyone would want to kill her. And as for Ricky, though I knew he had turned sour and antagonistic over the years after leaving the Family, murder and homicide was the last thing I would have expected any young person raised in the Family to do.

My name is Celeste DiMattina, I’m 26 and was born and raised in the Family. I haven’t lived my entire life in the Family though. When I was a young teen I took a “break” for a few years. At the time I lived with my dad (who is no longer a Family member – though he is one of the thousands who are just fine moving on in life) but as soon as I realized what I was missing – the fun, excitement, happiness, contentment, enthusiasm, joy, peace, etc. (I don’t think I could do the subject justice and the list would go on and on) – from not being in a Family Home and around Family members, I realized I had to get back to the Family as soon as I could. It wasn’t easy to rejoin actually, contrary to what some might say of our recruiting techniques, but I look at it as a time in which I was able to see both sides of the fence and make a concrete decision of just what I wanted to do with my life.

Throughout what I proudly call a very fun-filled-adventurous life growing up with the many diverse nationalities as you find in our Homes I’ve never seen or understood what it is that those who leave the Family and end up hating us so much are so upset about. I’ve been to 4 different continents, lived with hundreds of Family members and am presently in Mexico. I speak several languages, I’m well educated, I have many talents, and I can say I’m happy and fulfilled. Sure, I’ve bumped into some Family members that I didn’t get along that great with, I’ve had arguments with some, disagreements, etc. and yes, I’ve heard of some situations which were wrong, but they have been remedied and the appropriate discipline has been meted out, as the rules within our Charter and Family publications call for. But to hear certain descriptions of life in the Family recounted by some of those who have left (who, might I remind you, are a minute percentage of those who have actually left the Family at any point in time), I wonder where they got their experience from, and whether perhaps they just had such a bad dream that they didn’t realize that it was a nightmare, not reality. I admit, I’ve had some dreams where I think I told someone something I was meant to tell them, it’s so realistic that when I wake up I can’t remember if that was a dream or not, but I’d like to hope that I knew when a nightmare was a nightmare and not real life.

I never actually lived with either Ricky or Angela for an extended period of time, but I have met both of them so this recent happening does mean something – a lot – to me.

Angela came to our Home when I was 18 as she was traveling with Peter and others from their Home for some meetings and seminars, she was helping with secretarial. I do secretarial now and wanted to when I met her so I really looked up to her as someone I wanted to be like. I remember at the time we were getting more glimpses into “life in WS”, different individuals who had been “behind the scenes” (as we call it) for so many years were starting to visit our Homes, and Angela was, in fact, one of the first Family members I met who had lived in WS. She had no kids of her own, though all the kids in our home gravitated towards her as she was a bubble of love and entertainment for them. I can still remember her playing on the carpet with our preschoolers, reading books with them, talking to them (or more like them trying to talk to her and her pretending to actually understand their lingo)…she was just a super sweet “aunty”, the term they used when referring to her. In general there seemed to be an ever-present smile on her face and it wasn’t one of those plastered for show, it was inside of her and reflected on the outside. – Needless to say, she made a big impression in my life. She told me she didn’t have any kids, though from seeing her with our kiddos and talking with her I came to realize that all kids in the Family were “her kids”. She poured so much love and attention into them, I almost felt it was probably only fair that no one or two or three kids were to get all that special love. – This way she could share it with all.

I also met Ricky when I lived in Eastern Europe. He was a nice guy, or so was the impression he gave me. I remember him as a sweet young man, perhaps a bit quiet at first, but it didn’t take long before he had his big smile on his face and was jabbering with all of us and having a good time. – I actually enjoyed his company.

Why am I saying all this? Well, I don’t know, I think because I’m trying to keep the good memory I had of these people I once knew and cared for live in my mind. It’s sad to think that a life as precious as Angela’s was lost due to bitterness and resentment, and it’s even more depressing to imagine that someone who had such a wonderful upbringing as Ricky became so hardened and bitter to the point of killing someone who considered him a friend.

From what I know of Ricky’s life he was taught the same founding principles each of us who have been born and raised in the Family have had ingrained in us. – To love, not to hate! The morals my parents instilled in my brother and I, and the ones each Family parent, first or second generation, instills in their kids as they’re growing up, are the ones at the core of the Christian religion. As Jesus so simply put “Love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, with all thy soul and with all thy mind….and love thy neighbor as thyself.” You just need to take a look at how much mention of love we have plastered all over our publications to know what we teach and preach. –LOVE! I mean, we were even known as the Family of Love during the FFing years, I don’t see how one can associate love with all these schmucky rumors and lies that embittered former members are spreading.

I’m just so tired of having to hear complaints over and over again from people who just don’t have a life. – And who, in the bummishness of feeling they don’t have one, end up doing all they can so that others don’t enjoy theirs.

I’m sorry if someone had a rough time at some point or another during their life in the Family, we’re not denying that there were bad things that happened due to some individuals acting totally out line, but Family leadership has apologized, over and over and over and over and over and over, and yes, hundreds of times over again. – What else is there to do? I had no part in any of the accusations brought against the Family, and I know that my peers didn’t either. Not to mention that the kids my fellow second generation peers are raising are definitely not to blame for it either. If someone has an issue with someone then they should settle it with them, not try to take it out on people who have given their lives to help others daily. Not on those who are pouring out day in and day out to raise their children in a Godly manner by teaching them the good morals and virtues in life.

If anything, the kids who I’ve seen abused in the Family are those who were amongst the 700 who were taken from their homes during pre-dawn raids, and submitted to abusive testing (i.e. picture a 7 year old girl having to sit on a freezing cold metal table without her clothes or panties on while some stranger forces her to sit still while he – and yes, it was a man – checks her out to see if she’s ever been abused sexually. Tell me that’s not abuse!), they were torn from their parents arms, told they would never again see their daddy and mommy who they’ve known all their lives as the ones who loved and cared for them, snatched from warm and cozy beds and a home of love and care to be stuck in filthy conditions (a.k.a. orphanages, correctional institutions, etc.) with people who couldn’t care less about them. You want to tell me that’s not abuse?! What world do you live in? I know many of those 700 kids and not one, not one single one, will tell you that it wasn’t a nightmare for them and a hellish experience, to say the least.

I believe that our actions in this life account for what rewards we will receive in Heaven. That is why I’ve given my life to helping others and living the sample Jesus laid out for us in the Bible. I’d like to think that, like Angela, when it’s my turn to meet my Savior, He will be able to tell me “Well done thou good and faithful servant”. I know Angela is receiving a huge reward for her countless labors of love but it scares me to think of what shame and contempt those who are so hell bent on ruining the lives of so many people through their lies, false accusations and fabrications, will have to face.

Again though, as my parents so lovingly taught me, and as Jesus so clearly spelt out for us in Matthew chapter 5, verse 44: “Love your enemies, bless them that curse you, do good to them that hate you, and pray for them which despitefully use you, and persecute you;” likewise will I pray for, love and yes, even forgive those who are trying to ruin our lives with their malicious slanders.

I just hope for their own good they don’t get to such a sad state as Ricky Rodriguez…

Celeste DiMattina is a second generation member of the Family International.