From Dan (23), second generation member of the Family.

Living in WS, and being part of the WEB team, I’ve known about this site since day one, but it’s been what though, two weeks? Two and a half now? and I’ve still not contributed. I’ve been known to write a little every now and then so all my friends have been asking me, “Why haven’t you written anything?” and “When are you going to write something?” It’s not that I haven’t wanted to, I just haven’t felt like I have had enough of a ‘conclusion’ to my thoughts to tell all of you about it. I’ve been thinking about ways to try to pull it all together into some kind of a topic, theme, or central point, but I just haven’t really gotten anywhere.

But, like Archimedes, I too had my Eureka in the bath (well, shower) tonight, and I leaped out naked and wet to write something without form, order, or outline. I’m a Virgo and this isn’t usually my style, but since I just haven’t been able to wrap my thoughts around any sort of binding theme, my great breakthrough was that I can just throw them all up here random-like and see what happens.

Here’s a good starter: I love the Family.

That felt good. I’ll try again: You know what’s even better than the Family? Jesus! That’s something I’m learning through all of this. I’m learning that even though I’m crazy about our group and all that we’re accomplishing, it’s even more important to be crazy about and for Jesus, because He matters more than any group, He’s the core of it all, He’s why we fight and we’re being fought, and He’s the only one that can really hold us together no matter what else tries to tear us apart. So hail Jesus! My life for You any day!

Oh, here’s an obvious one: The Family is a safe place to raise children. Wait, I’ll top that. The Family is a superior place to raise children than where you are raising your children, unless you too are raising your children in the Family. I was raised in the Family, in WS, and when I think about my childhood, teen years, heck even last year, my mind falls on nothing but joy. Not only was I never abused, I don’t even have any “bad and hard times that shaped my character” times. Not that I’m characterless (I hope), more that whatever character I may have wasn’t built through learning to rise above mistreatment. It was shaped lovingly by my parents and the many, many good people that cared enough to give years of their lives to take me from child to man with the best care anyone could receive and the greatest gift anyone could give—a to be brought up knowing the Lord, that He loved me, that He cared about what happened to me, and that I was and am still worth something to Him.

My biggest fear as a parent (yes, even bigger than my kids being taken away because I’m a Family member. [I’ll explain why in a minute]) is that I won’t be able to reproduce a childhood for my son and daughter that will be as fun, godly, educational, and all around awesome as the one I had. I think of my childhood in such positive ways that I truly fear that my kids won’t have it as good as I did. I am going to try my best though, and I hope we can come close.

And why don’t I worry about my kids being taken away? True, it is a threat we have to live with—it’s probably in the back of every Family parent’s mind at one time or another. (Which in itself is pretty messed up if you think about it, that hundreds or thousands of us Family parents have to live with that possibility hanging over our heads because of the vengeful actions of a few that can’t just let it go.) But I’ll tell you why it doesn’t freak me out too much: One, we have an awesomely powerful God who loves our kids more than we do and will do whatever it takes to ensure their wellbeing, and two, even if they did get “taken in” for evaluation or liberation of some kind, they would be proven the most cool, loving, smart, and well-adjusted kids that those people had ever seen. They’d be a testimony that we in the Family raise not just good kids, but the best kids—kids that grow up to be good, selfless people that will make a difference in the world. They would be returned before long, I guarantee it. They’d probably come back with a six-figure “please don’t sue our butts too bad” bank note attached. Anyways, enough on that. God is our defender. Enter at your risk.

I think that’s enough on the privilege that is a Family upbringing. Except to say that it’s even more than a privilege—it’s a tradition of excellence.

Ok, let’s move on to something else and talk about suicide for a minute. Kind of a weird switch I know, but I did warn at the top that this article was going to be kind of a mixed bag. I’ve heard from a few negative sources that the suicide rate among our ex-members is some kind of reflection on the emotional distress we cause to them in the group. When I heard that, I kept thinking about how the suicide rate among Jesus’ personal disciples was 1 in 12. Made me think. But still, like it says in our Statement, any loss of life is too much, and it’s really sad when people feel they have no options left, nothing left on Earth to do or live for. Sad, but entirely inaccurate. You can always come to The Family. Even if you hated us, fought us, or whatever, we’ll love you and be proud to call you our brother or sister again. If Jesus loves and forgives you, God help us if we ever do less. Plus, if you’re going to throw your life away, might as well give it for some good cause, right? Just a thought.

I just remembered a thrilling personal account. Not about suicide, though—this story is about Star Wars. As far as things that have no eternal value go, Star Wars is one of my very favorite things in all the world. I love those movies. Once when I was less busy than I am now (and less Renewed ) I joined an internet discussion board dedicated to the Star Wars universe. Like a lot of things there’s this whole subculture dedicated to these movies that goes way beyond just the films and stuff. Anyway, it was stupid and a timewaster and I’m glad I’ve learned a few things about better ways to spend my time, but at the time I was really into it.

For the uninitiated Padawans of the bunch 3 movies comprise the “original series” those being:
1. Star Wars (Re-titled “A New Hope” upon it’s 1997 re-release)
2. The Empire Strikes Back
3. Return of the Jedi

My personal favorite was always Return of the Jedi, then Star Wars, and Empire last. I loved the throne-room duel, Jabba’s place, and the fact that it was the last movie and brought closure to the whole story. Apparently though, this is not a cool opinion in the land of Star Wars fandom. It might be a minority viewpoint, but more or less Return of the Jedi gets maligned and abused almost primarily for the Ewok scenes. (Those furry teddy-bear guys. Not the tall one, that’s Chewbacca. The little short ones.) People really tended to beat up on that movie. The cool movie to like was #2—Empire. That one had the “dark” ending, the cooler director, the good Yoda scenes, “I am your Father", and I even read one guy’s lengthy post about Empire’s superior color palette. (He does kind of have a point [Carbonite chamber duel], but that’s really delving deeper than one should into a movie.)

Although writing obscure details about Star Wars movies is fun, the point to all of this is that I eventually left that message board an Ewok apostate. When I stopped going to that message board, if you had asked me in which order I liked the movies I would have said in all conviction that I liked Empire the best, Star Wars the next, and Jedi the least. I told you—an apostate. The moral of this very, very pathetic story is that peer pressure makes a difference. You hang around with a bunch of people that bash something often enough, and glorify something else instead, and you’ll be singing the same tune pretty soon.

This does, more or less, have something to do with Ricky and the bad way he decided to go out. It’s really stupid to compare something as trivial as Star Wars movies to someone’s life direction, but I feel the principle is the same. True reality doesn’t change, but perceptions do. History doesn’t change, memories do. And those perceptions and memories are oh so easy to alter and affect, especially over time. Just ask the Ewoks. It’s worth keeping that in mind when you hear these detractors firing each other up about bringing us down. Standing alone, most of them probably wouldn’t have half the beefs they do.

But it’s cool now that we’ve got this thing going, and we’re firing each other up too and there are way more of us, which is really awesome. Anyone who’s posted here, or will, you rock hard and I’d be proud to call any one of you my friend or brother.

And for the curious that may wonder if I repented from my Jedi apostasy, the answer is that I don’t really worry about rating those movies anymore. I’ve decided that I have not one to spare and I love them equally—although I don’t really have time to get into them much these days.

Since I mentioned Ricky above, I’d love to mention Angela. Something interesting I noticed is that in reading the great things people said about her, both here and on her website, it’s really amazing that having known her personally, none of it gets old, seems exaggerated or have the “Is that you John?” kind of ring to them. Honest and truly, enough good can’t be said about her. I haven’t seen an exaggeration yet. She must be having so much fun now, and she deserves every minute of it.

I said I was done talking about children, but there was one big thing I forgot that I wanted to mention. It’s that after going through this media battle (I say with some shame that this is my first real big one that I’ve been old enough to understand the gravity of and help out in—gotta earn your wings somewhere I guess though) something that I feel that I very strongly want to impart to my children as they grow is the extreme distrust of professional media of all kinds. My kids are going to learn that there is extreme truth to the saying “Don’t believe everything you hear/read” when it comes to the media. I’ve been genuinely surprised at what untruth, and misrepresentation passes as fact these days. Not everything’s a lie, but a mighty big lot is, or something so extremely twisted as to be unrecognizable as the truth it began as.

So my kids will learn to distrust the media. Another adage I’d like to impart to them is that if God approves of what you’re doing, you don’t need to give a goddamn what anybody else thinks. I need more of that attitude myself and I hope to teach it to them too. This is all kind of stuff that I’m learning through persecution and that I’m hoping I can pass along as a father. Somebody probably taught me these same things, but I guess you’ve got to live through it once to really understand. Another good related one would be that we’re following Jesus, not a movement or a leader. When Jesus tells us to stick with Mama and Peter, we do, but that’s not what it’s all about. We feel Jesus’ spirit coming through them, but they themselves are not the be all and end all. The alpha and omega is the Alpha and the Omega—King Jesus!

Lastly I’ll teach my kids that our group doesn’t have to be perfect to command our allegiance. I know it isn’t, you know it isn’t, but we don’t care because we’re still getting the job done better than we could anywhere else and imperfections don’t change that. Something that is too often forgotten by those that want to dredge up mistakes of the past is that the Blood of Jesus Christ cleanseth us from all sins. That same blood that will keep you out of hell no matter how much you poke your finger in God’s eye and mock his prophets is the same blood that cleanses us, The Family, from our mistakes past, present and future. When any of us is sorry, repents, and does our best to make things right, Jesus forgives and those sins become no more. We can all be free from whatever in our past is hurting us or seeming to hold us back. Jesus did it all. There will never be anyone more worthy of respect than him. You’re marvelous Jesus!

This is honestly the most unstructured document I have ever authored, and you readers have my pity. I wasn’t sure what to say but I guess that I didn’t have to know what to say to speak my heart that the Family is a good place, worth living for and dying for, and that our kids are safe and sound and you don’t ever have to worry about them. I guess I didn’t have to know what to say to say that Angela was a good person and Ricky a very misguided one. I didn’t have to know what to say to say that we are all privileged to have such loving shepherds as King Peter and Queen Maria. I didn’t have to know what to say to say in faith that the Blood of Jesus has cleansed us from sin and freed us to go out there and get the job done.

To close, I think that I’ll sign on with Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego to say that my conclusion is that: Our God whom we serve is able to deliver us from the burning fiery furnace, and He will deliver us out of thine hand. But if not, be it known unto thee, that we will not serve thy gods, nor ever, ever, ever, ever worship your goddamned system idols!

Dan is a second-generation member of The Family International