By Bethy

I’m the eldest daughter of Peter Amsterdam, (currently co-administrator of the Family with Maria) and as I was growing up, I lived in or visited the household of Father David and Maria four times.

My first encounter with Father David occurred when I was six years old. At age 10 I spent a month living in his home. At 12 I spent another six months in his home. Finally, at the age of 14 I spent an additional eight months living in his household.
I have many vivid and fond memories of these periods of time.

I’ve read the transcript of the Montel Williams show, “Escaping a Cult” and I am shocked and disgusted by what I feel is an extremely inaccurate picture painted by Davida of life as a child and teenager in Father David’s household.

I simply cannot reconcile the things she alleges with my own very clear memories of the time I spent in that same household during some of the same time periods. I cannot begin to compare the reality of my own experiences to the dark picture she paints.

The mistreatment of, harm, and abuse of children that she describes are not at all part of my experiences. I was always treated kindly and fairly while in Father David’s household.

The idea that Father David lived in luxury and mansions is preposterous. The houses in which I visited him were large, but that would be because they adequately housed between 25-40 people. Luxurious would never be a word that I would use to describe his dwellings.

Having spent my childhood and most of my adult years in WS units of some sort, and also having visited some Family Homes, I feel that I’m qualified to say that the lifestyle within WS is at least as economical if not more so than the frugal missionary life that most of our Family communities lead.