Posted on 04/06/2008 5:27:22 AM PDT by SkyPilot
Local and state officials entered the temple of a secretive polygamist sect late Saturday, said lawmen blockading the road to the YFZ Ranch near Eldorado.
The action comes hours after local prosecutors said officials were preparing for the worst because a group of FLDS members were resisting efforts to search the structure.
The Texas Department of Public Safety trooper and Schleicher County sheriff’s deputy confirmed that officials have entered the temple but said they had no word on whether anything occurred in the effort.
The incursion into the temple caps the three-day saga of the state’s Child Protective Services agency removing at least 183 women and children from the YFZ Ranch since Friday afternoon. Eighteen girls have been placed in state custody since a 16-year-old told authorities she was married to a 50-year-old man and had given birth to his child.
Saturday evening, ambulances were brought in, said Allison Palmer, who as first assistant 51st District attorney, would prosecute any felony crimes uncovered as part of the investigation inside the compound.
“In preparing for entry to the temple, law enforcement is preparing for the worst,” Palmer said Saturday evening. They want to have “medical personnel on hand in case this were to go in a way that no one wants.”
Apparently as a result of action Saturday night at the ranch, about 10:15 p.m. Saturday, a Schleicher County school bus unloaded another group of at least a dozen more women and children from the compound.
Although members of the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, or FLDS, have provided varying degrees of cooperation to the sheriff’s deputies and Texas Rangers searching the compound, all cooperation stopped once authorities tried to search the gleaming white temple that towers over the West Texas scrub, Palmer said.
“There may be those who would oppose (entry) by placing themselves between law enforcement and the place of worship,” Palmer said Saturday afternoon. “If an agreement cannot be reached … law enforcement will have to — as gently and peaceably as possible — make entry into that place.”
Sect members consider the temple, dedicated by then-leader of the sect Warren Jeffs in January 2005 and finished many months later, off-limits to those who are not FLDS members, said Palmer, who prosecutes felony cases in Schleicher County.
Palmer said she didn’t know the size or makeup of the group inside the temple.
The earlier refusal to provide access was even more disconcerting because CPS investigators have yet to identify the 16-year-old girl or her roughly 8-month-old baby among the dozens removed from the compound, Palmer said.
“Anytime someone says, ‘Don’t look here,’” she said, “it makes you concerned that’s exactly where you need to look.”
The girl told authorities in two separate phone calls a day apart that she was married to a 50-year-old man, Dale Barlow, who had fathered her child, Palmer said.
The joint raid included the Texas Rangers, CPS, Schleicher County and Tom Green County sheriff’s deputies and game wardens from the Texas Department of Parks and Wildlife.
Although CPS and Department of Public Safety officials have described the compound’s residents as cooperative, Palmer disagreed.
“Things have been a little tense, a little volatile,” she said.
Authorities removed 52 children Friday afternoon and 131 women and children overnight Friday. About 40 of the children are boys, said CPS spokeswoman Marleigh Meisner.
No further children have been taken into state custody since Friday, when 18 girls were judged to have been abused or be at imminent risk for abuse. CPS has found foster homes for the girls, Meisner said, and will place them after concluding its investigation.
Meisner declined to comment on the fate of the 119 other children and said authorities were still searching the ranch for others Saturday evening.
“They’re in the process of looking,” she said. “They’re literally about halfway through.”
:)
And what does it mean with all your confrontational posts to Mormons on these threads. Is there something deeper in you that we should be concerned about?
Sorry, your accusational approach isn’t going to bait me into your alley.
How many times have you scolded Mormons because they refuse to give straight answers to simple questions? A thousand? Well I asked you to give a straight answer to some simple questions and you respond just like those you are so quick to criticize.
Frankly MHG, if you are going to take that attitude, then I don't ever want to see you again complain that some Mormon refused to give you a straight answer to a simple question.
God has always spoken to his servants, and they have written it down. That is the history of the Bible for thousands of years. The pattern is clear, and God is not dead. He is the same as He has always been.
_________________________________________________
That is true...
Jesus, who is God is Alive...
And promised he would send the Holy Spirit to be a Comforter, a guide, and teacher..
That’s why Jesus sent the Holy Spirit...
Remember, the third member of the Trinity..
Jhn 16:1 These things have I spoken unto you, that ye should not be offended.
Jhn 16:2 They shall put you out of the synagogues: yea, the time cometh, that whosoever killeth you will think that he doeth God service.
Jhn 16:3 And these things will they do unto you, because they have not known the Father, nor me.
Jhn 16:4 But these things have I told you, that when the time shall come, ye may remember that I told you of them. And these things I said not unto you at the beginning, because I was with you.
Jhn 16:5 ¶ But now I go my way to him that sent me; and none of you asketh me, Whither goest thou?
Jhn 16:6 But because I have said these things unto you, sorrow hath filled your heart.
Jhn 16:7 Nevertheless I tell you the truth; It is expedient for you that I go away: for if I go not away, the Comforter will not come unto you; but if I depart, I will send him unto you.
Jhn 16:8 And when he is come, he will reprove the world of sin, and of righteousness, and of judgment:
Jhn 16:9 Of sin, because they believe not on me;
Jhn 16:10 Of righteousness, because I go to my Father, and ye see me no more;
Jhn 16:11 Of judgment, because the prince of this world is judged.
Jhn 16:12 I have yet many things to say unto you, but ye cannot bear them now.
Jhn 16:13 Howbeit when he, the Spirit of truth, is come, he will guide you into all truth: for he shall not speak of himself; but whatsoever he shall hear, [that] shall he speak: and he will shew you things to come.
Jhn 16:14 He shall glorify me: for he shall receive of mine, and shall shew [it] unto you.
Jhn 16:15 All things that the Father hath are mine: therefore said I, that he shall take of mine, and shall shew [it] unto you.
Jhn 16:16 ¶ A little while, and ye shall not see me: and again, a little while, and ye shall see me, because I go to the Father.
Jhn 16:17 Then said [some] of his disciples among themselves, What is this that he saith unto us, A little while, and ye shall not see me: and again, a little while, and ye shall see me: and, Because I go to the Father?
Jhn 16:18 They said therefore, What is this that he saith, A little while? we cannot tell what he saith.
Jhn 16:19 Now Jesus knew that they were desirous to ask him, and said unto them, Do ye enquire among yourselves of that I said, A little while, and ye shall not see me: and again, a little while, and ye shall see me?
Jhn 16:20 Verily, verily, I say unto you, That ye shall weep and lament, but the world shall rejoice: and ye shall be sorrowful, but your sorrow shall be turned into joy.
Jhn 16:21 A woman when she is in travail hath sorrow, because her hour is come: but as soon as she is delivered of the child, she remembereth no more the anguish, for joy that a man is born into the world.
Jhn 16:22 And ye now therefore have sorrow: but I will see you again, and your heart shall rejoice, and your joy no man taketh from you.
Jhn 16:23 And in that day ye shall ask me nothing. Verily, verily, I say unto you, Whatsoever ye shall ask the Father in my name, he will give [it] you.
Jhn 16:24 Hitherto have ye asked nothing in my name: ask, and ye shall receive, that your joy may be full.
Jhn 16:25 ¶ These things have I spoken unto you in proverbs: but the time cometh, when I shall no more speak unto you in proverbs, but I shall shew you plainly of the Father.
Jhn 16:26 At that day ye shall ask in my name: and I say not unto you, that I will pray the Father for you:
Jhn 16:27 For the Father himself loveth you, because ye have loved me, and have believed that I came out from God.
Jhn 16:28 I came forth from the Father, and am come into the world: again, I leave the world, and go to the Father.
Jhn 16:29 His disciples said unto him, Lo, now speakest thou plainly, and speakest no proverb.
Jhn 16:30 Now are we sure that thou knowest all things, and needest not that any man should ask thee: by this we believe that thou camest forth from God.
Jhn 16:31 Jesus answered them, Do ye now believe?
Jhn 16:32 Behold, the hour cometh, yea, is now come, that ye shall be scattered, every man to his own, and shall leave me alone: and yet I am not alone, because the Father is with me.
Jhn 16:33 These things I have spoken unto you, that in me ye might have peace. In the world ye shall have tribulation: but be of good cheer; I have overcome the world. John 16:1-33
Who would want to be satisfied with a weak puny lying man when they can have God, the Holy Spirit speak to them ????
Have they found the 16 yr girl yet that started all this?
“BTW, Trinity is not found in the bible. Godhead is, several times.”
There are two problems with your statement Seven...
1. The word “Trinity” isn’t found in scripture. That is meaningless as an argument. The issue is, what does the scripture teach?
2. The word Godhead doesn’t mean what mormonism teaches.
Mormonism ends up with three separate gods, which is an ancient heresy, condemned by the church. Add to these the billions and billions of other gods of mormon teaching and your outdo the Hindus as polytheists.
“...that they may be one, even as we are one:”
_______________________________________
Yes one...
Not three “personages”
ONE God..
The Three-in-one...
The Trinity
When I exchange with the mormons, who are in a non-Christian cult, my posts are repleat with reasons for the hope that is within me of God’s Grace in Christ. Didn’t you notice?
Good question.
I keep returning to this thread to learn about the young girl and all I seem to get are religious wars.
No word yet. Maybe they have but are not saying to protect her?
You & I would agree that Paul had God's view on this matter, wouldn't we? Well what was Paul's perspective on Onesimus? Philemon 15-17: Perhaps the reason he was separated from you for a little while was that you might have him back for good—no longer as a slave, but better than a slave, as a dear brother. He is very dear to me but even dearer to you, both as a man and as a brother in the Lord. So if you consider me a partner, welcome him as you would welcome me.
Frankly, that was also Paul's perspective in Gal 3:28 & Col. 3:11--making no worldly distinction between slave & free as Christians.
So, to sum up Paul's treatment of Onesimus, he...(a) deemed him a worthy recipient of the gospel; and (b) sent him back with the understanding that Philemon would receive him "no longer as a slave, but better than a slave, as a dear brother."
Also, we don't know if Onesimus was one in the economic bond-servant category or not, do we? Why do I mention that? Well, look at many contemporary Americans who work accumulative years to pay off the debt they owe to credit card companies. Who's the master & who's the slave there? These folks are almost like part-time inmates...slaving away for someone other than their families. How would these contemporaries be much different from someone bonded over for 7 years to pay off an economic debt via labor?
According to your viewpoint, you somehow think that God condones (but doesn't advocate) a man having two masters--God & the credit companies. Why don't you ask a representative number of Christians if they think that's so.
As for a more over-arching viewpoint of God's perspective on slavery, the Bible condemned slave traders (1 Tim. 1:9-11) & kidnapping for slavery (Ex. 21:16); advised against returning escaped slaves (Dt 23:15-16); and advised slaves to gain freedom (Moses & Paul...Paul 1 Cor. 7:21-23).
Now I know there are a few verses where some have thought God "condoned" slavery or was more neutral toward it...see Deut 15; Ex 21; 1 Pet. 2:18; Eph. 6;5-9: Titus 2:9-10; Col. 3:22-25; 1 Tim. 6:1)...but again, first of all, many of the "slaves" of the era were "bondservants"--meaning they were paying off an economic debt...would be released after a certain # of yrs. (no credit in those days)...secondly in many households, servants were treated as family members; For these slaves, anyway, that was no comparison to the slave-as-property mentality of American & Muslim slavery. (Certainly other slaves acquired by conquering warriors were nowhere near treated "like family").
My point is that in Biblical times, there were "degrees" of slavery, from temporary bond-servants to those treated like "plunder" captured after a victorious battle. From servants treated like family members to those abused. (Note, too that God didn't rush in to rescue the Israelites from bondage in Egypt...they were there over 400 years...how many generations is that? Did that mean God "condoned" it? No. But how would we know about spiritual debt & spiritual slavery unless He allowed real-life slavery. How would we know about spiritual warfare unless He allowed real warfare? "Allowance" and "condoning" are NOT the same attitudes.)
If it is true that she was a minor when impregnated, then we will have to wait for the filing of charges to learn of this young girl’s fate.
Maybe it’s just the sheep.
Oh, like this little comment to sevenbak?
Protect her from what, who? They have all the women and children out of the place at least as I can gather from news reports. Bonfire I’m not jumping on you just what to hear about the one who supposedly started this. Where is she?
If she’s underage they will not give her name. IF they are protecting her it’s for good reason as she’s probably afraid of retribution. Heck....I’ve heard the stories of women and boys from this cult and they are horrifying!
You are showing just why I am now putting you on ignore.
You're not doing a very good job of it.
“Maybe it’s just the sheep.”
What do you mean?
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