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.”
Titus 3:9-11
9. But avoid foolish controversies and genealogies and arguments and quarrels about the law, because these are unprofitable and useless.
10. Warn a divisive person once, and then warn him a second time. After that, have nothing to do with him.
11. You may be sure that such a man is warped and sinful; he is self-condemned.
Brilliant invocation of the applicable guidelines! Well done!
“the more you talk the more it reveals your wicked soul...”
Wouldn’t this fall into “Making it Personal”?
LOL. Yeah, that fits pretty well. You may have noticed that when she made this statement about me...
-—”I felt in one of your post when you so hard hitting on Mormon in general “
...and when I challenged her on that by replying with this...
-—”Since you seem so adept at pulling up my posts... feel free to pull up, and post here, any post I made that was taking a shot at Mormons. “
... that she never come up with any post of mine to respond with? The reason? Because her accusation was a blatant lie and there was no such post for her to throw back at me.
Your cartoon is very appropriate.
You be better not pose as something you never were!
-—”I’m enjoying watching the cognitive dissonance of the mormons here whose creed states “We believe in the Bible as far as it is correctly translated...”
Very VERY good point.
-—”By the same token, it’s interesting that they deny the LDS practice polygamy, and here they are on all the polygamy threads defending it.”
Yes. It would be very amusing if it were not so sad.
I need to smile? Perhaps so. But then, people who blatantly lie about me, as you did, tend to be counterproductive to that end.
I will tell ya what. I will smile more, if you are honest more. Deal?
That would not be me. I am way too bald and ugly.
“since Exodus 21 also sets up minimum standards for treatment of slaves, does that then mean you would claim that the Bible advocates slavery?”
I’m not suggesting that God advocates slavery, but I would suggest that in several places, the Bible condones the practice. I believe the original poster’s statement was:
“Just because people in the OT were polygamous does not mean God condoned it.”
I believe in the passage I quoted, God DID condone it. I do not believe that God ADVOCATED polygamy anywhere in the Bible. There is a difference.
Polygamy is an act of sinful will, not a predisposing genetic condition like eye color. Your claim is like saying that someone who had a bank robber in their family tree generations ago is also likely to be a bank robber.
As I stated. I will smile more, and in fact we may even have some friendly conversations, if you will endeavor to be a tad more intellectually honest. When people mischaracterize, or blatantly LIE about things I say, I tend to view that as a personal attack. And this dog is not so cute as the one in your pic. This dog bites back.
Hi, honey!
Agreed. This is exactly the same reason I take issue with those who make the statements that all Americans are immigrants. Some of my ancestors were... but that does not make ME one.
Sorry for jumping to conclusions will you accept my apology?
Micah 6:9 8 He has shown you, O man, what is good; And what does the Lord require of you But to do justly, To love mercy, And to walk humbly with your God?
Matthew 19:16-22 16 Now behold, one came and said to Him, "Good F97 Teacher, what good thing shall I do that I may have eternal life?" 17 So He said to him, "Why do you call Me good? F98 No one is good but One, that is, God. F99 But if you want to enter into life, keep the commandments." 18 He said to Him, "Which ones?" Jesus said, "'You shall not murder,' 'You shall not commit adultery,' 'You shall not steal,' 'You shall not bear false witness,' 19 'Honor your father and your mother,' F100 and, 'You shall love your neighbor as yourself.' " F101 20 The young man said to Him, "All these things I have kept from my youth. F102 What do I still lack?" 21 Jesus said to him, "If you want to be perfect, go, sell what you have and give to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven; and come, follow Me." 22 But when the young man heard that saying, he went away sorrowful, for he had great possessions.
Many millions today and countless throughout history have led lives in the Lord and either were not aware or didn't have been religiously suppressed for political reasons. Certainly no one is condemned for that.
The Lord loves diversity -- that's why we are all created as individuals and are free to explore our own spiritual path. Everyone in the human race is pre-destined for heaven. It's only a matter of how they live their life... civilly, morally, and spiritually.
In fact, to carry the same point a bit further...
My G-Grandfather, Emery Coombes, was a U.S. Marshall for Judge Parker in Ft. Smith Arkansas. Another of my ancestors was a sheep theif. So which does that make me.. a criminal, or a servant of the law?
I also had ancestors who fought both as confederates, and others as union soldiers... so which am I?
I am what I am... not what my ancestors were.
I always accept apologies, when offered. So yes.
As many others have tried to explain to you, the biological components of a human being are different from human acts of will. The fact that some of Mary's ancestors may or may not have practiced polygamy could not possibly affect the single egg she may possibly have released to engender the Messiah; or it is also possible the entire embryo was implanted by the Holy Spirit. Either way, the actions of forebearers are not transmitted by genetics.
Polygamy is an act of will that in this thread is of concern because it involves underage children and incest. Polygamy is a behavior, not a genetic trait that can be transferred from generation to generation biologically.
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