The people are singing
The Dallas Morning News spoke to an unnamed law officer who was at YFZ Ranch as investigators swept the compound owned by the FLDS Sect.
The source described women being loaded onto buses that carried them away from the ranch. They sang, the newspaper said, to calm their children. The song? ''Sweet Spirit of Prayer.''
It's original title is ''Sweet Hour of Prayer'' and its hymn used by The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. You can hear it here .
As he did with many LDS songs, Warren Jeffs change the title and some verses of the song to ''Sweet Spirit of Prayer.''
Why? Because prayer shouldn't be confined to an hour, an FLDS woman told me this morning.
The woman's family was able to speak to a brother at the YFZ Ranch in the early days of the raid. The brother told his family that as law officers entered their home, his children began to sing the ''songs of Zion'' -- not a particular song, but various hymns.
By singing, the people are making a statement. Members of this sect were forewarned in 1953 that Arizona authorities planned to raid their community, then known as Short Creek. It lies at the Utah/Arizona border and today is known as Hildale, Utah, and Colorado City, Ariz. They set up lookouts on Berry Knoll, who ignited dynamite sticks to announce a long line of vehicles making its way to the community at 4 a.m. on July 26.
The people gathered around a flag pole at the schoolhouse and they sang ''God Bless America'' as officers arrived.
The woman spotted another, younger brother in one of our photos of a group of teens playing soccer at Fort Concho. He is 17, she said, and is married to a woman his own age. They have one child and she is due to give birth in August.
In a brief phone call made to family in the past few days, her brother began to cry. He said he has seen his wife across the grassy field at the compound but hasn’t been able to speak with her.
The source described women being loaded onto buses that carried them away from the ranch. They sang, the newspaper said, to calm their children. The song? ''Sweet Spirit of Prayer.''
It's original title is ''Sweet Hour of Prayer'' and its hymn used by The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. You can hear it here .
As he did with many LDS songs, Warren Jeffs change the title and some verses of the song to ''Sweet Spirit of Prayer.''
Why? Because prayer shouldn't be confined to an hour, an FLDS woman told me this morning.
The woman's family was able to speak to a brother at the YFZ Ranch in the early days of the raid. The brother told his family that as law officers entered their home, his children began to sing the ''songs of Zion'' -- not a particular song, but various hymns.
By singing, the people are making a statement. Members of this sect were forewarned in 1953 that Arizona authorities planned to raid their community, then known as Short Creek. It lies at the Utah/Arizona border and today is known as Hildale, Utah, and Colorado City, Ariz. They set up lookouts on Berry Knoll, who ignited dynamite sticks to announce a long line of vehicles making its way to the community at 4 a.m. on July 26.
The people gathered around a flag pole at the schoolhouse and they sang ''God Bless America'' as officers arrived.
The woman spotted another, younger brother in one of our photos of a group of teens playing soccer at Fort Concho. He is 17, she said, and is married to a woman his own age. They have one child and she is due to give birth in August.
In a brief phone call made to family in the past few days, her brother began to cry. He said he has seen his wife across the grassy field at the compound but hasn’t been able to speak with her.
2 Comments:
While I don't agree with the practice of marrying teenage girls to older men, stories such as the 17 year old man married with a child and another on the way break my heart. Yes, there may be abuse there (is?), however not everyone is being abused. Hopefully the authorities will start to sort this out in the next few days and the children that are deemed to be out of danger can return to their lives. I can only imagine how terrified they are.
I have a correction to make:
My mother and I learned yesterday that my brother (age 17) is not married as I thought. He has been speaking about his sister. She is 20 or 21. He has been referring to her in phone conversations as "a young lady we love." We have not used names on the phone or spoken in detail about relationships because we believe the lines are being monitored. We just assumed he was married because he has been away from us for a number of years. He is not married. And I am sorry for the misunderstanding. He is concerned for his sister, as any loving brother would be about a sister. And in the interest of truth in this historical record, I wish for you to post this paragraph as a comment on the blog entry. Thank you.
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