Warren Jeffs ratcheting up the pressure on the FLDS people
18.05.12
Imprisoned polygamous sect leader Warren Jeffs continues to increase the pressure on his people as the year winds down.
He's set Saturday, Dec. 31, as the deadline for Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints people to be "re-baptized" by meeting an increasingly restrictive set of requirements, including donating $5,000 to the church, giving up children's toys, signing over all possessions to the bishop and refraining from sex, said private investigator and author Sam Brower. Read my story on the new rules here.
Everyone has to undergo a rigorous interview session, and those who don't earn the approval of Colorado City-Hildale bishop Lyle Jeffs (Warren's brother) by the end of the year are out.
(Some reports have said Jeffs is threatening those who aren't approved would be "destroyed," but former sect spokesman Willie Jessop, now opposed to Jeffs, says it's more of a warning: if you aren't among the chosen people, you're going to suffer the earthquakes and melting predicted in Jeffs' apocalyptic "revelations from God" along with everyone else.)
Source: Salt Lake Tribune (blog)