A Current Affair’s Alison Piotrowski looks at the Australian Twelve Tribes group and speaks to some of its former members. Subscribe here: Get full episodes here:

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Gillian McNally, The Sunday Telegraph

Members must relinquish all properties, possessions, wealth and “sovereignty” on joining to become “true disciples”, and live like members of the early Church.

The group has been dogged by allegations of child beating and child labour abuses overseas, one of the most high profile cases in Germany 2013, when a documentary showed children in a local branch being beaten so badly, the government removed them.

The Twelve Tribes has repeatedly denied allegations of child abuse and child labour and say their child-raising practices are not harmful.

Or Mathias, 26, who was raised in the Twelve Tribes and alleges he was beaten daily as part of the group’s strict child rearing doctrine, said it was not a charity and should be investigated.

“They say they are so they don’t have to pay taxes, and they don’t have to pay employees,” Mr Mathias said. “What they do is want is for others to donate to them in order to continue living their beliefs.”

He said visitors were being misled into believing the community was a “utopia” of communal life but “once a visitor decides to join and pass all their possessions to the Twelve Tribes that’s when they start to see the real life they have come into”.

“Then it’s too late. They’re broke and are trapped with no way out.”

Mr Mathias, who has lived in 10 of the Tribes’ communities including six years at Picton, alleges he and other children received harsh corporal punishment daily in the Tribes.

He said children received poor education, were frequently sent to work and “everyone has to work very long hours and are constantly being pushed to get more done”.

In Australia, about 90 members live communally in Twelve Tribes properties at Picton, Katoomba and Coledale near Wollongong, spending the bulk of their time working as volunteers in its commercial enterprises.

They live in accommodation forming part of the Tribes’ property portfolio, including Balmoral House in Katoomba and Peppercorn Creek Farm in Picton, where a large Georgian-style home is under construction.

On its website, Twelve Tribes states it “doesn’t use religious tax exemptions to avoid paying tax” but, in Australia, it claims tax exemptions as a charity for advancing religion.

Its holding company, The Community Apostolic Order, lists assets worth $5.64 million and seven businesses including the popular Yellow Deli cafe in Katoomba and Common Ground bakery in Picton, all of which receive GST concession, fringe benefit tax rebate and income tax exemption.

 According to figures lodged with the Australian Charities and Not For Profit Commission (ACNC), its businesses produced an annual trading income of $3 million in 2015 — half of that declared as profit, although in 2017 its declared income plunged to $245,000.

There were no details in the accounts to explain the change.

Members are not permitted to accumulate private wealth but documents cited by The Sunday Telegraph show some still hold assets in their name, including a 78.5ha tract of land near Bigga in NSW.

The Yellow Deli building at 214 Katoomba St, purchased for $1.5 million in 2004, is owned by Granite Investments, of which several members are shareholders.

Despite the religious charity’s assets and income, the six ex-members we spoke to said there was no financial accountability to members inside, and they had little or no access to money.

None recouped any assets or funds on leaving other than one, and only after threatening legal action. They received no pay, superannuation or financial support.

Rosemary Cruzado, who lived with the Twelve Tribes for 14 years and has been cut off from her daughter and four grandchildren who remain inside, said “common members” of the community had to “beg leaders” for basic things like shoes, clothes and doctor visits.

At the same time, she alleged leaders have access to cars, cash, credit cards, even holidays.

“There’s a lot of medical neglect, my kids never had dental check-ups, I never had dental check-ups. You had to get really bad so that you were in agony to go to the dentist,” Mrs Cruzado said.

“On a bigger scale, I lost a baby there and I believe that’s because I didn’t have enough resources to go and see a proper specialist to actually tell me what was going on.”

She said home schooling of children was “fundamentalist”, with work emphasized over study and her son was removed from education at 13 to work six days in the Tribe’s bakery.

“The point of education is for them to become a member, it’s not for them to know their rights in society, how they can participate in society,” she said.

Ros Hodgkins of the Cult Information and Support Group, which has supported a number of ex-members, said people who joined the group were enticed by the ideal of living a true Christian life in a sustainable community.

But she said many found themselves trapped in a group that dictated every aspect of their lives, from what they ate to how they parented, with no financial means to leave.

“It’s very painful once they come out and they realise this was a scam in a way, to get workers for their business, because it is a business,” Ms Hodgkins said.

She said there was a lack of political will to look at groups like the Twelve Tribes because of notions of religious freedom “but that’s not an excuse”.

“It goes against the grain of what spirituality is from the Christian perspective,” she said.

As a religious charity, the Twelve Tribes can legally raise revenue only to benefit members but it must show it is meeting or intending to meet purposes outlined in its governing document, created in 1995 and lodged with the ACNC in 2012.

That document states it will care for members’ wellbeing, undertake activities such as prison ministries and housing the homeless, assist charities with similar purposes and provide counselling ministries for people with emotional, psychological and “social disabilities”.

Locals who spoke to The Sunday Telegraph in Katoomba could cite no examples of charitable works by the group and several business owners said it was tough competing with a business not required to pay wages, tax, rent or super.

A spokesman for the ACNC said due to the secrecy provisions in the ACNC Act, they could not disclose if the commission had received any complaints, or was investigating the charity.

“Allegations of a charity causing harm to its beneficiaries would be of concern to the ACNC. We encourage people who think a charity is not acting appropriately to report it to the ACNC.”

The Sunday Telegraph contacted the Twelve Tribes several times and left a list of questions on Tuesday however at the time of publication the community had not responded.

The group states on its website that spanking is used on children, however it is not abusive, that leaders do not live off the labour of members and the group does not follow anti-social or oppressive rules.

Other episodes in the series

Chapter 1

Life inside the Twelve Tribes

Chapter 2

Escaping hell

Chapter 3

Paying the price

• Sect accused of using ‘slave labour’ to run cafes
• Escaping hell: Beaten with a bamboo stick

The second email Rosemary Cruzado sent in her life was in 2010 to the elders of the Picton Twelve Tribes religious community. It read: “I’m not coming back.”

After 14 years inside the strict Christian fundamentalist sect, Mrs Cruzado and her two daughters had gone to Auckland to visit her husband and son who had left.

Her eldest daughter, who was about to be married, chose to return.

“Straight off my daughter was told we were never allowed on any of their premises. She went really stiff on us, she was afraid to be alone in a room with me,” Mrs Cruzado said.

“I think if it was up to her she would have still continued to see us but they make a rule of separating those who left from those who are still in.”

Her daughter, now 29 and married, has four children in the sect that Mrs Cruzado cannot see.

“There’s only so much you can cry. It’s almost as if she has died. I know if she died, they probably wouldn’t let me know. I hope and pray she will get out some time,” she said.

Mrs Cruzado, along with fellow ex-member Matthew Klein and their families, have faced years of heartache after leaving the Twelve Tribes.

Mr Klein spent just two years in the group before leaving in 2001 with his three small children but another 18 years watching them grow up without their mother, Tysha, who chose to remain inside.

“My wife gave up a breastfeeding child, and she did it because she was told to do it. Then she didn’t contact them for 16 years. It doesn’t make sense.”

His children have tried reaching their mother several times, including his daughter Tessa, but meetings were cancelled or when she called, she was told her mother wasn’t available.

In 2011, after one attempt at contact, he said he was called by his ex-wife’s new husband.

“Tysha’s husband told me to stop calling and to leave them alone and that he didn’t care about my children suffering,” he said.

Recently his youngest son made contact with Tysha and then Tessa reached out but again meetings were cancelled.

“As she’s remarried and her husband is now the head, he has to permit contact,” Mr Klein said.

The family’s story is not unique among ex-members of the Twelve Tribes, which has communes in about 40 locations around the world.

Mr Klein, who spent time in a community in the US and in Canada as well as Picton in Sydney, said it was common practice for members to alienate family and friends outside, making it hard to leave.

“It’s surprising the number of people in there who are separated from the kids and it’s unusual for estranged parents to be given permission to visit,” he said.

“And no one outside the community ever gets child support from members

“Every year I’d ring up the Child Support Agency and contest the $0 child support she was required to pay, she’s working full time (in the Tribes’ businesses), she’s not getting paid in money but she’s getting paid in kind. She can’t do a thing for her kids,” he said.

“When I was in America there were a couple of Europeans who could never go home because of all the child support they owed.”

Counsellor Raphael Aaron, who is the director of Cult Consulting Australia, has helped several former Twelve Tribes members recover, including the Cruzado and Klein families.

He said the group’s indoctrination and subsequent splitting of families had caused significant trauma to ex-members.

“The most important aspect for me which defines them negatively is the way they deal with any families outside the organisation,” Mr Aron said.

“Families are estranged from children or parents and they’re doing nothing at all to do anything different and foster contact.

“It comes back to indoctrination and the sort of views being spread over there that children don’t need to be seen because they’ve left the organisation.”

It’s easy to dismiss people who join fringe religious movements as naive or foolish, but Mr Aron said people convert for all sorts of reasons.

In some cases, membership could also be benign early on. Addicts, for example, may go in and stop using drugs but it’s unlikely they deal with the issues behind that addiction. The group doesn’t believe in conventional medicine or psychiatry and “therefore people are at the mercy of its belief system”.

In the Twelve Tribes case, from the outside, their belief system seems old-fashioned and bucolic. Members live communally, praying and working together in the Tribe’s businesses and on the farm. Children are homeschooled, babies are born at home and modern books, TV and the internet shunned.

But the ex-members we spoke to said inside life is very different to that quaint picture. Following a doctrine of Christian fundamentalist, Hebrew and Messianic beliefs created by founder Eugene Spriggs, they say every aspect of life is controlled.

Marriages are arranged, corporal punishment of children mandatory and information from outside strictly controlled.

Having relinquished all their personal wealth to join, members also have no financial means, making it difficult to leave.

“There’s not one religious order anywhere in the world that would endorse them and would say they’ve got a legitimate path,” Mr Aron said.

“They’ve cobbled together all these different ideas, it’s a little bit alternative, it’s a little bit hippyish in a lot of ways, and it’s very attractive in that respect, the clothes that people wear, the whole thing I would say it’s almost seductive rather than attractive.”

Membership doesn’t happen overnight.

Most new recruits meet the community in the Yellow Deli and Common Ground cafes, or at their market stalls and festivals. Visitors are invited to attend the group’s Friday night dinner or Sabbath, then stay as guests. If they chose to join, they are baptised after relinquishing all their wealth and possessions, and often take a Hebrew name.

“On the Friday night, when we first went to the Peppercorn Creek Farm (in Picton), we were met by very friendly people,” Mrs Cruzado said.

“They had this huge tents, musicians, they had the table set up with candles, all very pretty. The impression was like they were a breakaway little society, which seemed very wholesome and beautiful when we first met them.”

She said her family were made to feel very at home and continually asked to stay for a bit longer — for the next festival, or event, or celebration.

Eventually, they joined the commune.

“They want to be self-sufficient, they don’t fight, they don’t divorce, they homeschool all their children. They seemed harmless, intelligent, spiritual loving people.”

But she said, once inside, she found she became a “willing slave” working all the time, depressed with a catastrophic view of the world as a result of the apocalyptic preachings inside. Every day was up to five hours of teaching, then work and no communication with people outside.

“They’re actively engaged in trying to convince you that you need their salvation, you need their community, their friendship, their God,” she said.

“When you’re cut off from all other sources of information, I didn’t talk to anybody, I was fully immersed in their life, I became convinced I was going to hell.”

Mr Klein said he was also drawn to the Tribes’ promise of an intentional, loving community, when he and his then wife Tysha joined in 1999. He also feared if he didn’t join, his marriage would fall apart.

Like Mrs Cruzado, he struggled with the demand to physically discipline his children, the hierarchal system which he said favoured leaders and their families over common members, the poor education offered to kids and the lack of medical care, which he said almost claimed his youngest son Peter two weeks after he was born, until he demanded his wife and child be taken to hospital.

“They did pressure me to put faith in God and to just pray for him rather than take him to hospital,” he said.

“At the hospital he actually stopped breathing in the emergency department and if we weren’t there, he would have been dead.”

Mr Klein said there were good people in the group but the elders should be held accountable.

“There’s no checks and balances, there’s nowhere to report concerns. There is no accountability. If you go against the system, you’re punished, and it’s psychological for adults — demoted, shunned, ignored, ostracised,” he said.

Labelled a disgruntled ex-member for repeatedly speaking out against the group, Mr Klein said the public needed to know the group’s practices were damaging families, especially children.

“They’re getting minimal education, little life or work skills. They’re damaged, damaged kids. They’re continually disciplined so some of them are getting spanked 10-20 times a day. Not just parents, but teachers and other elders in the community can administer spanking.

“I don’t want anyone else to suffer like my kids have suffered. Society gives them such an easy ride, and they need to be held accountable for the damage they do to people.”

The Sunday Telegraph contacted the Twelve Tribes several times and left a list of questions on Tuesday however at the time of Publication the community had not responded.

The Twelve Tribes has repeatedly denied allegations their child-raising practices are harmful. They also deny their leaders live off the labour of members, do not follow anti-social or oppressive rules and are simply trying to live like the first disciples.

Source: Daily Telegraph

• Sect accused of using ‘slave labour’ to run cafes
• ‘I’m not coming back’: Mum’s brave escape

He wasn’t allowed to be comforted by his mother. Instead, he was sent to help the night shift in the Tribe’s bakery. He was five.

By the time he moved from the Twelve Tribes’ Brazil commune to Picton a year later, he said he had become a compulsive liar to minimise the daily “discipline” applied with the thin rod used by the group to “train” children.

Born and raised in the fundamentalist Christian sect that has communities around the world, including three in Australia, Mathias, now 26, said his 18 years inside had left him scarred and angry.

For the first time since leaving eight years ago, he has spoken about life in the Tribes, claiming the constant physical punishment, poor education, use of child labour and “the fear they put into children about schooling and the outside world” made for a damaging childhood.

“As far as I am concerned they shouldn’t continue operating,” he told The Sunday Telegraph. “I have learned to cope with it but it’s something that will affect me for life, as it will so many others.”

Allegations of child abuse, child labour and indoctrination have dogged the Twelve Tribes overseas for decades, leading to the removal of some children in the US and Europe.

The Twelve Tribes, which follow a mix of Christian fundamentalism, Hebrew Roots, and Messianic beliefs, claims to live like the first disciples and follows the teachings of founder Eugene Elbert Spriggs, who is considered a modern-day apostle.

Conventional medicine is shunned, women must be subservient to men, children are homeschooled, marriage is forbidden outside the group and information and technology from the outside world restricted.

But it’s the Twelve Tribes’ strict doctrine of child-rearing and use of corporal punishment that Mr Mathias claims is the worst.

The group’s 300-plus page child-rearing manual demands children who are not unquestioningly obedient be spanked for any breach with a 50cm thin rod, with “training” beginning at six month of age.

Toys are forbidden, as is imaginary play, and children must be supervised at all times by an adult. Members other than parents can administer discipline.

While the group states on its website “because we love our children we do spank them”, it has repeatedly denied allegations of child abuse, saying the rod is not used to abuse or harm children, only to “discipline”, but former members we spoke to dispute this.

Mr Mathias said he received daily discipline, “usually 15-20 lashes at a time on the hands or buttocks” often for reasons unknown, or obscure such as asking for a drink of water.

He said he saw his five-year-old sister severely whipped with a bamboo stick “leaving huge welts all over her legs and buttocks,” and witnessed an eight-month-old baby “disciplined” for crying at dinner at Picton.

Clinical Psychologist Rudi Črnčec, who has worked with some older adolescents and adults raised in Twelve Tribe communities, said the Tribe’s child-rearing manual promoted ideas of parenting and childhood development long since abandoned in scientific literature and the international community.

It was also at odds with longstanding international views about children’s rights, he said.
“The practices put forward could meet contemporary definitions of childhood physical abuse,” Dr Črnčec said.

“These observations have been made by many others both within Australia and abroad over time.

“Indeed, the manual acknowledges that the approaches endorsed may be viewed by psychologists as abusive, but also specifically states that psychologists are ‘very stupid’ and their opinions are to be disregarded.”

Rather than focusing on a child’s mental health and wellbeing, and secure parent-child relationships, Dr Črnčec said the child training manual focused explicitly on children being conditioned from birth to be in a “surrendered” state, totally obedient to the parents.

Parents’ failure to obtain complete control of the child also meant the child’s potential rejection from the community.

But he said such practices and the environment in which they’re carried out are likely to have unintended results of long-term mental ill health, particularly in children who already developmentally vulnerable.

Children with ADHD or autism spectrum disorder were likely to experience additional harm given the difficulty they would have in complying with the behavioural demands.

Dr Črnčec said a child’s brain development can be negatively affected by excessive physical punishments over a long period, affecting their stress response which could present as chronic anxiety, numbing and detachment. Those conditions can continue into adulthood.

Mr Mathias, who spent time in 10 of Tribe’s communities, including six years in Picton, said his childhood was one of work and constant physical discipline.

“Long term, it has made me scared of messing up, or doing something that I think others wouldn’t like. So I am not who I really am, I am always living something that is ‘pleasing’ to others,” he said.

In Picton, he said he was regularly sent to work late nights with his 11-year-old brother in the Tribe’s bakery and said children were given mate tea to keep them awake.

Frequently left in the care of other adults, he alleged he was sexually assaulted in a Tribe commune in Brazil as a small boy and in Picton, where he lived from 2000 to 2006, he was left in the care of “sketchy” men.

There is no suggestion of sexual abuse in the Australian communities.

“The Twelve Tribes don’t really do background checks on anyone. So they welcome in a whole lot of people that they have no idea who they are,” he said.

“One time a man came to visit from Melbourne and he was very strange, he came into our room, sat down and got a knife and started passing his finger over the blade as if he was feeling how sharp it was.”

When Mr Mathias left the Tribes in Brazil, he said he struggled to adjust to life outside.

“It really made things very hard, because I had no schooling, I had no support, I feared that I was going to suffer for the rest of my life and go to hell after I died because I left,” he said.

“I was constantly told that I left I would never be forgiven or have a relationship with my family again.”

He fell into heavy drug and alcohol use until an uncle pulled him back from the brink and, over the years, has adjusted gradually.

Now based in Auckland, four of his five siblings have left the Twelve Tribes, as has his mother. He remains in contact with other ex-members who have left.

“Most of them don’t have the courage to come forward because they have no hope or expectations that if they speak up it will help them,” he said.

“Things that have hurt in the past cannot be remedied in the present. We’re talking about, mental and spiritual problems here, it’s not something money or anything else could do to help that hurt go away.”

Dr Črnčec said it was not easy to conceive of a community of parents setting out to raise young people in a way that could cause harm to them.

“Where this occurs it is often inadvertent,” he said. “Twelve Tribes parents sought eternal salvation for their children, and were persuaded that these practices were an integral part of the path to achieving that goal.”

The Sunday Telegraph contacted the Twelve Tribes several times and left a list of questions on Tuesday however at the time of Publication the community had not responded.

A photo of the deli’s swirling yellow logo was posted on Facebook within days of it appearing alongside U.S. Highway 101. The poster and subsequent sharers on social media identified the Yellow Deli as one of many, all of which belong to a religious group called the Twelve Tribes.

The restaurant building at 702 Robert Bush Dr. W was purchased in October 2016 by The Yellow Deli South Bend LLC for $125,000, according to Pacific County Taxsifter. The limited liability corporation is based at an address on State Route 105 in Raymond, according to state records. Its registered agent is Todd Thiessen, with Jeremiah Carlin and Wade Skinner IV also shown in corporate roles.

Growing awareness of the group’s plans to open a business in South Bend has generated intense interest. A local woman’s July 9 Facebook posting regarding Yellow Deli and Twelve Tribes was up to 329 comments and 37 shares by noon July 16. The tenor of comments ranges from hostility and calls for a boycott to defenses of their choice to live how they choose, so long as laws are obeyed.

A number of these individuals were careful to state that while they are concerned based on the research they have done, they are also willing to listen and be open-minded. The Twelve Tribes’ approach to physical discipline of children is a special area of concern for several commenters, along with objections to its stance on gender roles and other subjects.

It is unknown when the Yellow Deli is set to open. No business license is currently pending. The city manager declined to speak on the record about the deli.

Got its start in 1972

The first iteration of the group was in 1972, with the first Yellow Deli opening shortly thereafter in Tennessee.

Twelve Tribes now owns farms, hostels and Yellow Delis internationally — from Argentina to Australia, Canada to Spain — but this is their first known location in the state of Washington.

According to the Twelve Tribes website, members live communally “like an extended family, sharing all things in common, just as the first disciples did in the first century.”

All members are required to contribute 100% of their income to a “common purse” where funds are distributed to families and individuals equitably.

Income from the Yellow Deli will go directly into the same fund. Because of this system, those who work at the delis are unpaid and considered volunteers.

“We don’t have our own independent income or debts to carry by ourselves,” says their website.

The group invites interested parties to find out more about their community and beliefs with the Yellow Deli’s slogan, “We serve the Fruit of the Spirit, why not ask?”

Some describe a ‘cult’

This communal, faith-focused living may be seen as unconventional and may raise the eyebrows of more traditional folks, but these are not the issues that have caused so many to bristle at the thought of the new deli.

Twelve Tribes members consider themselves to be followers of Christianity, but those on the outside — including ex-members — frequently describe the group as a cult.

The Southern Law Poverty Center (SLPC) agrees.

In fact, SLPC published an article in 2018 that details the history and beliefs of the Twelve Tribes. The article, titled “Into Darkness: Inside an American White Supremacist Cult,” includes conversations with a number of former Twelve Tribe members, and leading religious scholars who have studied the group.

According to the article, one of the main tenets of their faith is based on the “The Curse of Ham,” in which Ham is cursed to “serve his brothers” forever.

Although the Bible does not describe the race of any of the characters in the story, white supremacists have long portrayed Ham as dark-skinned and his brothers as white, thereby using the Bible to not only justify the perpetuation of racism, but even to defend slavery.

Written teachings provided by ex-members of the group even go so far as to call Martin Luther King Jr. “evil” and to say, “It is horrible that someone would rise up to abolish slavery. What a marvelous opportunity that blacks could be brought over here to be slaves so that they could be found worthy of the nations.”

How children are raised in the community has also sowed some discomfort among county residents.

Adults in the community do not allow their children to attend college, and they openly encourage corporal punishment outside of what is generally considered acceptable. It is a stated practice to punish a child by spanking them “with a small reed-like rod, which stings but does not damage.”

Ex-members, however, contest this, alleging they have seen children severely and frequently beaten.

The Q&A portion of the Twelve Tribes website does offer some insight into the minds and beliefs of Twelve Tribes members.

“Are you a cult?” is addressed directly. The response reads: “When a person uses the word cult he usually means some group he fears or dislikes. While we are, from time to time, called a cult, we are not false, unorthodox, or extremist.”

The website also provides an emphatic denial of racism.

However, the group makes no effort to deny anti-LGBT sentiment, stating “We do not approve of homosexual behavior. We do not regard it as a genetic variation, a valid alternative lifestyle, or a mere psychological quirk.”

The previously mentioned article from the SLPC says that the group has been known to brag about members who are “formerly gay.”

A yet-to-be-opened Yellow Deli restaurant on Robert Bush Drive in South Bend has generated controversy. The cheerful sign includes the business logo of the Twelve Tribes, a group sometimes described as a cult.

• Yellow Deli Cafe in the Blue Mountains is run by religious cult ‘Twelve Tribes’
• Vast majority of customers have no idea, but staff are happy to discuss it if asked
• Members work for free cooking hipster-style food and live in commune nearby
• They encourage interested customers to attend meetings or visit farm in Picton
• Believers paint idyllic picture but ex-members say they were brainwashed
• Cult is accused of child abuse and child labour and has authoritarian rules
  

Source: the Daily Mail

By Nic White For Daily Mail Australia

Published: 14:03 AEDT, 7 July 2019

Minutes after opening, a popular cafe in the Blue Mountains just outside of Sydney is already buzzing with energy and has a line out the door.

The Yellow Deli Cafe is a landmark on Katoomba’s main street and renowned for its delicious, wholesome food and unique hobbit hole-like decor.

Tourists clutching cameras and weekenders from Sydney huddle against the winter chill outside as they wait up to an hour for a table to open.

What the vast majority of them don’t know is the cafe is run by a cult and the flannel-clad waiters serving artisanal sandwiches and green tea are members.

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The Yellow Deli Cafe is a landmark on Katoomba’s main street and renowned for its delicious, wholesome food and unique hobbit hole-like decor

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None of the staff are paid for their long shifts, the huge profits instead flow back into controversial religious sect The Twelve Tribes

The men wear their long hair in tight buns or ponytails behind intense expressions, and those behind the counter don matching overalls while cooking tirelessly.

None of them are paid for their long shifts – the profits instead flowing back into the coffers of controversial religious sect The Twelve Tribes.

The cult, founded in Tennessee in 1975, came to Australia in the 1990s and now has about 120 members living and working in communes here.

Working in the cafe

Those working in the cafe live in nearby Balmoral House while the rest are at a farm near Picton, about 90 minutes southwest of Sydney.

Yellow Deli just looks like a hippie cafe not out of place in the often alternative vibe of the Blue Mountains, so few people are aware of its background.

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A barista makes coffee and a selection of green teas made from yerba made in Brazil, where the Twelve Tribes has a very profitable farm producing it

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The smell of chili powder hangs in the air as sounds from the open kitchen resonate through the space

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A worker prepares hundreds of sandwiches made from vegetables grown at the group’s farm near Picton, and hipster-style bread made in its bakeries

However, pamphlets promoting the group are scattered around and, though busy, staff are happy to speak generally about it.

‘We’re here because we felt unfulfilled in our old lives and have found a place we can belong,’ one of them explained.

‘We live together and work together and look after each other. We have everything we need.’

He said he worked at the cafe most days and loved the work and serving the community, some of whom he hoped would join them.

The cafe is closed on Saturdays and shuts at 3pm on Fridays so they can celebrate Shabbat as the cult follows an amalgam of Christianity and Judaism.

Workers quickly extended invitations to visit these celebrations, which involve folk dancing and devotions, either at Balmoral or the Picton farm.

Members are given a Hebrew name when they join and don’t drink, smoke, vote or watch TV and all their children are home-schooled.

The only people working there who aren’t part of the Twelve Tribes are tourists doing shifts in exchange for free food and board, or those trying out life inside the group.

Staff chatted with regulars and encouraged several of them to work a shift or two at the cafe to learn more about the group.

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This line represents only a fraction of those waiting for a table as their name and number are taken in return for an estimated wait time, after which they retreat back outside

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What the vast majority of customers don’t know is the cafe is run by a cult and the flannel-clad waiters serving artisanal sandwiches and green tea are all members

A worker prepares smoothies, juices and various concoctions of plants and vegetables

Andrew McLeod, who manages the cafe and is an original member of the Australian branch of the group, said Yellow Deli was an important outreach platform.

‘We’re a spiritual people who follow the bible, including the parts of the Old Testament that haven’t been made null and void, in our opinion,’ he said.

‘We have a wonderful tribal life together and the deli is what we do to make a living and meet people for outreach. We want to be a light to the nation.

‘We live together and share all our money [instead of being] greedy and living for the capitalistic fantasy that everyone thinks will make them happy.’

Nearby business owners knew of the group behind the Yellow Deli, but appeared to have no ill-will towards their controversial neighbours.

‘Yeah it’s a cult. Not many people know as it’s not really obvious, though they are always trying to recruit people,’ one said.

‘I’ve never had any problems with them though, and they’re very friendly.’

Behind the friendly facade

However, former members claim that behind their friendly facade and idyllic descriptions of communal living is a more sinister reality.

Mark and Rose Ilich were members of Twelve Tribes for 13 years after meeting the group at the Newtown Festival – a fertile recruiting ground.

They said when people join the group they have to sell all their possessions – including houses and cars – and give the proceeds to the group.

 The cafe is closed on Saturdays and shuts at 3pm on Fridays so they can celebrate Shabbat as the cult follows an amalgam of Christianity and Judaism

The interior is dominated by rich, dark timber full of nooks that make its tables feel cozy and plentiful homemade knick knacks add to the homey feel

Their clothes are replaced with conservative outfits and their lives become filled with long hours of work and chores in the self-sustaining community.

Mr Ilich said he worked 15 or even 20 hours a day on the farm or at one of the cult’s many businesses – from bakeries to furniture making and the Yellow Deli Cafe.

‘Once I helped them carry $40,000 in cash out of the Easter Show. But I never saw a cent,’ he told the Sydney Morning Herald years after escaping.

The couple said they were constantly told the outside world was evil and their sin needed to be purged from their lives.

‘Leaving is not an option. You have to understand how brainwashed you become. You lose the ability to think critically,’ Ms Ilich said.

The worst aspect, for which the group is most notoriously known, is institutionalised child abuse from as young as six months old.

Children aren’t allowed to play with toys, engage in make-believe, or any of the normal childhood activities, and must be supervised at all times.

Signs of the cafe’s cult ownership aren’t obvious until you reach the hallway on the way to the toilet where a noticeboard is packed with propaganda

The men wear their long hair in tight buns or ponytails behind intense expressions

They must be strictly obedient and are beaten with a 50cm rod for every infraction by any adult watching them, not just their parents.

‘The kids are not meant to cry. They’re meant to ‘receive’ their discipline quietly. Then you tell them why you hit them and they say, ‘I’m sorry, I’m sorry.’ It becomes a ritual,’ Mr Ilich said.

Twelve Tribes is open about its use of corporal punishment for children, outlined in a 267-page Child Training Manual.

‘The rod removes guilt from children’s souls and trains them to do good… We know some people consider this controversial but we have seen from experience that discipline keeps a child from becoming mean-spirited and disrespectful of authority,’ the group insists.

Children also work alongside their parents from a young age, often at the expense of education, which the group claims gives them purpose.

Birth control is forbidden and members are told to have big families, both to boost membership and fulfill its goal of producing 144,000 ‘perfect male children’ so God can finally return.

What is the Twelves Tribes?

The cult began in 1975 in Chattanooga, Tennessee, when former carnival showman Gene Spriggs broke away from the First Presbyterian Church after finding services were cancelled for the Super Bowl.

He and his wife Marsha earlier opened the first Yellow Deli a few years earlier and were living communally with a small group from 1972.

Twelve Tribes practices a hybrid of pre-Catholic Christianity and Judaism mixed with teachings by Spriggs.

The group’s stated aim is to bring about the return of Jesus – whom they refer to by the Hebrew name Yahshua – by reestablishing the 12 tribes of Israel.

Twelve Tribes practices a hybrid of pre-Catholic Christianity and Judaism mixed with teachings by its founder, Gene Spriggs

All members are forced to sell their possessions and give to proceeds to the cult and are assigned a Hebrew name discard their old ones. Spriggs himself is known as Yoneq.

These tribes would include 144,000 ‘perfect male children’, which accounts for the group’s obsessive and controversial child-rearing practices.

The Sabbath is observed in line with Jewish tradition, along with conservative dietary rules and abstinence from alcohol, tobacco, and drugs.

Birth control of any kind is banned, as is much modern medicine – they instead rely largely on homeopathy and ‘natural’ remedies.

Marriage outside the cult is forbidden and couples must go through a series of supervised talks to get to know each other. Only after marriage can they even kiss or hold hands.

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These tribes would include 144,000 ‘perfect male children’, which accounts for the group’s obsessive and controversial child-rearing practices

Children aren’t allowed to play with toys, engage in make-believe, or any of the normal childhood activities, and must be supervised at all times.

They must be strictly obedient and are beaten with a 50cm rod for every infraction by any adult watching them, not just their parents.

All children are homeschooled and do not attend university as it is considered a waste of time and not a good environment.

Instead, children work in the community from a young age, sparking accusations of child labour.

Estée Lauder and other businesses cut ties with the organisation after finding children were involved in making their products.

The few boxes of pamphlets would be easily missed or glossed over by the vast majority of visitors

Members don’t vote and are not allowed to watch TV or any other media as ‘the crazy box robs your time and pollutes your soul’.

Twelve Tribes has 3,000 members and operates in the U.S., Canada, France, Spain, Argentina, Brazil, Germany and England, arriving in Australia in the early 1990s.

There are now about 120 members living in Balmoral House in Katoomba, Peppercorn Creek Farm near Picton, and a small number in Coledale, north of Wollongong.

Numerous businesses include a network of cafes in every country, all called the Yellow Deli or Common Ground, and bakeries, farms, and furniture, construction, and demolition businesses.

These are believed to be very profitable because none of the workers need to be paid.

However, the couple’s son Daniel was considered rebellious, which eventually led to them being ostracised as ‘bad parents’.

Ms Ilich said a senior member told her it was ‘God’s kindness’ that her baby was stillborn because it would be ‘evil’ to give a baby parents like them.

Mr McLeod, in a rare candid discussion of Twelve Tribes’ Australian operations, said allegations of child abuse and child labour were untrue.

‘We want our children to have a well-balanced life and what we do and our beliefs have somehow been taken out of context to portray us as a fundamentalist cult that bashes our children, which is just not true,’ he said.

‘It’s sad that so many people are gullible enough to believe what they believe without looking into it themselves.’

Mr McLeod instead encouraged people to visit the group at the cafe, Balmoral House, or the farm in Picton – the doors to which are always open – and even spend a few days getting to know them.

‘They can see there’s no horns, no cloaks and daggers, just some people with a genuine faith wanting to raise their children with purpose and purity and make an honest living and be hospitable,’ he said.

Ex-members said when people join the group they have to sell all their possessions – including houses and cars – and give the proceeds to the group

Nearby business owners knew of the group behind the Yellow Deli, but appeared to have no ill-will towards their controversial neighbours

The father-of-five said children were indeed all home-schooled but no one working in the cafe was younger than the legal work age of 14 and nine months, and teenagers worked on Sundays or school holidays.

‘I raise [my children] strictly but honestly and openly and will admit when I’m wrong. That’s why they’re still here and haven’t run off on a motorbike to join a rock band,’ he said.

Authorities have intervened in the past. In 1984 American police raided the group’s base in Vermont and took 113 children into care, but they were later released when the raid was ruled unconstitutional.

The in 2013 German police seized 40 children secretly recorded video showed some being beaten, but they were also returned.

Former members and anti-cult groups claim the group’s activities have been repeatedly reported to Australian authorities, but no action has been taken.

Inside the Yellow Deli cafe

The Yellow Deli is such an institution that hundreds of tourists and Sydney weekenders include it in their itinerary.

Customers mill around the door taking in the rustic decor, described asby some as ‘Hobbiton in real life’, while they wait to be served.

The interior is dominated by rich, dark timber full of nooks that make its tables feel cozy and plentiful homemade knick knacks add to the homey feel.

Pamphlets promoting the group are scattered around and, though busy, staff are happy to speak generally about it

Minutes after opening, the most popular cafe in the Blue Mountains is already buzzing with energy and has a line out the door

A selection of gluten-free snacks includes a green bar made from the same vegetables plus peanut butter, oats and rice bubbles

A man with an intense stare, wrinkled shirt, and tied-back ponytail takes your name and number and gives you a wait time of up to an hour.

After joining those shivering outside for a while you are seated and friendly waiters had you a double-sided handwritten menu.

On offer is a wide variety of sandwiches served on homemade artisanal bread, salads, a hearty soup of the day, and a spectacular chili with jalapeno bread.

Staff said all the ingredients were grown on the group’s farm near Picton and cooked by members of the sect.

A barista makes coffee and a selection of green teas made from yerba mate made in Brazil, where the Twelve Tribes has a very profitable farm producing it.

A spectacular chili with jalapeno bread is one of the cafe’s highlights – washed down with green tea made from yerba mate

A wide selection of drinks is on offer, along with all-day breakfast

Other favourites are its signature ‘green drink’, made from silverbeet, kale, and broccoli along with yerba mate leaves, honey, and juices.

A selection of gluten-free snacks includes a green bar made from the same vegetables plus peanut butter, oats and rice bubbles.

Staff said most recipes are sent in from the U.S., where the cult is based.

The smell of chili powder hangs in the air as sounds from the open kitchen resonate through the space.

Waiters wear flannel shirts with bushy beards and their long hair tied back while cooks have matching overalls. The women are conservatively dressed in a fashion with strong Amish vibes.

Signs of the cafe’s cult ownership aren’t obvious until you reach the hallway on the way to the toilet where a noticeboard is packed with propaganda.

These and the few boxes of pamphlets would be easily missed or glossed over by the vast majority of visitors.

A hearty soup of the day – in this case pumpkin – is served along with sourdough bread

Cream cheese pie topped with strawberries and generous addition of honey

Other favourites are its signature ‘green drink’, made from silverbeet, kale, and broccoli along with yerba mate leaves, honey, and juices

Yellow Deli was built in 2008 as Common Ground Cafe, then remodelled into its current form and renamed in 2013.

Manager Andrew McLeod said all the timbers that make up the interior, and all the other materials, were recycled.

‘It’s just like people with damaged lives, there’s hope they can be restored and become purposeful and useful again,’ he said.

‘Even though they may have already made a mess of it, there’s hope for a new life.’

He said the group would like to expand the deli as it’s gotten so popular that there can be up to 100 people on its waiting list on busy days.

‘It’s a bit rough, I feel very bad about that so we’d like to make more room so people don’t have to be turned away,’ he said.

 

Source of article: The Epoch Times.com

Source of FBI records: FBI.gov

FBI records on Twelve Tribes in PDF file you can view and download: FBI files Twelve Tribes Part 01 of 01

June 28, 2019 Updated: June 30, 2019

The FBI released redacted documents this week on the cult community known as the “Twelve Tribes,” revealing numerous allegations against the group, including child sexual abuse, drug trafficking, ritual abuse, and forced labor.

The 61-page document—released by the bureau’s Vault library on June 25—included separate complaints detailing the alleged crimes, mostly against children. The cult has communes all over the United States, including Vermont, New York, New Hampshire, Massachusetts, Florida, California, Tennessee, and more.

In 2013, a preliminary investigation was conducted by the FBI, based on a complaint the bureau received from the Alexander County Sheriff’s Office in North Carolina that children were being “sexually exploited” at a Twelve Tribes compound in the town of Hiddenite. The case was closed the same year.

Twelve Tribes has communes around the world, with the Hiddenite location being one of its training centers.

Documents showed that drugs were used at the commune and placed into “ritual” bread—usually LSD and hallucinogenic plants, as well as heroin and meth. There were also ritual ceremonies once a month that involved the bread being broken and gang rapes.

Punishment within the cult involved being beaten with a rod and having the wife or children of the accused being sexually assaulted by other cult members. The sheriff’s office had been aware of the Hiddenite location since 2006 and that much of the land in the area was owned by the cult, since families who joined had to turn over their property.

Members of the Hiddenite compound also allegedly were forced to go to a location and work all night and day for “three straight days,” in what was known as a “push” that involved three or six members. Those working were allowed to drink coffee that may have had something added to it to keep them awake.

In a prior complaint included in the released documents, a name that was redacted had contacted the public access line to report child sexual abuse in a Twelve Tribes commune located in Manitou Springs, Colorado. The person had said children were threatened not to tell the police or anyone else about the beatings or sexual abuse, and that the cult ran a restaurant in the area.

Yet another document, one from 2010, detailed how a former member was allegedly sexually and physically abused by cult members as a child but had repressed the memories. In 2009, the former member had seen a psychologist, who reported the abuse to local authorities, and had also contacted national leaders of the cult to inform them of her abuse. The former member also attended personal meetings with the cult leaders.

After a meeting on a date that was redacted, the former member was killed in a car crash that “was not accidental” and was allegedly “orchestrated” by cult members to prevent the woman from “propagating the claims of abuse.”

In the Twelve Tribe cult, members were also “allowed to punish any child belonging to the community.” The FBI document detailed how members would take their children to be “wooped,” meaning beaten, if they smiled at another child during a gathering, or if they were “horsing” around.

“Bigger children have missed ‘gathering’ for a couple of days at a time because they were beaten so badly and left in a condition where they could not attend,” the documents said, based on an interview with an FBI agent.

One former member said that they were once “locked in a cellar, beaten, and deprived of food.”

The release of the FBI documents came days after Keith Raniere, the former leader of purported self-help organization NXIVM was found guilty on all charges at a Brooklyn federal court on June 19.

NXIVM Collapse

A federal jury, made up of eight men and four women, deliberated for less than five hours before finding Raniere guilty of all 7 criminal counts including sex trafficking, forced labor conspiracy, and racketeering.

Raniere listened attentively but showed no visible reaction as he learned the verdict. His sentencing is scheduled for Sept. 25.

The accusations against Raniere center around a secret society within the group—which he allegedly created in 2015—named DOS, an acronym for the Latin “dominus obsequious sororium,” loosely translated as “master of the slave women.”

Prosecutors say Raniere was the “highest master” of DOS and forced other members—all women—to have sex with him. Many of the DOS members were branded with a cauterizing pen while naked and being filmed.

Days ago, during closing arguments in the high-profile trial, assistant U.S. Attorney Moira Penza alluded to the prosecution’s May 7 opening statements, telling the jury that Raniere was chiefly after “sex, money, power.”

Penza brought up the testimony of former NXIVM members, including one identified by prosecutors as “Daniela,” who had spoken about being locked up in a room for nearly two years after Raniere found out she had kissed another man. Another member, identified as Sylvie, testified about being forced into a sex act with the leader. Another, a senior board member, detailed Raniere’s manipulation and fraud.

The verdict comes after a 7-week long trial. Raniere could face a maximum sentence of life in prison.

Follow Bowen on Twitter: @BowenXiao3