Speaker 1: It's the truth way, Jesus Crassy Holy Way.
Speaker 2: Life in River Road Fellowship was full of music, and
Speaker 2: that's part of what Lindsay loved about.
Speaker 3: It, that it loved long a.
Speaker 1: That's Gary news.
Speaker 2: Now. They didn't have radios, and after the bonfire where
Speaker 2: they burned their belongings, there weren't any records or CDs
Speaker 2: or cassettes from life before. So they made their own recordings,
Speaker 2: wrote their own songs, and listened to their own music.
Speaker 4: It always seemed like the musicians were kind of put
Speaker 4: on a pedestal too, you know, like it was just
Speaker 4: something they worked closely with. They got to sing in
Speaker 4: front of the church and help out a different functions
Speaker 4: with the music. A lot of times he said it
Speaker 4: was a battlefield and playing music for God is a
Speaker 4: battle against spirits.
Speaker 2: Victor saw it as an actual war against evil and
Speaker 2: that they had to do everything they could to stop
Speaker 2: that evil. Their souls and the fate of the world
Speaker 2: were at stake. But over the coming years, for Lindsay,
Speaker 2: music wasn't just a battle against spirits, but a battle
Speaker 2: within herself. Music was the realm where she worked out
Speaker 2: the competing forces insider the voices that screamed at her
Speaker 2: to get out or to stay, and Victor's voice was
Speaker 2: always in her head.
Speaker 4: Victor said that, you know, Lindsay is the old flesh
Speaker 4: and you need to become a new man in Christ.
Speaker 4: Lindsay has to die.
Speaker 2: From Rocco, Punch and die Heart podcasts. This is the
Speaker 2: Turning River Road, I America Lance and I'm Alan Lance
Speaker 2: Lesser Part four, Predator and Pray on the Outside. Music
Speaker 2: was part of Lindsay's role as a maiden. Victor dubbed
Speaker 2: the Maidens the main music makers of River Road Fellowship,
Speaker 2: replacing the adults who led it before, and Lindsay and
Speaker 2: her friend Jess, the two youngest maidens, became the guitar
Speaker 2: players of the group.
Speaker 4: She and I were bonded from the beginning.
Speaker 2: Brought them even closer. Their favorite thing to do was
Speaker 2: to put fresh strings on their guitars together.
Speaker 4: Oh, the new guitar sound, like the new strings sound.
Speaker 4: We both loved it so much.
Speaker 2: They go to a secluded spot the deck that jutted
Speaker 2: off the chapel. Giant trees grew up through holes cut
Speaker 2: in the middle of the deck.
Speaker 4: So that wind would be blowing the trees would be swaying,
Speaker 4: and you could almost feel the leaves moving. We wouldn't
Speaker 4: pick a song. We would just start playing chords and
Speaker 4: it was like we were so in sync with one another.
Speaker 4: Maybe we would start humming, making up a melody. I'd
Speaker 4: like try to pick apart different notes while she would strum,
Speaker 4: and it felt like the rest of the camp wasn't there.
Speaker 4: The worries and the fear. It kind of just melted away.
Speaker 4: All the bad things and all the good things. None
Speaker 4: of it mattered the weight I had to carry every
Speaker 4: single day. I was able to take off, set it aside,
Speaker 4: and just be myself with Jess, and I could sit
Speaker 4: back and relax and breathe this moment of just feeling
Speaker 4: safe and loved by her, like just a true sister
Speaker 4: and friend, not feeling judged or afraid.
Speaker 2: Actual love.
Speaker 4: Felt like we were the only two people in the
Speaker 4: world in that moment.
Speaker 2: Sometimes having another maiden nearby, especially Jess, was the thing
Speaker 2: that brought Lindsay the most happiness and comfort, but there
Speaker 2: was also a layer of regimented control and how she
Speaker 2: interacts with the other maidens. Lindsay could never be alone.
Speaker 2: They weren't allowed to be alone. The rule was that
Speaker 2: anywhere the Maidens went, they went in two's.
Speaker 4: Two people were always assigned to Victor.
Speaker 2: Victor lived in what they called the Lodge, a big
Speaker 2: log building at the center of the camp. He often
Speaker 2: met with his followers there.
Speaker 4: Too, and working for Victor was considered a privilege, like,
Speaker 4: oh wow, you get to work at the lodge. And
Speaker 4: what that meant was you would clean the lodge. He
Speaker 4: smoked all the time cigarettes, So run the air purifire
Speaker 4: and clean up the ash trays and make the coffee.
Speaker 4: Get the shower ready for him, turn it on so
Speaker 4: it's nice and warm. Maybe hand him his towel while
Speaker 4: the other one was making breakfast, lay out his clothes.
Speaker 4: Remember having to put lotion on his legs after he'd
Speaker 4: get out of the shower, just like weird. That made
Speaker 4: me feel so uncomfortable.
Speaker 1: Like.
Speaker 2: There was one part of this job she dreaded the most.
Speaker 4: You'd go wake him up in the morning, you'd physically
Speaker 4: wake him up in the morning. And one thing about
Speaker 4: Victor was he was a hard sleeper, I mean so
Speaker 4: difficult to wake up. And it scared me because if
Speaker 4: you kept letting him sleep, you know, you'd go in there.
Speaker 4: You pict her like it's time to wake up, good morning.
Speaker 4: He wouldn't wake up. You'd go back in. There were
Speaker 4: so many times where I couldn't get him to wake up.
Speaker 4: It took me thirty minutes to wake him up. I
Speaker 4: mean that sounds crazy, but it legit took me that.
Speaker 4: Sometimes he'd wake up late, and then I'd get in
Speaker 4: trouble for not being more aggressive. In my head too,
Speaker 4: he wasn't just a man, he was a man of God.
Speaker 4: He was pretty much Christ in the flesh. So even
Speaker 4: little things like picking out his clothes was oh, very stressful.
Speaker 4: The maidens were definitely idolized.
Speaker 3: Even though Christa Leser Pitch, the girl whose books were
Speaker 3: burned to please Victor, was around the same age as Lindsay,
Speaker 3: she wasn't chosen to be a maiden. She was on
Speaker 3: the outside looking in.
Speaker 5: After they were moved to the Shepherd's camp into that
Speaker 5: four plex and given the title of the Maidens and
Speaker 5: started serving Victor, they started to over time kind of
Speaker 5: become the gold standard of how a young lady should
Speaker 5: behave and act and what she should aspire too.
Speaker 3: These young girls were a tool. They often had an
Speaker 3: effect on how expectations were rolled out.
Speaker 4: There were a lot of rules.
Speaker 5: Women were required to wear their hair back and ponytails
Speaker 5: or buns or something. And eventually we also weren't allowed
Speaker 5: to have bangs because bangs Victor believed came from Egypt,
Speaker 5: and Egypt was evil and Cleopatra and you know, they're
Speaker 5: all whores and this and that, so long hair. And
Speaker 5: then it was shortly after that, you know, the maidens
Speaker 5: had all moved to the camp. The women weren't allowed
Speaker 5: to wear jeans anymore. We had to start making our
Speaker 5: own clothes, dresses, very much prairie like dresses.
Speaker 6: So what I'm picturing is kind of like little house
Speaker 6: on the prairie FLDS type garb.
Speaker 5: Yeah, and the dresses or the making of clothes. A
Speaker 5: big part of it was Victor wanted himself and he
Speaker 5: wanted the maidens to wear homemade clothes, specifically because a
Speaker 5: lot of clothes are made by you know, children in
Speaker 5: sweatshops and other countries, and they might have devil spirits
Speaker 5: attached to them. That was another big thing, devil spirits,
Speaker 5: evil spirits. And then the rest of the churches kind
Speaker 5: of followed. It's like, you don't want to be the
Speaker 5: weird one. Out who's still wearing jeans, and the styles
Speaker 5: changed over time, like the way that the maiden's dress.
Speaker 4: Those became kind.
Speaker 5: Of like the basis of fashion. Essentially, you see one
Speaker 5: of the maidens wearing something and being like, oh, I
Speaker 5: want that pattern. I wanted to wear that dress, and
Speaker 5: so you'd go and you'd check out the pattern because
Speaker 5: we had like a whole pattern library, and we would
Speaker 5: go and get fabric from this fabric room and you'd
Speaker 5: make it to fit you.
Speaker 3: Yeah, the maidens often felt distant, untouchable, but then there
Speaker 3: were times leadership would bring the maidens front and center.
Speaker 5: One of them came to our house and basically told
Speaker 5: me that this particular maiden was moving in with us.
Speaker 5: They probably asked, but it was never really a question.
Speaker 5: It was always like a question with the expectation that
Speaker 5: you were going to agree.
Speaker 3: So a maiden showed up at Christa's door.
Speaker 5: None of the maidens had very much stuff, so it was,
Speaker 5: you know, just a few boxes of personal belongings, clothes, toiletries,
Speaker 5: you know, a few personal sentimental items, and she moved.
Speaker 5: In the way that the church worked, they got people
Speaker 5: unpacked very quickly. Everybody came over and just would unpack
Speaker 5: a person or a family. Within a day, our house
Speaker 5: would be set up, decorated, and ready to go. I
Speaker 5: remember leaving to go somewhere for a little bit, but
Speaker 5: it was about six hours. Came back and they were
Speaker 5: moving her out. And it's going to sound really paranoid,
Speaker 5: but I have a really good reason for saying it.
Speaker 5: I have a suspicion it was to spy on us
Speaker 5: and report back to leadership, because that was absolutely a
Speaker 5: thing that happened, and not just with my family, with
Speaker 5: a lot of different families where they would move these
Speaker 5: young single people around with the intention of having eyes
Speaker 5: in these people's houses. And I know that because they
Speaker 5: told me many many years later.
Speaker 3: Jess, the youngest maiden with red hair, would later write
Speaker 3: in her diary that she moved twenty two times in
Speaker 3: River Road. This kind of thing was normal, and not
Speaker 3: just for the maidens. It happened to Christa and her
Speaker 3: family too.
Speaker 5: Victor would come to our house and be like, you're
Speaker 5: moving to this location, regardless of whether or not we
Speaker 5: own the house, and we would be packed and moved
Speaker 5: within twenty four hours, and life would up route and change.
Speaker 5: It was very disruptive there were families who moved regularly,
Speaker 5: like once every couple of months. Especially leadership. Leadership would
Speaker 5: switch and move around a lot. When I say he
Speaker 5: was building an army, I'd say he was forming a
Speaker 5: group of individuals who would literally do whatever he wanted
Speaker 5: them to do. And that's honestly terrifying.
Speaker 3: Christa had a keen sense of who leadership valued, and
Speaker 3: she could tell she wasn't in that group. It's not
Speaker 3: that she wanted to be a maiden, but she noticed
Speaker 3: she was never picked to work with them, something that
Speaker 3: was considered an honor.
Speaker 5: One time, my sister got to go help the maidens
Speaker 5: with something, and I remember sitting my sister down and
Speaker 5: being like, don't do anything that's going to cause them
Speaker 5: to like not want you to come back, because I
Speaker 5: was like, I don't know what I did, but I
Speaker 5: did something and they don't want me there.
Speaker 3: Christa really felt like an outsider. When her family was
Speaker 3: moved yet another River Road property, it would be the
Speaker 3: worst year of her life. This new location was overseen
Speaker 3: by Jan and her husband. Neither of them responded to
Speaker 3: her requests for comment, even though she'd known the couple
Speaker 3: her whole life. Christa found the husband intimidating. He was
Speaker 3: quiet and tall and let Jane take the reins.
Speaker 5: She was a very strong willed woman. She was very
Speaker 5: much a leader. She was Victor's right hand. She was
Speaker 5: whispering in his ear. She was counseling him. She was
Speaker 5: the person that he bounced things off of. She was
Speaker 5: an extension of Victor. What she said was as good
Speaker 5: as if it came from the mouth of Victor.
Speaker 3: Christis ays Jan and her husband were almost militaristic in
Speaker 3: how they ran the satellite property. When Christa's family was
Speaker 3: moved there, her dad got a lot of assignments at
Speaker 3: River Roads butcher's shop and cabinet shop, so he was
Speaker 3: almost never home. Victor told Chris's mom that she should
Speaker 3: do whatever Jan told her to do, and one thing
Speaker 3: Jan decided was that Christa could be better. Christa started
Speaker 3: having date lee room checks to make sure she was organized.
Speaker 3: Victor said, an organized stock drawer meant you were doing
Speaker 3: well with God. That did not come naturally to Christa,
Speaker 3: and when she didn't meet Jan's standards, she was punished
Speaker 3: or publicly shamed.
Speaker 5: I was never like a super skinny fit girl like
Speaker 5: everybody else in my age group. I was a little
Speaker 5: heavier than the other girls, maybe ten fifteen pounds, and
Speaker 5: so I was heavily bullied, not by other kids, but
Speaker 5: by adults about my weight. I was put on extremely
Speaker 5: restrictive diets as early as the age of eleven years old.
Speaker 5: Victor detested overweight women. He thought they were disgusting, and
Speaker 5: that was one of the reasons that such an emphasis
Speaker 5: was put on weight control. And any of the women
Speaker 5: in the church who were a little heavier were consistently
Speaker 5: being told to their weight. They took my morning animal
Speaker 5: care away from me so that I could get up
Speaker 5: and exercise every day. So while everybody else was all
Speaker 5: of my friends were out taking care of the animals,
Speaker 5: I was walking back and forth on the road getting exercise.
Speaker 3: Krista was homeschold with a group of kids by a
Speaker 3: mom a couple of houses down, and Jan made a
Speaker 3: rule that she couldn't eat while she was there, even
Speaker 3: when the other girls did.
Speaker 5: I was put on a diet that was known as
Speaker 5: the rotation diet, which is a calorie deficit program. I
Speaker 5: was twelve years old and I was being fed as
Speaker 5: little as six hundred calories a day. I was hungry.
Speaker 5: I started to think it was normal to go to
Speaker 5: bed hungry. This is what it should feel like when
Speaker 5: you go to bed.
Speaker 3: How'd you feel about her at the time when you
Speaker 3: were being put on those extreme diets.
Speaker 5: That is a really good question, because there is the
Speaker 5: way I actually felt, and there was the way I
Speaker 5: was supposed to feel and tricked myself into believing I felt.
Speaker 5: How I actually felt was abused. I felt it was wrong.
Speaker 5: I felt that she had set the standard so high
Speaker 5: that I was set up for failure, and I was terrified.
Speaker 5: I was so scared of her and of the people
Speaker 5: who reported to her, because I was constantly doing something wrong.
Speaker 3: That must have been so hard to feel constantly sort
Speaker 3: of left out of the loop or rejected, and you
Speaker 3: don't know quite why. It sounds to me like.
Speaker 6: By categorizing people, raising certain people up to a higher position,
Speaker 6: or creating a hierarchy, it both makes people feel special
Speaker 6: or makes people feel rejected, and then both types of
Speaker 6: those reactions could pull people in further, because it's like,
Speaker 6: if you feel accepted, you feel great about it, and
Speaker 6: if you feel rejected, then you feel like, oh, I
Speaker 6: need to prove myself.
Speaker 5: Yeah, exactly, I need to do better I need to
Speaker 5: try harder. I need to strengthen my walk with God.
Speaker 5: I need to study the Bible more. I need to
Speaker 5: be more active in fellowships. I need to You know,
Speaker 5: all of these things go through your head and then
Speaker 5: you do them and nothing changes.
Speaker 4: My whole being.
Speaker 5: Felt like there was something about me that just wasn't
Speaker 5: good enough, because that literally was how I was treated.
Speaker 5: The mental gymnastics that I went through trying to figure
Speaker 5: out why they didn't like me, especially when it was
Speaker 5: people that I looked up to. It was something that
Speaker 5: became a part of me, is believing there was just
Speaker 5: something wrong with me and that I was not likable
Speaker 5: or lovable by the people who mattered. That feeling of inferiority,
Speaker 5: I don't think it will ever completely go away.
Speaker 2: While Christa struggled as a kid looking up the social
Speaker 2: ladder of River Road, on a different property at the camp,
Speaker 2: Lindsay faced the pressures of being a maiden. Like Christa,
Speaker 2: she got criticized about her body, in this case directly
Speaker 2: from Victor.
Speaker 4: He thought I was getting too overweight. I think as
Speaker 4: I was developing into a young lady, I was getting
Speaker 4: more curves and just naturally how my body is, but
Speaker 4: he said that I was gaining too much weight and
Speaker 4: he wouldn't have sex with me at all until I
Speaker 4: lost the weight, which to an outsider you might think,
Speaker 4: oh my gosh, you should have been so happy, But
Speaker 4: for me, it felt like I was so ugly and
Speaker 4: being so rejected. He had told me, you know, all
Speaker 4: those times, that him having sex with me was God's
Speaker 4: love for me.
Speaker 2: Lindsay's body was controlled in many ways, like around that
Speaker 2: time when she was fifteen, she also started having some
Speaker 2: health problems, really bad headaches and trouble going to the bathroom.
Speaker 4: Then they started having me do something called the colon cleans.
Speaker 2: And their colon cleans, Lindsay couldn't eat regular food for
Speaker 2: seven days, only certain fluids in a combination of pills.
Speaker 4: I was so hungry and so weak because we still
Speaker 4: had to keep our schedules, We had to be up,
Speaker 4: we had to be working. I think I did the
Speaker 4: cleanse like a total of maybe fourteen times. And when
Speaker 4: I think back on even like the physical aspect of
Speaker 4: what they had us due to our bodies, it's crazy.
Speaker 4: Victor had me try smoking at one point cigarettes to
Speaker 4: try to help me go to the bathroom. They one
Speaker 4: time chopped up garlic and put it on my stomach
Speaker 4: with saran wrap, and then put a heating pad on top,
Speaker 4: which made my stomach burn so bad. I had these
Speaker 4: huge blisters all over my tummy. It was so so painful.
Speaker 4: It wasn't just like mind control. It was like so
Speaker 4: many things combined into this control and breaking you down
Speaker 4: and hurting me even physically.
Speaker 2: Lindsay was always under Victor's microscope. One time, she and
Speaker 2: Jess were set to play at a church service for
Speaker 2: all one hundred and fifty members of River Road. So
Speaker 2: the night before, Lindsay and Jess got together to do
Speaker 2: their favorite thing, change their guitar strings. Victor was not
Speaker 2: happy about this.
Speaker 4: Victor told us that we did it to seek attention.
Speaker 2: Because it was like in a public setting or something.
Speaker 4: Because we wanted everyone to hear that we had new
Speaker 4: strings on our guitars, and we should have waited, and
Speaker 4: we did it because we wanted to draw attention to ourselves.
Speaker 3: So you got in trouble for that.
Speaker 4: Yeah, it's like crazy going back through even all these
Speaker 4: little things that happened telling it now, like it's so
Speaker 4: what one two sentence story, but just how much damage
Speaker 4: even that can do.
Speaker 2: It's like, it's not just that he was chastising you
Speaker 2: for a mistake, it's that he was saying, this mistake
Speaker 2: shows that you have bad character and you're not a
Speaker 2: good believer, and there's something fundamentally wrong with you.
Speaker 4: Yeah. It made me I feel like question everything then,
Speaker 4: and made you so scared to do anything.
Speaker 2: Whenever she could, Lindsay disappeared to a quiet spot with
Speaker 2: her guitar. She tried to remember the songs she loved
Speaker 2: from her past for before any of this, like in
Speaker 2: The Little Mermaid when Ariel sings part of Your World.
Speaker 4: One of my favorite movies from growing up was The
Speaker 4: Worst of Oz and me and my pop would sing
Speaker 4: over the Rainbow, and I think a lot of those
Speaker 4: songs helped me through that time because I was feeling
Speaker 4: so alone. And it sounds maybe so silly to draw
Speaker 4: on Disney movies, you know, but all these people, all
Speaker 4: these girls you saw, were trapped and they had these
Speaker 4: songs of hope and longing and wishing. So there were
Speaker 4: times and I would try to figure some out on
Speaker 4: my guitar, and I couldn't do it in public with
Speaker 4: the rest of the Maidens, but when, like in my
Speaker 4: own quiet time, I'd try to figure some out and
Speaker 4: play some And there were so many times I remember
Speaker 4: laying on the couch the upstairs unit in the four plex,
Speaker 4: the one to the right, the couch in that unit,
Speaker 4: and just like dreaming, Gosh, what would it be if
Speaker 4: I somehow got a hold of my grandparents and I
Speaker 4: was able to move in with them and they'd help me,
Speaker 4: and I'd be able to go to college And just
Speaker 4: dreaming of stuff like that and just leave everything and
Speaker 4: have a whole new life.
Speaker 2: And get out of there.
Speaker 4: Yeah, I just I was dreaming that maybe one day
Speaker 4: it would happen. Some of those songs helped me stay
Speaker 4: strong and get through some of those times. If happy
Speaker 4: little bluebirds fly over the rainbow, why why can't I?
Speaker 2: There was one person Lindsay could be honest with, who
Speaker 2: she could tell all her daydreams of leaving Jess.
Speaker 4: I would say she was my best friend. And I
Speaker 4: mean we fought just probably like sisters do, but overall
Speaker 4: we were just thick as thieves and had talked about
Speaker 4: trying to run away together.
Speaker 2: Music was Jess and Lindsay's escape. But when Jess was
Speaker 2: thirteen and Lindsay was fourteen. They thought about escaping for real,
Speaker 2: getting out. They thought maybe they could commandeer the camp van.
Speaker 4: We talked about trying to drive it to Petrie's baiton
Speaker 4: tackle shop, the gas station in Finnliss. Then I remember
Speaker 4: us talking about even running through the woods at one
Speaker 4: point and just keep going. And for some reason, our
Speaker 4: destination was always Pea Trees.
Speaker 2: Their secret conversations gave shape to their wildest dreams. They
Speaker 2: talked it out, how would they get to pea Trees,
Speaker 2: when would they go? Once they got there, what would
Speaker 2: they do? Would they try to call someone? Would they
Speaker 2: ask for help? They considered all the potential pitfalls of
Speaker 2: their plan. They considered it in a real way, thinking
Speaker 2: out how they could navigate the logistics of being two
Speaker 2: kids running away from this isolated compound. But they always
Speaker 2: came to the same conclusion. They'd never driven on main
Speaker 2: roads before, they were too young for a license.
Speaker 4: And then who would believe us? You know, who would
Speaker 4: we even call? We didn't have any phone numbers of anyone.
Speaker 4: Jess brought up on time O, we don't even have
Speaker 4: any identification on us, And I remember saying, yeah, they'll
Speaker 4: probably just end up calling her parents, and we'd kind
Speaker 4: of just look at each other and shrug our shoulders
Speaker 4: and be like, Okay, well, I guess this is it
Speaker 4: for now. Kind of felt like you were stuck with
Speaker 4: no other options.
Speaker 2: So she kept to her regular life. She went to
Speaker 2: their fellowships, listened to teachings from Victor, and then sometimes
Speaker 2: she'd spend time alone with Victor at night, and that
Speaker 2: gave Lindsay an idea. Maybe their sneak out could be
Speaker 2: more subtle. She knew that Victor had the Maidens use
Speaker 2: a type of birth control, a spermicide, when they were
Speaker 2: with him, so one night she thought, what if I
Speaker 2: use it wrong? If all went to plan, she could
Speaker 2: get pregnant and use that to save herself. If she
Speaker 2: were pregnant, then she'd have to go to the hospital
Speaker 2: and then someone there could help her. This was her
Speaker 2: chance to get out. She was only fourteen, but at
Speaker 2: that point, to Lindsay, even being pregnant at fourteen seemed
Speaker 2: better than staying where she was. So that night, at
Speaker 2: Victor's lodge, she faked her application, did it just halfway,
Speaker 2: but almost immediately Victor noticed and corrected her. She had
Speaker 2: to do what he said her plan wasn't going to work. Eventually,
Speaker 2: Victor got a vasectomy, so it wouldn't be an issue anymore.
Speaker 2: Lindsay would never become pregnant from Victor. Another escape plan lost.
Speaker 3: Victor wanted to know everything about the Maidens, all of
Speaker 3: their sins, even from years ago. He was constantly wanting
Speaker 3: them to confess things, especially when he got angry. One day,
Speaker 3: Victor ordered the maidens to stay in Alamoth together and confess.
Speaker 3: They couldn't leave. Victor wasn't even there, but they did
Speaker 3: as they were told. For three days, the maidens sat alone,
Speaker 3: confessing to each other.
Speaker 4: Unlitially. That's all we did. We would eat and then
Speaker 4: all ten of us would go around the room confessing
Speaker 4: prior sins. I felt like I had almost nothing to share.
Speaker 4: I did not know what big sin I had in
Speaker 4: my life that was so big that we had to
Speaker 4: stay in Alamov for three days. And so I had
Speaker 4: this necklace, this gold necklace that i'd I think since
Speaker 4: I was a child, and I think a family member
Speaker 4: had given it to me. I made up this whole
Speaker 4: story that I bought it in nineteen ninety six, So
Speaker 4: this was pre maiden out a fortune teller's tent.
Speaker 3: So Lindsay told the other maidens that she went to
Speaker 3: a carnival with a friend, she had her fortune read
Speaker 3: and got a necklace, and she never got rid of it.
Speaker 4: She told them, I didn't realize the effect it had
Speaker 4: on me because of the spirits that the necklace carried.
Speaker 4: That was the big sin that I made up and
Speaker 4: confessed just to say something, because I literally had no
Speaker 4: idea what to say. Here, I am lying, which is
Speaker 4: a sin, sinning confessing sin that wasn't really a sin.
Speaker 3: Another time, Victor accused Lindsay of not quote claiming God's promises.
Speaker 3: Victor often used obscure phrasing from the Bible, the exact
Speaker 3: meaning unclear. Sometimes he gave her tasks in symbolic language
Speaker 3: that felt impossible to obey, like he was messing with
Speaker 3: her mind. Maybe A good example is a story that
Speaker 3: started one day when Victor was upset with her and
Speaker 3: another maiden named Lisa. He sent the two of them
Speaker 3: out on a cryptic quest. He said Lindsay had to
Speaker 3: find the White Stone and Lisa should find the bright
Speaker 3: morning Star. Victor said not to come back until they
Speaker 3: completed the mission. The White Stone and the Bright Morning
Speaker 3: Star are mentioned in the Book of Revelation, the enigmatic
Speaker 3: part of the Bible about the apocalypse, But these two
Speaker 3: kids had no idea what they were actually supposed to do.
Speaker 3: They got to work doing chores at Lisa's family's house,
Speaker 3: confused about their mission, so they sat at the kitchen
Speaker 3: table discussing how to find the White Stone and the
Speaker 3: Bright Morning Star. Lisa thought maybe baking some muffins for
Speaker 3: Victor would help, so they brought him a basket of
Speaker 3: freshly baked muffins during breakfast time dining hall where everyone
Speaker 3: was gathered. But this was not the right move.
Speaker 4: I remember him getting so angry, so angry that we
Speaker 4: had come with muffins, and I remember him saying stuff
Speaker 4: like can't you see him eating breakfast? Like why would
Speaker 4: I need these muffins?
Speaker 3: They hadn't found the White Stone and the Bright Morning Star.
Speaker 3: Victor sent them back out to keep looking, this time
Speaker 3: with a deadline. They must meet him back at the
Speaker 3: lodge by noon. What would happen if they arrived empty handed?
Speaker 3: What would happen if they didn't show up at all?
Speaker 3: After a long discussion about what to do, they arrived late,
Speaker 3: which made Victor even angrier. He told them he'd been
Speaker 3: sitting under the apple trees with two empty chairs for them.
Speaker 3: They stood him up. They disobeyed God's word. Victor told
Speaker 3: Lindsay to pack up her belongings at the camp. He
Speaker 3: was sending her home.
Speaker 2: Immediately, she felt scared and sad at the same time.
Speaker 2: She had daydreamed escape plans, but at this point these
Speaker 2: people were her home and she was being cast out.
Speaker 2: Lindsay saw her future melt in front of her. They
Speaker 2: loaded her stuff into a truck. As one of the
Speaker 2: elders of the church started driving out of the camp
Speaker 2: onto the dirt road, Lindsay saw Victor. She told the
Speaker 2: driver to stop and jumped out of the car. Her
Speaker 2: body trembled, her heart began to beat faster. She started
Speaker 2: to confess, I.
Speaker 4: Don't even know what words were coming out of my
Speaker 4: mouth at the time. Most of my reproof over the
Speaker 4: years had to do with me pleasing people and having
Speaker 4: to get out of that mindset, and so I'm sure
Speaker 4: there was something in there of me talking about how
Speaker 4: my eyes had been maybe on some of the other
Speaker 4: young men, or I had been thinking about maybe wanting
Speaker 4: to get married someday, which aren't bad to be thinking about.
Speaker 4: That's what a normal teenager is probably thinking about, if
Speaker 4: they want to get married, if they want to have kids,
Speaker 4: what they might want to do in college, or a
Speaker 4: crush they have on a cute guy.
Speaker 3: But Lindsay was learning to think and behave in a
Speaker 3: different way.
Speaker 4: There was nothing left of myself to me. It was
Speaker 4: just this empty, shallow of this empty person in there
Speaker 4: walking around being filled with what Victor wanted me to think,
Speaker 4: not any of my own thoughts or things that I
Speaker 4: had passions about.
Speaker 3: Lindsay can't remember the words she used to confess, but
Speaker 3: something about them clicked for Victor. He'd later tell her
Speaker 3: that was the moment she'd found the white stone. She
Speaker 3: could keep living at the camp, at least for now,
Speaker 3: but within a couple months Victor was unhappy again. She
Speaker 3: wasn't clear why.
Speaker 4: Victor said, I wasn't doing well spiritually.
Speaker 3: So Victor sent her home to her parents. She wouldn't
Speaker 3: have the honor of living with the Maidens. Lindsay hadn't
Speaker 3: lived at home in almost two years, but being there
Speaker 3: wasn't a relief. Home didn't feel like it used to.
Speaker 3: It felt awkward and weird. When she got home. Her
Speaker 3: mom cried. It was considered a disgrace to have her
Speaker 3: daughter tossed out of the maidens, and Lindsay missed them.
Speaker 3: They had started to feel like home. Then, late one
Speaker 3: summer night, Lindsay lay asleep in her bed when she
Speaker 3: heard music outside her window. Suddenly, she heard Victor's voice
Speaker 3: ringing through her bedroom. She slipped out of bed and
Speaker 3: ran outside. Victor was there with one of the other maidens.
Speaker 3: Lindsay hugged him.
Speaker 2: The song they were singing was based on an old
Speaker 2: hymn text written in the eighteen hundreds. It was the
Speaker 2: poem that had been read right before the maiden ceremony
Speaker 2: when they all made a vow to Victor. I found
Speaker 2: a friend, Oh, such a friend. He loved me ere
Speaker 2: I knew him. He drew me with the chords of love,
Speaker 2: and thus he bound me to him.
Speaker 4: I found afraid, such afraid.
Speaker 2: He loved.
Speaker 1: The chords of love, and thus he bound me too.
Speaker 2: This is a recording of River Road members singing it.
Speaker 2: Lindsay had set the poem to music herself. Now Victor
Speaker 2: and a maiden sang it for her as a reminder.
Speaker 1: Which cannot be said.
Speaker 2: River They spoke a few words with Lindsay, and then
Speaker 2: they left. Lindsay had not been invited back. Her head swirled.
Speaker 2: It all felt so complicated, like music, Her own music
Speaker 2: was now a weapon, being wheelded against her.
Speaker 4: I can still remember watching them drive down the road.
Speaker 4: I remember in that moment, feeling so alone, so helpless,
Speaker 4: so unworthy, almost so dirty, like I didn't like I
Speaker 4: was being rejected, almost like wanting to die, like so worthless.
Speaker 4: It was almost like there was nowhere to go. I
Speaker 4: had no one that wanted me.
Speaker 2: That same night, Victor came back, the same kind of
Speaker 2: whiplash Lindsay faced all the time, hot and cold, showing up,
Speaker 2: going away, then showing up again. He picked her up,
Speaker 2: took her to the lodge, yelled at her all night
Speaker 2: until she confessed something again. When the sun came up,
Speaker 2: he finally accepted Lindsay back into his good graces. Then
Speaker 2: Victor said she had a choice. He offered her two paths.
Speaker 2: She could recommit to being a maiden, or she could
Speaker 2: leave the maidens and eventually marry another man.
Speaker 4: Which honestly is crazy, Like you're asking a fifteen year
Speaker 4: old to make these kind of commitments. You know. I mean,
Speaker 4: I look back now, and it's just crazy when I
Speaker 4: think about this stuff, like these major life decisions that
Speaker 4: he was having me figure out and decide.
Speaker 2: Lindsay had just been through so many iterations of Victor's anger,
Speaker 2: been rejected so many times, so many of those times
Speaker 2: she starved for his attention to be in his favor,
Speaker 2: in God's favor. Still, after all this manipulation, Lindsay knew
Speaker 2: what she really wanted. She wanted to leave, and this
Speaker 2: was the first time she would have the guts to
Speaker 2: say it, not just to anyone, to their leader and profit.
Speaker 4: I told them that because of all the trouble I
Speaker 4: had caused in the maidens and tears that they had
Speaker 4: on my behalf, I wanted to not be a maiden
Speaker 4: any longer and to get married someday. Thinking back, I
Speaker 4: honestly don't know how I got the guts to say
Speaker 4: what I did, because I was so scared to go
Speaker 4: against anything that he was saying. And he was really
Speaker 4: quiet and eventually said okay, and I remember feeling really
Speaker 4: good and at peace and really light. Then I was
Speaker 4: finally not going to be a maiden anymore and living
Speaker 4: like that and ready to move on.
Speaker 2: Victor told Lindsay to hand in everything she'd been given
Speaker 2: while she was a maiden.
Speaker 4: Which was very hard. I don't think I expected that.
Speaker 4: Had me hand everything in, I didn't get to say
Speaker 4: goodbye to the maidens at all.
Speaker 2: After that, when she was around the maidens, they didn't
Speaker 2: talk to her or even look at her, almost like
Speaker 2: someone told them not to. But she didn't care. She
Speaker 2: was ready for this change. No more constant scrutiny, no
Speaker 2: more living at the Shepherd's Camp.
Speaker 4: None of it had to do with the maidens anymore.
Speaker 4: It didn't have to do with Victor. It didn't have
Speaker 4: to do with remaining unmarried or even getting married. I
Speaker 4: wasn't thinking it all about marriage. It was all like
Speaker 4: me on my own journey now with God. And I
Speaker 4: think I was just feeling so free.
Speaker 2: She felt like she could connect with God on her
Speaker 2: own terms now. And then three days later there was
Speaker 2: the phone call.
Speaker 4: Somebody got a call from the Shepherd's camp staff inviting
Speaker 4: just the leadership to come to a campfire at the
Speaker 4: camp and to bring me along.
Speaker 3: Lindsay arrived back at the Shepherd's Camp and joined the
Speaker 3: group around the fire pit on chairs and blankets. The
Speaker 3: fire was in the middle of the camp by the pond,
Speaker 3: not far from Victor's lodge. Many of the camp elders
Speaker 3: and the maidens were there. It was on a warm
Speaker 3: summer night, and Lindsay could see the water stars glistened
Speaker 3: off the pond.
Speaker 4: Victor did a teaching lord what would you have me
Speaker 4: to do?
Speaker 3: His point was they should submit themselves to God's will.
Speaker 3: They shouldn't focus on their wishes or desires, but.
Speaker 4: God's ultimately, if we really look at it, it was
Speaker 4: a Victor, what would you have me to do?
Speaker 3: Then Victor turned to the maidens and asked each of
Speaker 3: them to recommit. The maidens were clustered together on a hillside.
Speaker 3: He went one by one, and one by one they recommitted.
Speaker 4: And I remember feeling in that moment like I have
Speaker 4: nowhere to go, Like I basically am being trapped again
Speaker 4: into being a maiden. Like what am I going to say?
Speaker 4: Nobody's supporting me, nobody's helping me. I was literally so
Speaker 4: happy for the last few days, so free, so light,
Speaker 4: and here I am with all the leadership, with Victor,
Speaker 4: with my parents, with the maidens, And so I said yes.
Speaker 3: Lindsay had returned, she would become a maiden again, and
Speaker 3: Victor would honor her for it.
Speaker 4: Victor said that God had told him to give me
Speaker 4: a new name. He said that the name was going
Speaker 4: to be Lia, which Lira is a constellation in the heavens,
Speaker 4: which is an eagle with a harp.
Speaker 3: He told her, no matter what time of year it is,
Speaker 3: when you look up, Lira will always be overhead in
Speaker 3: the sky. In giving her this new name, Victor was
Speaker 3: not only labeling Lindsay a musician, but a leader among
Speaker 3: the musicians, a place of high honor, even among the maidens.
Speaker 3: It held responsibility and power.
Speaker 4: He talked about how in war the musicians were always
Speaker 4: the one who went first in battle, and in our
Speaker 4: spiritual warfare, it's always the musicians who like go first
Speaker 4: and sound the battle cry, and he said that that's
Speaker 4: what Lera is about. He basically said that I was
Speaker 4: going to be this the forefront of the maidens and
Speaker 4: making sure no evil was around, casting down strongholds. I
Speaker 4: think about that night, I remember in that moment feeling
Speaker 4: really special, but also when I think of it now,
Speaker 4: it was almost like he prophesied his own demise. For
Speaker 4: all those years you know Victor was the predator and
Speaker 4: I was the prey, and then he became the prey.
Speaker 3: The Tuning is a production of Rococoa Punch and iHeart Podcasts.
Speaker 3: It's written and produced by Erica Lance and me. Our
Speaker 3: story editor is Emily Foreman. Mixing and sound designed by
Speaker 3: James Trout. Grace Doe is our production assistant. Fact checking
Speaker 3: by Andrea Lopez Cruzado. Our executive producers are John Piatti
Speaker 3: and Jessica Alpert at Rococo Punch, and Katrina Norvell and
Speaker 3: Nikki e Tour at iHeart Podcasts. You can follow us
Speaker 3: on Instagram at Rococo Punch, and you can reach out
Speaker 3: via email The Turning at rococopunch dot com. I'm Alan
Speaker 3: Lance Lesser. Thanks for listening.