In TFI novels, sexism manifests in many ways. Most traditionally, and very apparent in this novel, is the extreme sexualisation of female characters. This is the most prominent aspect of sexism in the novel, and therefore it is the aspect I will focus on most, along with its various facets. The women in Warriors are sexualised without exception: whether they are teens or in their 50s, within in The Family or of the System, whether they are present in the scene or absent. As a rule, comments made about a female character are about her appearance, while the male characters’ appearances are rarely mentioned. The men are allowed character traits, whereas the women are given bodies.

However, there is some nuance: the TFI women are allowed other traits, like having a special loving care for others or a deep love of motherhood. If the System women have personality traits, those traits are mocked. Likewise, the System women are written with more stereotypically shallow interests, like putting on make-up or reading magazines. These interests are also either mocked or showcased as negative and put down. Additionally, TFI (or TFI-adjacent) women’s purpose in life is to use their bodies to save people. That’s the bulk of their existence. Sex with those women is good, because it not only brings the men to Jesus, but also saves their souls. Meanwhile, sex with System women is shallow, lusty, and impure.

Alongside TFI’s notorious practice of Flirty Fishing, or female characters using sex to bring men to Jesus, this novel also showcases TFI’s interesting ideas surrounding age and sex, as well as the practice of Spiritual Sex. In this first novel, Flirty Fishing is used by the characters Gypsy and Judy to encourage male characters to accept Jesus into their hearts. TFI’s views on age and sex can be seen through the array of older and younger women who are sexualised throughout the novel, as well as an age gap between two TFI characters. The practice of Spiritual Sex aims to include Jesus and God in sexual acts; this novel exemplifies not only this, but also takes it one step farther and has sexual interactions between two spirit helpers and between a TFI member and a spirit helper. These three demonstrate just a few of TFI’s more out-there sexual beliefs.

In the upcoming section, I focus on the first key point: the main difference in how men and women are described in the novel.

A great example to show the difference in character descriptions are the first three main characters: Lenny, Gypsy and Don. Readers of the novel get a vague idea of the characters’ appearances, because they’re depicted on the cover and back of the novel. However, Lenny’s appearance is never properly described in the novel. He’s the first character the reader meets, and seemingly an important protagonist. Yet in his own chapter, there are instead descriptions of Gypsy’s looks and dress in the past and present. His only description appears in Part II – Chapter 1: A Family Affair.

Among the crowd of disciples was Lenny, with his patchy haircut (given to him by Brother Shadrach, who held a book about cutting hair in one hand, and some scissors in the other), his memory work and toothbrush hanging from the cord around his neck, his faded jeans with the knees all bagged out from wear and tear, a blue work shirt, and a grin from ear to ear as they sang song after song to the Lord with great inspiration. (HL, 93)

This is already much more description than before, although it is the only description the reader ever gets of Lenny’s appearance. The reader can see that his hair matches the cover of the novel (See Below), which also depicts his toothbrush and memory work. There is minimal description of his clothes, “faded jeans” and “a blue work shirt”. This may seem like a lot, but it’s little when compared to a casual first description of Gypsy, which describes her hair length and colour, four articles of clothing, two accessories, her eyes, and especially how, “Her moist lips hung slightly open, her head cocked to one side, and I knew I had never seen a sexier sight in all my life” (13). For further context, this is how Lenny describes Gypsy’s lips and body language right after she asks him “Yes?” for clarification. She’s literally just answering a question and he finds it oh, so sexy.

Don, the other male protagonist at the start, is described earlier than Lenny, but just as little. In Don’s first chapter the reader discovers that he has curly hair, wears glasses, and describes himself as, “not too good-looking” (59). This is, however, the extent of his description in the entire novel! In fact, in Don’s first chapter there is a more detailed description of the character Will than of Don himself. Also, instead of comments on Don’s looks, there are many comments on the sexiness of Don’s girlfriend. Such comments recur across all scenes where she is mentioned or appears, yet still Don’s own appearance is never described.

Figure 1. From left to right: Sherry, Marduke, Will; Don, Lenny, Gypsy.

So let’s contrast these bare descriptions with the first depictions of Gypsy. The reader meets Gypsy in the very first chapter, which is written from Lenny’s perspective. He describes how he first met her in college and what she looked like then, “She’s your typical hippie, long light brown hair, big green eyes, floppy black hat, poncho, bell-bottom jeans and lots of ‘natural’ jewellery.” (Steiner, 1). As I wrote above, this is already far more description than the reader receives about either of the men. Lenny continues to describe how, “Gypsy seized every opportunity to doff her clothes” (HL, 14), a further focus on her body and nudity. In this first chapter, all the afore-mentioned comments come from Lenny’s reminiscences. However, in the present moment he’s sad, so he, “Needed her loving. I felt comfort and peace flow into my heart, body and soul as we kissed and caressed. My hands felt the warmth of her waist, then her torso, back and soft breasts under her thin blouse. I needed her now. She was my link with sanity. She […] was all that kept me from going insane with the dreams and premonitions I had been having.” (14-15).

All throughout this first chapter, there are a variety of descriptions of Gypsy. Not only the basics of how she looks, but details about her skin, body, clothing and sexual freedom. Additionally, the descriptions of her appearance are accompanied by opinionated comments on her appearance, in relation to her sexiness or how comforting her body is, or how helpful her sex is. The depictions of Gypsy are not mere descriptions, but also statements holding judgements and interpretations about her body. This all contrasts starkly with any descriptions of the men, not only in the first chapter, but all throughout the novel. The male characters are rarely described in the first place, much less with a judgement statement on their bodies or sexuality.

In any case, the men may not receive further descriptions throughout the novel, but Gypsy’s descriptions only get worse. In her own chapter of Part 1, where perhaps she would describe Lenny in as much sexual detail as Lenny described her, the reader is still given no idea what Lenny looks like. However, Gypsy’s body is described repeatedly. In her chapter, she runs around naked in the woods and skinny dips in a river; the author stresses multiple times that she is naked. During that same chapter, her spiritual awakening is also a sexual one.* Not only are there numerous descriptions of Gypsy’s body, but almost every description is sexual. Gypsy’s character is written to centre heavily around sex. This characterization can be attributed to the TFI belief that sex can “save” people, which is explored in the Flirty Fishing section below.

*Compared to Don and Lenny, both of whom have non-sexual spiritual awakenings. Lenny’s awakening comes with a dream where he grabs a sword and some clothes, which prepare him to be a warrior. Don’s awakening is through prophecy, as he receives a prophecy about events that happen later in the novel. Only Gypsy’s spiritual awakening is a sexual one.

As a final comparison I examine the one other female character who holds a larger role in these chapters: Sherry, Don’s girlfriend. The only words that are ever used to describe Sherry, in Don’s chapters, are “beautiful, hot, sexy” (59) – otherwise there are repeated comments on the skimpiness of her clothing. There are no concrete physical details like Gypsy received, or even something basic, like the description of curly hair for Don. However, the reader is told their entire relationship centres around sex. In a letter Sherry writes to Don, she describes how much she misses him (for the sex) and how they’re going to have so much awesome sex when he returns to live with her:

I can almost taste you. I’m so hungry for you, I think I will literally eat you up our first night together. Now, sweetheart, you be sure to get lots of sleep these last days before I see you, because you won’t be able to count on any the first few nights we’re together. Can you come back early, like before the weekend, so we can have some really wicked times together? Hmmm? What do you say, Baby? I’m going to do things to you that you have only imagined. (59)

Just like Gypsy, Sherry’s sexual traits are the main focus of her description. Sex is also the main focus of Don and Sherry’s relationship. Sherry does not have her own chapters, so the reader never sees her point of view. Instead, Don’s point of view is dominant and primarily concerned with her looks and their sex. What little description we get of Sherry and her hobbies and personality traits is extremely judgemental. Don judges her for not being a hippie, for drinking, for watching soap operas and for reading magazines. The reader can tell all these traits are bad and shallow because Don says, “She doesn’t have the incredibly deep talks about poetry and Dylan’s music that he, Lenny and Gypsy do” (Steiner, 3). Ironically, there is character description of Sherry that paints her as more three-dimensional and could have led to a more interesting story. She gets depressed, eats lots of chocolates and gains weight; this makes her diet, smoke a lot, and check her weight constantly. In essence, any sensible reader will realise that Sherry has an eating disorder. Instead of delving into this and depicting Sherry’s battle with this disorder and how she overcomes it, the novel describes Sherry as crazy, undatable, and shameful for her “irrational” behaviour.

In this section, I already delved into some similarities and differences in how Sherry and Gypsy are described. In the next section, I compare how TFI women and System women are depicted in the novel, and how the aspect of being in TFI or the System influences their characterisation.

One of the most striking and fascinating aspects of this novel is the distinction drawn between Sherry and Gypsy. There are many aspects that match in their descriptions – most notoriously, they are both described as extremely sexy, and sexual, women. However, the tone and judgement cast on their respective sexualities is very different. Sherry wears skimpy clothes that highlight her sexiness, while she also really loves to have sex. Gypsy doesn’t necessarily wear skimpy clothes, but her clothes do highlight her body, and she is often naked in the novel. She, too, has a lot of sex and sees it as something positive. However, Sherry and sex with her is described as ‘lust of the flesh’, a very negative view of sexuality that focuses on lust rather than love and is ‘of the Devil’. Meanwhile, sex with Gypsy is portrayed as godly and her nudity is spiritually healthy.

This is one of the first cases where TFI’s us versus them mentality is highlighted in the novel. A TFI person and a Systemite can perform the exact same action, yet the novel describes the TFI person’s performance of this action as godly, while the Systemite’s execution of the same action is ‘of the Devil’. A further simple example to expand on this is Gypsy and Sherry’s respective relationships. Gypsy and Lenny constantly have sex; both of them state this and it’s also described in their chapters. Sex with Gypsy is described as comforting and healing, and her relationship with Lenny is portrayed positively, especially her part in it. Meanwhile, Sherry and Don also have a lot of sex, which is mentioned many times in Don’s first chapter and also described. Nevertheless, sex with Sherry is lusty, superficial and shallow, and her relationship with Don is the same, with Sherry specifically called out as a negative part of Don’s life. These two couples do the same activities and it’s all described in mirroring ways. The only difference is Sherry is of the System and bad, therefore sex with her is ‘of the Devil’, while Gypsy believes in God and is good, therefore sex with her is godly.

This difference is further expanded upon in Don’s dream at the end of his first chapter: Part 1, Chapter 3: The Devil Fights. In this dream, Don sees Gypsy as a “free and happy” (HL, 86) little lamb. In the same dream, Don sees Sherry as well, but her description is as follows:

With a shock, I saw her face was that of a plastic doll with great blue marbles for eyes, long plastic eyelashes and a puckered rubber mouth. She was in a skimpy outfit, and I could see where her plastic arms and legs were attached to her plastic torso. I saw her strings twisted round mine, and her movements, which showed no sign of struggle at all but total surrender to the Game Master by her total obliviousness to his existence, had a powerful influence over mine. My emotion went from disgust to pity to sorrow for her dangerous shallowness. A tear tumbled down my cheek for her captivity. (88)

Tragically, Don describes Sherry in greater detail when she’s a puppet than he ever describes her as a person. The reader learns her eye colour and some information about her makeup. But then again, Don emphasises her sexuality and the skimpy clothes she wears. This entire section is very hypocritical. Don says, “her dangerous shallowness”, even though he spends the entire chapter describing how much he likes to have sex with her. He also hypocritically calls her shallow while he has never described her actual person as anything other than sexy, or seemingly interacted with her hobbies and interests at all, except to call them shallow as well.

• Don is such a freaking jerk here. I think he can save his pity and honestly just shove off; Sherry deserves better than Don.

The differentiation and hypocrisy between the descriptions of Gypsy and Sherry is continued very obviously here. While Sherry is a plastic doll who’s fake and shallow, Gypsy is real and alive, because she’s literally an ewe. Gypsy is happy, free, and full of life and light in Don’s dream. The distinction of us versus them, Systemite versus TFI, is more explicitly detailed in Don’s dream. Gypsy is a lamb on a mountain pasture with Jesus as a Shepherd; Sherry is on a chessboard, tied up with strings and puppeted by this “Game Master” who is a bird. (We later find out that the Antichrist looks like an evil bird, so we can assume this bird is Satan.)

There’s just this insane differentiation that goes on through this whole book – with many, many parallels – about how non-TFI can be sexy, but it’s ungodly, while if they’re of TFI then all their sex is of God. This difference is especially highlighted in the most ridiculous chapter of this entire novel, Chapter 2 of Part II: Don’s Deliverance. Lenny has joined TFI and feels comfortable to be in a relationship with Gypsy again. They are dating, but both worry about Don and want to help him. Don breaks up with Sherry and is in a bad place, so Lenny and Gypsy go over and attempt to win his soul for Jesus. They try their best to witness to him, they help him clean his apartment, then they get prophecies together and he mostly calms down. However, that night, while she is still with Lenny, Gypsy sleeps with Don because Lenny told her to do “whatever it takes” (120) to save Don and “she knew that what her heart was telling her to do was right, that the love that welled up in her heart for this dear, struggling friend was from God” (122). So Gypsy literally cheats on her partner with his best friend, while said best friend is sleeping in the next room, but it’s okay because she’s doing it to calm him down from a panic attack. The reader is told that it’s super godly because the book says:

They met and melted and molded into one in the utmost of love – a love neither of them had ever known, for it was more than their love. It was the love of Jesus, the love of the God of the whole universe. It was their destiny, it was right, and it was meant to be. No one could ever tell those two again that love was wrong, that sex was evil, for they had touched the very heart of God firsthand that first night in the bed of passion together. (123)

The hypocrisy becomes even more obvious in this whole passage, this whole scene, where Gypsy and Don sleep together. In this same chapter, Sherry was disparaged for being sexual in a negative way and described as lust of the flesh – she, however, was merely having sex with her partner and enjoying herself. However, for some reason, sex with Gypsy isn’t lust of the flesh; even though the scene descriptions are very similar to those with Sherry, sex with Gypsy is still of God. Furthermore, Sherry is also criticized because she was just using Don for sex, however, he admits many times in the novel that he was also using her for sex; and in this scene when he sleeps with Gypsy, he is also just using her for sex, except it’s sex so he can calm down from a panic attack. And as a final point where I’m very confused, I don’t understand why sex with Sherry is ungodly for Don, but sex with Don isn’t ungodly for Gypsy! At the time of this scene Don is not yet saved, he doesn’t believe in God yet! So why doesn’t Gypsy get dreams about the lust of the flesh for sleeping with Don, a non-Christian, like Don does for Sherry? It just doesn’t make sense and is a whole load of hypocrisy. It’s the us versus them: Sherry will ensnare a soul because she’s of the System; Gypsy will save souls because she is of God.

In The Family International, there was a belief that sex could “save” people. This probably sounds rather bizarre, so let’s elaborate. It was basically the idea that love is what saves people’s souls for Jesus, which is the goal: You want to save souls, whatever it takes. Berg said that having sex with people can be a form of showing love to them. Therefore, in some cases, “whatever it takes” means having sex with someone to save their soul. In theory, if a person accepted Jesus into their heart after a TFI person had sex with them, then that was a win.

• What is certainly debateable is how often this actually happened. I’m not sure that the TFI members who slept with outsiders made sure each time that their sexual partner got saved afterwards. I don’t know if the idea was that the Systemite would promise to pray for salvation after the sex, and then what if they decided against it? There are obviously many issues with this philosophy, and I’ve always wondered about the specifics.

The idea of TFI members sleeping with Systemites in order to save them was called Flirty Fishing. While it was meant to save people’s souls, it also sometimes encouraged people to join TFI. This is Gypsy’s main role in the novel, she saves people by sleeping with them. Gypsy is essentially a plot device: her body is used to save and heal people. And this is literally stated in the book! For example, when Lenny finds out that Gypsy and Don cheated on him in the passage I described above, he tries to make sense of the situation in the following passage:

Gypsy had helped him through the toughest year of his life and had done her job well. He had repaid her by bringing her to the Lord. Who needed Gypsy most now, Lenny or Don? That wasn’t hard to see. Don needed Gypsy (124-125).

I mentioned before that Lenny used Gypsy’s “loving” as comfort and healing, and he states that again in this extract. In return, he says, he introduced her to God. Because Gypsy and her body are specifically there for healing and helping, Lenny rationalises that it’s okay she slept with Don, because Don is the one who needs more healing and help in that moment. I really want to emphasise that Lenny is talking about sex here, when he talks about himself or Don needing Gypsy. In this extract, he is actively rationalising what happened. He thinks about reasons why Don would have sex with Gypsy, and comes to the conclusion that Don needs to have sex with Gypsy, because it will comfort and heal him.

After Lenny finds out Gypsy and Don slept together, he leaves the apartment and goes on a walk to clear his thoughts. That’s when he rationalises in the above extract. Later on, Gypsy and Don find Lenny to make sure he’s okay. Lenny explains what he has rationalised to them in the following extract:

[Lenny:] “Her love helped to free you?”

[Don:] “Yeah, yeah, it sure did.”

[Lenny:] “Then it’s okay. It’s not wrong. One thing I know is that God will do, and has done, just about anything to win a soul and a disciple. And He doesn’t have any limits when He’s trying to show us His love. He used LSD and the Beatles to deliver me, and I know for darn sure that Gypsy and her lovin’ are a far sight more godly than they are. So that’s what it must have taken for you, Don, and I’m glad for you.” (126)

Lenny explains how, in his rationalisation, Gypsy having sex with Don was in God’s plan. God used Gypsy and her body to show his love for Don and win Don’s soul. They repeatedly use the words “love” and “lovin’”, so the novel continually aims to connect sex to love and say that’s what brings people to Jesus, but still it is sex that everything centres on. This sex, while with Gypsy, still doesn’t have her as a focus. Lenny says that it’s God showing his love, that God doesn’t have any limits, and what he means is God using Gypsy for these actions. That is Gypsy’s purpose across the novel: God uses her to sleep with people to help them in some way. I fixate on this because it is so important – the other main male characters have their plots and goals across the novel, but Gypsy is primarily there for sexual reasons. This is further important because, although the book shows Gypsy in a more favourable light than Sherry, Gypsy is used as a plot device just as Sherry is.

Gypsy is not the only female character who is used as a plot device in this way. In the later chapters of the novel, there’s a new main female character, Judy. Judy converts not one, but two men to Jesus with her “loving”. The novel exemplifies that having sex with a Christian, but specifically a TFI woman, is a holy and healing experience. Meanwhile sex with Systemites or Catholics is unsatisfying and leaves a guilty feeling.

This idea is specifically stated by a later important male character, Collin. Collin used to live with Gypsy, Lenny and Don, but he never got saved like they did. However, he was a Christian and went to church; he just wasn’t brought to TFI levels of worship. Later in the novel, he becomes more important as he helps Judy escape one of the Antichrist’s minions. For a short period, they hide out from the Antichrist’s minions at his parents’ lake house in Texas. In the following passages, they’re chilling at the lake house and Collin thinks about his wonderful experience so far with Judy:

He heard the creak of the back-screen door and turned to see Judy stepping off the back porch dressed in a bikini top and shorts. He smiled as she approached in her scanty attire. God had sure answered his prayer (well, it had actually been more of a murmur than a prayer), “Why, God, don’t You give me a lady who believes in Jesus to make love to?” And here she was. She sure believed in Jesus, and she was no prude, God bless her little heart. (263-264)

Collin had already learned that this wonderful woman who loved Jesus so much was even more fun in a bathtub full of foam than any hired girl in any expensive hotel suite could ever be. (265)

Collin makes two comparative judgements about Judy in these passages. The first judgement compares her to other women at his church, who did believe in Jesus, but were not related to TFI and therefore prudish. He has mentioned earlier in the novel that there were decent women in the church, albeit not sexually satisfying; he obviously needs the special TFI woman sex. The second judgement compares her to a prostitute (escort) who was hired for him earlier in the novel. That girl sounded perfectly nice, yet the novel described her as it did Sherry, and after having sex with her Collin had a guilty feeling. He doesn’t have this guilty feeling with Judy, though. Even though Judy was in love with one of his old friends who just got murdered! Nope, no guilt there, just when he slept with a hooker. This is all extra ironic, because Collin originally compared sex with the prostitute to sex with women at church, “If only some of those ladies at church could love me and make me feel the way that girl made me feel” (166). (I dunno, Collin, maybe the problem with the ladies at church is you!) Obviously, that scene was foreshadowing for the present movement, when Collin has found a wonderful mix of godly and sexy in Judy.

All these extracts and examples have described Flirty Fishing, although they never quite stated it outright. However, later on in the novel, the characters acknowledge having sex with non-members as a way they brought people to Jesus and to TFI. In the below passage, Don talks to his and Gypsy’s children about the battle in the Spirit and the differing weapons TFI used for that battle:

[Don:] “You know, some of those old weapons weren’t too bad either, especially when wielded by a sharpshooter like your mom. She bagged me with ‘em, and in those days they weren’t just new weapons, they were downright futuristic.” (184)

When Don talks about weapons, he means weapons of the spirit, generally prayer and prophecy. Except prayer and prophecy are new weapons, and he specifies old weapons that Gypsy used. Now he is literally talking about sex. When he says that Gypsy “bagged him” with that weapon, he means that above passage I mention where she sleeps with him. He calls it a weapon they used to fight the battle against the Devil. This is extra ironic, because the general term for Flirty Fishing is Love Bombing.

A practice that was around as early as Flirty Fishing, but more officially in the late ‘90s, is the TFI practice of large age gaps between partners. This is especially true if the younger partner is a woman. Now, in order to examine this topic, we first need to look at how TFI viewed age and sexuality in general.

Since the Endtime[1] was prophesied to come quickly, Berg didn’t anticipate that TFI would acquire an aging population. Back at the beginning, he was witnessing to hippies and winning them over, just like the reader sees in the novel. In fact, the later events as they occur in the novel were what my mother expected to experience – the Antichrist would rise and the Endtime would start in the early 2000s. Nevertheless, the Antichrist has not risen, the apocalypse is not upon us, and TFI has an older age group.

The age groups are a little diverse, since the very first generation in the US was in their 20s in the 1960s and early 1970s. Meanwhile, the first generation of TFI members in Europe were in their 20s in the 1970s or 1980s. In any case, TFI began with a population that would generally age, while they all had a lot of children. These children made up most of the second and third generations, especially since fewer members joined directly from the System in the cult’s later years. Therefore, TFI covered a lot of bases age-wise, so there were many different age groups of women to discriminate against.

However, let’s examine the sexualisation aspect again, but with the focus on different age groups. I’m not sure whether this is a positive or a negative point, but TFI did seem to oversexualise its female members rather equally across all age groups. There doesn’t seem to be a lot of ageism. I mention this because I’m aware that today, especially in the media industry, women over ~35 are considered unattractive and are rarely cast as love interests in film and TV. Meanwhile in Warriors, Gypsy is considered equally attractive when she’s 20 as when she’s 40.[2] Even Marduke – who is not only of the System but a minion of the Antichrist – is over 50 in the second half of the novel, yet still described as pretty and sensual (269-270).

However, there does seem to be some distinction between age and sexuality when TFI women and general System women are compared. This is highlighted with Judy as a special case from both Will and Collin’s points of view. Although the reader meets Judy when she’s a teen or young adult, she only becomes a main character once she’s in her late 40s. At first, she works as a secretary for Will, who considers her good company to take drugs and have sex with (163). The first perspective on Judy’s sexiness is granted by Will, who normally has sex with women 20-years old and younger; this is proudly stated in one of his sections, and will be further examined below. Importantly, Will’s statement assumes that the younger women are younger and therefore better at sex. Therefore, it’s special that Will, who has “had sex with hundreds of women” (175), is able to find sex with the older Judy exciting. The reader can recognise that this is because sex with a TFI-saved Christian, even one not yet properly saved like Judy, is better than any sex with a non-TFI saved person.

Will mentions a few times that Judy is awesome in bed and hot despite her age. When he makes these statements, he compares Judy not only with System women, but also Marduke. Marduke is a special case, because Will isn’t quite clear why sex with her is not pleasing. The two main reasons I found are either 1) because of her witchcraft, or 2) because she is dominant in bed. Nevertheless, when the situation is examined as a whole, it becomes clear that the reason Will finds Judy sexy, hot, and good in bed although she’s older, is because she is TFI-saved. According to TFI, System women age unsexily and are only good at sex when they’re young. Meanwhile TFI-Christian women age sexily and remain good in bed.

• Note here how I say System women age unsexily. Will is a Systemite most of the novel and apparently stays sexy no matter what.

Now that we’ve covered age and sexuality in TFI, we can move on to the age gaps. The best way to explain those beliefs are with an example from the novel. In this case, the novel’s characters even reference the relevant MO Letters about the topic. The characters involved in this relationship are Roy and Michelle. Roy is a character who was originally introduced back in the first chapter of the novel: A Heavenly Call. He was a guitarist in Will’s band and a friend of Lenny, Gypsy, and Don’s. They recruited him to Jesus’ side in Chapter 3 of Part II: Baptism by Fire. Roy next appears after the 30-year time jump, when he has a much younger wife, Michelle. The fact that Michelle is much younger than him recurs (259; 315-316; 332), which is why this age difference stood out to me. Near the end of the penultimate chapter, Roy and Michelle lie in bed together discussing all that has transpired. It is Roy who brings up the topic of their age difference:

“Honey,” Roy said as he looked deep in Michelle’s eyes, “my life has never stopped changing ever since I first got saved. But one of the biggest and best changes I’ve had in all those years was you, Sweetheart. You took this old lonely geezer and lit his spark, and it was all because of the ‘Goals of ‘98’ and ‘The Law of Love’ series, remember?”

“No… what do you mean?”

“I know you just reached out to me because you were trying to obey the Law of Love and to help there be less lonely people in the Family.”

“Why would you think that?” Michelle asked, surprised and slightly embarrassed.

“I have my sources, darlin’. True, or not?”

“Well…”

“True or not?”

“Well, yeah, but then you… you just swept me off my feet you old Casanova you.”

(332)

The characters in this scene themselves explain the relevant essence of the mentioned Mo Letters[3] – Goals for 1998! and Living the Lord’s Law of Love! (Henceforth: Law of Love) series. Roy mentions loneliness and a focus in TFI to support lonely people, which was Goal 17 of the Goals of 1998! (Amsterdam, ML #3160). Part of this support of lonely people was an increase in sexual sharing. This aspect is mentioned in Goals of 1998!, but developed much further in the Law of Love series (ML #3201-#3212). In this scene, Michelle admits that she connected with Roy due to these Mo Letters, and the reader assumes that this connection was due to sexual sharing.

Goals for 1998! and Law of Love series were additional Mo Letters to expand and explain aspects of The Love Charter. The Love Charter contained the updated rules of the Family that were created in 1997. Goals for 1998! came first and often references a “Victory Review”, which was a review of the strengths and weakness of TFI and where it stood at the end of 1997. The chosen goals in the Mo Letters are based on this review. Law of Love series was a counterpart for Goals for 1998! with more advice, especially on the aspects of sexual sharing. Both sets of publications contain a push for more sexual sharing and less monogamy. Large swaths of Law of Love letters are solely concerned with the aspects of sexual sharing and the issues that arise from its practice.

• Before the Love Charter, the rules were not in a specific place, but all scattered throughout Mo Letters.

In the first Law of Love letter there isn’t much mention of age or age differences, but Living the Lord’s Law of Love! — Part 9 discusses how many of the older women in TFI feel neglected, because their own husbands as well as the older single men prefer sexual sharing with the younger women. This Mo Letter also discusses the inequality of how the older men will sleep with the younger women, but the younger men will not sleep with the older women. The Mo Letter encourages the younger men to seek out sexual experiences with older women in TFI as well and to combat the older women’s loneliness in that way. While it is interesting that this is encouraged, I must say as a kid I did not see relationships between older women and younger men, only the opposite, so I’m not sure what effect this push had.

There are other, smaller mentions of age gaps or preferences of younger women over older women throughout the novel. For example, we have Will’s throwaway line, “He’d had sex with hundreds of women, most of them in their twenties or even younger.” (HL, 175), which is just gross on a few levels. Then we have Marina, Don and Gypsy’s 16-year old daughter, who’s described as “a pretty blonde, with a vivacious way about her.” (183). As a counter-example to this preference, there is Marduke, who is deemed attractive by Don and Gypsy’s much younger son, John (269).

No matter how you look at it, the novel reflects TFI’s general views on age and sex. Women in general are sexualised regardless of age, but younger women are preferred or perhaps sexualised more than older women are. Of course, generally speaking, while older TFI women may be sexy, we cannot make the mistake of thinking that older System women could be sexy.

[1] The Endtime is explained in detail in a different article.

[2] I do want to mention that her naked body is described significantly less when she’s older. However, this may be because there is less written about her overall. It is very possible that Gypsy’s naked body is described comparatively as much in the sequel.

[3] Mo Letters were like magazine articles where the founder – Mo or David Berg – wrote about all types of subjects. These Mo Letters were considered the Word of God to be read and studied alongside the Bible. After Berg’s death, these Mo Letters were written primarily by Karen Zerby, known as Mama Maria in TFI, and at times Peter Amsterdam. These two were the new leaders of TFI.

While sexual sharing is a nigh unavoidable topic when discussing sex in TFI, a further must to examine is one of the weirdest aspects of TFI’s beliefs: Spiritual Sex. Above, I mentioned sexual sharing, which was revitalised with the Love Charter and the Living the Lord’s Law of Love! letters. Furthermore, the Charter also brought about what was called the “Loving Jesus Revelation”. The Loving Jesus part of this revelation was more literal than you might think.

However, before I delve into this topic, I want to make a few comments. The idea of Loving Jesus and Spiritual Sex was known to me as a child because it shows up in many TFI novels, books and music. In spite of this, I never actually learned about it. Maybe I simply wasn’t old enough for those Mo Letters, or condensed versions of them for teens, to become required reading. Still, there was this one book that I was allowed to read that mentioned it: Cool Tips for Hot Sex. Cool Tips for Hot Sex is a hilarious book that me and my friends liked to skim through from the age of 12 on up. There are many chapters discussing different aspects of sex; the final chapter is called Spiritual Sex. That final chapter was ripped or cut out in every physical version of the book that I ever found.

This process of removing part of TFI material is called purging. Purging was done in TFI in the case of any form of content that was deemed potential dangerous or improper for outsiders to discover. It ranged from colouring over naked women with black makers in some children’s comics, to the burning of larger books or posters. The medium ground was cutting or tearing out dangerous pages from books that were otherwise decent. This is what I assume happened to each of those copies of Cool Tips for Hot Sex.

However, during research for this novel, I was able to find an online copy of Cool Tips for Hot Sex and read that last chapter for the very first time. And, as I thought, Spiritual Sex is actually rather straightforward: The most basic form of spiritual sex is to include Jesus in your sexual experiences. This could range from solo masturbation to sex with a partner – the point was to pray or simply speak to Jesus and include him in the sexual act. That final chapter of Cool Tips for Hot Sex contained, among other things, a list of possible phrases to say in order to include Jesus in your sex life. These phrases were separated in two sections of Less Erotic and More Erotic. Here are a few that I consider funniest:

From the Less Erotic List:

Jesus, You’re the Lover of all lovers.

I want You inside of me! Give me Your seeds.

Come to Me, Jesus! Be here with me and love me. Let’s hold each other and say words of love to each other. (Cool Tips for Hot Sex!, 121)

From the More Erotic List:

You’re beautiful, Jesus, and so sexy–sexier than I ever dreamed–so handsome, so naked and so hard!

I want to suck Your penis. I want to suck Your seeds!

I’m juicy for You. (121)

Whenever I have spoken about Spiritual Sex to outsiders, they’ve always found this idea very strange and somewhat alarming. I am aware that this practice was somewhat debated within TFI itself. However, since I can remember, we were supposed to include Jesus in everything we did. If we ate, we prayed for Jesus to be there. If we studied, we prayed and asked Jesus to help us. If we cleaned, cooked, exercised… He was supposed to be ever-present. So why not during sex? Furthermore, there were less sexually active aspects of Spiritual Sex and the Loving Jesus Revelation. For example, there were poetry books with poems to read to Jesus and declare your love; some of these were sexual and some were just romantic. There were also Loving Jesus songs and albums, with sexual and romantic music directed towards Jesus. I grew up with many of those songs and remember that we children listened to them as bedtime music. Back then, I thought they were typical love songs – I never realised that the singer was directing their lyrics towards Jesus instead of some unknown TFI member.

• Spiritual Sex or Loving Jesus is most closely performed by the character Gypsy in this novel. While she never explicitly includes Jesus or God during sex, she is the character most likely to make statements like, “I love you, Jesus! I’m in love with you!” (HL, 47), or “I love You, my sweetest lover of all, Jesus.” (121).

In Warriors, there is the normal form of Spiritual Sex, where Jesus is included, but I’ll also discuss sex between or with spirit helpers, since that is literally spiritual sex. There is one instance of the general form of Spiritual Sex, where Jesus is included in the sex act. There are a further two instances of sex acts with spirit helpers, one between a TFI member and a spirit helper, and another between two spirit helpers, where Jesus is actually also included.

I have already written about the instance where Jesus is included in the sex act: When Gypsy uses sex to calm Don down from a panic attack. Although it’s not specifically stated that they include Jesus in their sex or speak with him while having sex, much of the description mimics the idea of spiritual sex. Using the same passage I quoted earlier, I will now expand on the spiritual sex aspects of that paragraph.

At last he tenderly placed his lips on hers and pulled her closer and closer into him, and they met and melted and molded into one in the utmost of love – a love neither of them had ever known, for it was more than their love. It was the love of Jesus, the love of the God of the whole universe. It was their destiny, it was right, and it was meant to be. No one could ever tell those two again that love was wrong, that sex was evil, for they had touched the very heart of God firsthand that first night in the bed of passion together. (122-123)

This is Gypsy and Don “making love” and this love is blessed by God. What stands out as a sign of Loving Jesus is the statement “more than their love” and the following description that it is God’s love, Jesus’ love, and the whole universe’s love. (Why the universe cares about these two banging we may never know.) Since their lovemaking contains the love of both Jesus and God, this is a strong indicator of Spiritual Sex. Furthermore, the last sentence is another sign, since they “touched the very heart of God firsthand”, which even describes a physical aspect to this spiritual connection. A more ideal depiction of Spiritual Sex would have the characters directly calling out to Jesus and telling him sexy statements. This does not happen in this scene, perhaps because the characters are not yet a part of TFI and don’t really know what they’re doing. They automatically include Jesus in their sex, but it’s not deliberate.

• This entire idea is very key when you consider the difference between sex with TFI women and Systemite women. The act of including God and Jesus in the sexual experience makes the sex act literally a godly act. This act can be performed by TFI women, and theoretically other Christian women, but System women would not be able to do this.

The other two scenes are not specifically Spiritual Sex with Jesus or God, but they are definitely sexual acts with spirit helpers. In the first example, there are the surprising sexual acts between Will and Gypsy. Will is dead at this point, so he is a spirit helper, and he has been enlisted to help stop Marduke. Meanwhile, Gypsy is preparing for the Endtime with Don and her home. Will’s goal is to warn their home of Marduke’s terrible plans. They’re supposed to warn them as soon as possible, but when Will sees Gypsy, he asks his mentor if he can deliver her the warning in a dream again. Wally mentions the time pressure, but when Will explains that he wants to practice solidification first before he visits Gypsy, Wally agrees to move the meeting and add a solidification lesson. The next morning, we find out what happened that night between Will and Gypsy:

[Gypsy:] “Will came to me. He lay right down beside me. He was as real as you, Honey [Don], lying there.” […]

[Gypsy:] “Oh, yeah, he said the funniest thing, he said he had just learned to solidify and he wanted to be close to me and let me know how sorry he was for everything he had done. It seemed like he needed to know that I had forgiven him, so we … we … well, we … touched, nothing fancy, just … touched, kind of … you know … all over.” (289-290)

Gypsy tells Don and her two children, Marina and Simeon, what happened once she wakes up in bed the next morning. While what they did is not explicit, based on Will’s plans from previous pages as well as Don’s reaction, it’s clear that this “touching all over” was of a sexual nature. Again, as Will is a spirit helper right now, this constitutes sexual acts between a spirit and a human.

• I feel it should be noted that Will learned solidification not to help move things around or stop bullets or help the TFI home members out. No, he learned solidification purely so he could engage in sexual acts with Gypsy. This just further demonstrates the incredible focus on all things sexual that was prevalent in the cult.

Lastly but definitely not least, we have a mix of the two scenarios: Spirit Helpers have sex with each other, and they involve Jesus. This scene takes place in the final chapter of the book, before the prologue. All the Family members are on their way to safety, while all of the countries of the world have just signed the Antichrist’s covenant. The Family members praise, pray about the future, and receive prophecies about the coming Endtime. Meanwhile, the spirit helpers who have been aiding the novel’s family members celebrate their victory in heaven. Will and the only female spirit helper mentioned in the novel, Lucretia, celebrate with sex.

“And it only gets better,” Lucretia said as she slipped her hand into Will’s. She had touched Will before, but this time the sexiest thoughts began to race through his mind. He turned in surprise to look into Lucretia’s expectant eyes. He had seen some “come hither” looks in his time, but this … this … was the “come hither” of all “come hithers.”

“I’ll be seeing you, Will,” Wally said with a wink, as he sped away into space.

“Yeah,” Will half-gasped-half-whispered, unable to pull his eyes away from the gaze that was caressing, undressing and arousing him. He blinked and suddenly found himself in a bedroom full of tapestries of exquisite hue and intoxicating perfume.

Lucretia loosed the few clothes she had on as the lights dimmed, and whispered to Will, “Jesus wants you to know how much He loves you, and how thankful He is that you gave your life to Him. He asked me to tell you that later, He will thank you personally for the wonderful job you did in helping His children. But right now, let’s thank Him together for the wonderful love which He’s given us and the Heavenly life that we have, thanks to Him and His love. Let’s celebrate this wonderful victory, Will. We can do whatever you want, and for as long as you want.”

“Oh, I want, I want,” he whispered intensely as his hands roamed her lovely body and his lips touched hers. (349)

This longer excerpt demonstrates a variety of aspects of spiritual sex that appear repeatedly in TFI novels. Firstly, the second sentence mentions how after Lucretia touches Will, “the sexiest thoughts began to race through his mind”. Lucretia is able to induce sexual thoughts in Will, in this case through touch, but other TFI novels show this would also be possible through a mental connection. As a second point, it later describes how Lucretia has a “gaze that was caressing, undressing and arousing him.” This is not a metaphor, it is literal. It’s described in more detail in other novels, but because they are spirit helpers, these two are able to use their minds to do many actions, including physical or sexual ones. Lucretia is literally able to caress him with her gaze and mind. Thirdly, Lucretia’s entire speech about thanking Jesus and celebrating their victory is the closest this novel comes to really showing spiritual sex. These two will presumably thank Jesus while they perform sexual acts and use their sexual experience not just as a celebration, but as praise time or generally Loving Jesus time. It is easy to imagine that they would sprinkle in some of the afore-mentioned quotes from Cool Tips for Hot Sex to include Jesus in their love-making.

• Praise Time was what TFI called time spent praising Jesus for all manner of things.

A third important note here is the focus on Will over Lucretia. She says, “We can do whatever you want, and for as long as you want.” [emphasis added]. Will replies, “Oh, I want, I want,” [emphasis added]. Although Lucretia is the instigator of the sexual acts, it is not about her as much as it is about Will. This is a similar pattern that many of the women exhibit. Gypsy, although she likes sex and gets excited about it, tends to be the object of the sex act and uses sex to heal or help others, making it less about herself. It is very similar with Sherry, who’s own words are focused on Don’s pleasure. Don’s words about Sherry at least mention, “she loved my body and my lovemaking”, which implies some focus on Sherry, although it’s debatable whether we should take his word for it.

In this section, I analysed the different ways in which men and women are described in the novel: Men have personalities, and women are defined by their bodies. To expand the analysis of the novel’s women, I then compared portrayals of TFI women to System women. Here I noted that System women’s sexuality is described as lust of the flesh, temptation and not too satisfying, while sexual experiences with TFI women are godly, loving, and very pleasurable.

This godly and pure sexual characteristic of TFI women explains some aspects of Flirty Fishing, so I then examined traits of Flirty Fishing and sex saving souls that take place in the novel. For that I described how Gypsy and Judy’s main character functions in the novel are to use their bodies to bring non-saved people closer to Jesus, and thus save non-Christians with their sexuality. Following that, I discussed the ideals surrounding age and sexuality in TFI – while the novel showed no significant difference in sexualisation for older women compared to younger women, a clear preference for younger women was present. Finally, I closed this section with an analysis of sex that includes Jesus, God or spirit helpers in the novel. This analysis helped explain and exemplify the TFI beliefs of Spiritual Sex and Loving Jesus.

Amsterdam, Peter. (1998) Goals for 1998. ML #3160.

https://pubs.xfamily.org/text.php?t=3160

Cool Tips for Hot Sex!. http://www.exfamily.org/pubs/ml/b2/b_cooltp_sc.shtml

Steinbeck, John, As told by. (1999) Warriors: At the Edge of Time. Thailand: Heaven’s Library.

Steiner, Kaylena. (2020) Warriors: At the Edge of Time Summary.

Zerby, Karen. (1998) Living the Lord’s Law of Love! — Part 1. ML #3201

https://pubs.xfamily.org/text.php?t=3201

Zerby, Karen. (1998) Living the Lord’s Law of Love! — Part 9. ML #3209

Zerby, Karen. (1999) Living the Lord’s Law of Love! — Part 12. Ml #3212

https://pubs.xfamily.org/text.php?t=3212