Latter Day Cult Leaders Research Paper

While these leaders create beliefs which are very outrageous for their members to believe, they also have very high expectations for their members to uphold. The leadership demands a lot from the members. Controlling how they think, act, and feel. Members must obtain permission by the leader for every detail of their lives; from who to date, when to change jobs, who to marry, and even whether or not to have children. Members are also expected to gather money from outsiders of the group, while also recruiting new members. Members must leave behind their old friends and family and life for their new brothers and sisters. The cult leader is seen as a prophet or disciple from their absolute highest being. The members are expected to hold unquestionable …show more content…
The notorious prophet of the group, Warren Jeffs, is now serving life in prison. After being on the run from police for months and being on FBI's Most Wanted List, Jeffs was finally caught. He was convicted for orchestrating marriages between underaged girls and adult men. Girls as young as 13 years old were married off to men as old as 30 year olds. He himself molested and raped multiple children, some being from other families in the community and some being his own children. Twenty-four of his fifty wives were under the age of seventeen. Jeffs was also known to make people (mostly teenage boys) leave the convent. He would drop them off in the middle of a desert, forcing them to find a way to make it on their own. It is a little ironic, Jeffs would force these people to figure out a way to survive on their own, while their entire lives has been dictated by Jeffs himself. Although Warren Jeffs is behind bars, he is rumored to still be the leader of the Fundamentalist Mormons group (Biography Editors). As a result of his absence, the FLDS is now teaching the children that Warren Jeffs is the president of the United States (ABC