The Last State

"The Last State" (ML 2306, GN 278, from ML Book Vol. 17), published as an internal document for all Family International members in 1987, is a transcript of recorded conversations constituting a verbatim exchange between Merry Berg at age 14 and her grandfather David Berg (referred to as "Dad"). "MB" is Merry Berg.

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29 (MB comes in and Dad greets her with a loving kiss and embrace:) "Praise the Lord, Honey, How are you? Bless and help her, Lord, as we talk to her about her problems, in Jesus' name. TYL" (Then, in a very loud voice:) "Hallelujah! Hallelujah! Hallelujah!" (Dad breaks into strong tongues for one full minute as he grabs MB with both hands and violently shakes her with every phrase that he shouts it!).

30 Get out of here, Devil! Get out of her in Jesus' name! Get out of here! In the name of Jesus, get out of her! Hallelujah! In Jesus' name! I rebuke you, Satan! Look at me! Get out of there! (Slaps her face) Get out of there!...

31 Do you hear me? (slaps) (MB: Yes sir!) Do you hear me? (MB: Yes sir!) Do you hear me? (MB: Yes sir!) Do you hear me? (MB: Yes sir!) Do you understand what I am talking about? (MB: Yes sir) That's what you're going to get if this thing comes back again! (Dad pushes MB into her chair.)

32 I have heard too much of this thing! (Dad is gasping for breath with each phrase.)

33 Do you know what they do with people in insane asylums that have devils and demons? Of course they don't call it that...

35 God is angry! He is angry with you! I mean he is really angry! The power of God's spirit curse that devil and curse you for allowing him in...

36 I've never put up with anything like this ever from the very first beginning of this Family, from my own first children, I have beaten them with the rod, I have beaten them until they cry for mercy...

37 From now on I'm going to knock the devil out of you if I have to...

38 How can you my own granddaughter suppose to be one of my saved children, how could you invite Satan in and put curses on others, send little devils to other people? I don't ever want to hear about that again! (Slaps MB's face) Is that clear? (MB: Yes sir!)...

39 Tonight you're going to go without your supper and you're going to fast and pray and pray with somebody every hour of the day and night until you get delivered and you don't let those god damn dirty slimy evil little things back into your mind! Is that clear? (Face to face with MB) (MB: Yes sir!) Or do I have to come over there and beat the devil out of you? huh! (MB: No)...

42 From now on you're going to suffer corporal punishment! ...

47 Your grandmother was insane, did you know that? I have just been giving them a long history of your background so they could have a little more sympathy and mercy on you and understand you came from a very seriously bad background. (Clears throat and spits.) Same to you, devil! Spit in his face! Do you want me to spit in your face? If you manifest any more of these signs of devilry, I'm not only going to spit in your face, I'm going to hit you in your face!

48 Has anybody ever punished you like that before? (MB: Yes) Who? (MB: "Uncle Peter".) (Peter Amsterdam: I spanked her once real hard.) Well, she undoubtedly needed it! (Maria: It wasn't anything like what you just gave her though.) When was this? (Peter: When we had prayer for her a while back.)

49 I have a rod here, will you please bring it to me.. You see this? Pass it to her, let her feel it. I want you to feel this, how heavy it is. (Face to face with MB again.) That is a rod!

50 I am going to take this rod to you and I am going to beat you with it the next time any of this stuff comes up.

52 Do you want me to help you know what you're going to get? Come here, I'll let you feel it just one time. Bend over. (Spanks her!) Did you feel that? Well next time your buttocks are going to be bare and you're going to really feel it!

53 You're dangerous you're going to go stark raving mad and do something terrible if you keep playing around with those devils.

55 Your mother Shula's insane... Your father Aaron was insane! If it hadn't been for the Lord, he would have jumped off the cliff a long time before that...

58 Do you want to be sane? (MB: Yes!)

64 If you can't resist (the devil) then get rid of him yourself, wake up somebody that's with you and tell them to pray with you. And if they have to use a rod to beat him out of you, fine, you've got my permission. (Sara: Yes sir I'll do it!) If you've got to slap her to wake her up and get her out of that kind of spirit, slap her! Slap her good! Knock her around! Let her have it! ...

74 Now get out, you damn devil, and leave her alone, or I'm going to whack the daylights out of her! (She cries.) Thank God that's the first time I think I've seen tears! Are you sorry? (MB: Yes sir!) But if you're not sorry, I'm going to make you sorry!...

81 You think you're going to make it up there (in the system) somehow? The only way you could make it is to be a whore, that's all! You wouldn't even be an FFer, you wouldn't even be doing it for God, you'd just be doing it for a living. You'd probably end up on drugs - a drug demon possessed, alcoholic, diseased whore and soon dead! Now is that what you want? (MB: No sir!)...

88 I don't know whether these here have ever seen me this angry before, and I'm sure you've never seen me this angry before, but there are some others who have! There are some others I have knocked around and slapped down for being so full of the devil and playing around with Satan and toying with demons! I kicked some of them out of The Family...

90 You're dirty, you're filthy, you stink! Your self righteousness pride stinks worst of all, like stinking dirty menstruous rags! ... And we're not going to stand the stench of it any more, is that clear?

93 We have spent too many hours putting up with this problem, too many days, too many weeks, too many months.

106 As far as I'm concerned your father Aaron died failing God. ... Do you want to die like that knowing you failed God and you disobeyed and hurt your family, your grandfather your father your foster father all of us? (MB: No sir!).

113 I was practically screaming in tongues, I think I'm hoarse from it now.

114 The Lord took hold of her head" (referring to the events set out in para. 29) "and yanked it around and back and forth and side ways to side ways by my hands until I was afraid I was going to yank her head off or break her neck! God was so angry... And then I hauled off and slapped her I don't know how many times tonight, hard, right? (MB: Yes sir!) And hit you....

145 If you go back into that foolishness again, these folks have got my permission to slap you around and knock you around, if they have to knock you out to get rid of that! Because you have got to want to get rid of it, and if it takes a good beating up to make you want to get rid of it, then we're going to beat you up!...

170 My God, MB, how could you think you could get way with it? How could you not fear God? How did you think you could get away from the wrath of God? I represent God to you... He nearly yanked your head off here! That was the Lord! I didn't plan that, I had no idea. I'm almost horrified to think back at what happened, but it was God! You heard the voice of the Lord bawling you and those dirty little demons out and threatening to take your head off if you didn't stop it!

183 The last resort we now have is to beat you with the rod until it really hurts and you don't want it any more! Right? (MB: Yes sir!) But if that doesn't work then what can we do? We can't kill you, that's God's business. We'll have to get rid of you. Now that's the facts.

185 Nobody want's to sleep with you, they're actually afraid of you because you've been under the control of the Devil...

186 So we can't trust you any more not even after all this tonight...

188 Now that's the picture I got while we were praying, that they're going to restrain you. We're going to punish you! You're not going to get away with this. God has put us here as parents to punish you when you do evil and you've been doing the vilest kind of evil, the worst kind of sin.

189 I suggest you tie her to the bed.

190 Make sure she goes to the toilet the very last thing. I don't care if you wet the bed, dear, your hands are going to be tied to the sides of that bed at night when the others are trying to sleep. Are you willing to submit to that? (MB: Yes!) If you have cotton or cloth ropes, that's the best thing.

191 Think of it, you've gotten to the state where nobody can trust you and they're afraid you might do them or yourself harm! You the great MB who was a great singer and so vaunted in her pride, in her talent, her singing and world famous has gotten so full of the Devil we have to tie her down at night and threaten to beat her up in the daytime if she doesn't behave.

194 If beating doesn't get the hell out of you, you're going to get the hell out of here: I want you to memorise that. (MB: If beating you doesn't get the hell out of you, you're going to get the hell out of here!)

196 So for a peaceful night's rest I suggest you tie her hands to the bed... Don't tie it so tight she can't move, just tight enough that she can't reach herself and she can't squirm out of it.

197 This is the first time we've ever done that that I know of, but that's the picture God gave me, and if I follow God's pictures, ..., it never fails.

198 So your first punishment was what God gave you tonight, and what I gave you, a good slapping around to knock that hell out of you, and just gave you one lick and felt like giving you more with this stick! And if we have any more trouble, you're going to get more of it, from anyone of these here that are authorised to do it.

199 She's not to be alone at any time from now on. Someone is to be with her at all times who is big and strong and spiritual enough that you just absolutely knock it out of her.

206 My God help her to realise how awful and how horrible this is, that she can never ever again claim any kind of righteousness of herself. She has been one of the most wicked persons we have ever had in this Family, one of the most evil one of the most dangerous so that we have to tie her up at night to make sure she doesn't do anybody any damage. We have to divorce her from our quarters, from our arms, from our children, and put her in virtual incarceration at least at night. She has to have a guard with her all day long to make sure that she behaves until we are sure she is cured.

215 If you don't get rid of those demons ...... you may have to get whipped in bed caned in bed.

243 I love you sweetheart. Goodnight.

References to The Last State in court documents

The following is from the Judgment of Lord Justice Ward, delivered as the result of a child-custody case involving The Family in the UK, 1995.

MEDICAL NEGLECT
[...]
Sara [Sara Kelley] wrote in "The Last State" letters:-

"How unbelievably good MB was in her overall behaviour, attitudes and even in spirit. There is no more extreme example we could use as an almost, nearly "perfect" child - the "best" we'd ever seen! We hardly could find any fault with her at all as MB was outwardly so very sweet, well behaved, submissive, yielded, very wise, very spiritual, mature and responsible and cooperative, just a real angel. Usually, when having to use such severe disciplinary measures as mentioned in the above letter, you're dealing with some incorrigible, defiant and rebellious teen terror or criminal, but this is not so in MB's case. She was always known and considered to be a very sweet and good girl."

Apparently her problem was being "seemingly too good". Sara recounted that it was not until they began to require a written daily report [see Open Heart Report] from the teens that they noted in MB's "Lesson and Trials" section that she repeatedly wrote "I need more love so I won't criticise others," or "I'm praying for more respect for my leadership."

Who could blame the girl for lacking respect for a man so revered by others when she knew from her personal knowledge that he was foul mouthed, drank too much and sexually abused her. For this she was brutally punished. Her crime was to have yielded to Satan. That led to a time of two months when she had five major exorcisms performed over her. She was subjected to total immersion in the Word, full-time, with top leadership "reading aloud along with her to keep her mind and mouth and eyes and ears occupied and for a constant infilling of the Holy Spirit." They prayed over her, even fifty times a day. She was 14 years old! She told me in her evidence that nearly every word uttered by Berg was tape recorded. I thought at the time that it seemed rather fanciful. "The Last State" letter GN278 written in August 1987, seems to be a transcript of recorded conversations and it constitutes a verbatim account of one of the exchanges between this vulnerable teenage girl and her grandfather. I am not surprised that the letter describes it as "the heaviest "strong meat" ever to be (published) and shared with our entire Family".

Multimedia

• Video: Steven Kelly talks about the exorcism of Merry Berg (2.9MB) — From "The Love Prophet" documentary