International Journal of Cultic Studies ■ Vol. 3, 2012 53
By the mid-1970s, Thomas was apparently
pressuring women to give him “spiritual
nourishment,” which (in the language of the
group) meant sex. Moreover, he was treating
some members “like slaves,” working
congregants up to 18 hours every day in church-
owned businesses, and subjecting men and
women to severe beatings (sometimes
administered by an internal group of women
known as a “Sisterhood” [Hoffman, 1983
Meyer, 1985 Pasternack &Torok, 1983]).
During the 1985 trial, one woman testified that
the minister’s spouse, Bertha, also sexually
assaulted her (Meyer, 1985 Philadelphia Daily
News, 1985). For his role in the crimes,
Reverend Thomas received a 20-year prison
sentence, and his wife received a year
probationary term for lewdness (Siegel, 1986).
Once he was in prison, however, the
documented instances of Thomas’s sexual abuse
of teenaged girls began as he used the prison
telephone to orchestrate, and listen to, sexual
encounters involving minors.
Even after Thomas was behind bars, his unique,
but secret program of sex education remained in
place, carried on by some of his followers.
Young women who left the congregation said
they were told that learning from other church
women how to “express themselves” sexually
would help remove sexual anxieties and prepare
them to be “more beautiful women” and better
bedmates for their spouses.
All said they were instructed to keep
these special educational sessions secret.
In most instances, they said, the sessions
ended with a report by telephone to the
bishop [Thomas], detailing the student’s
sexual response. In other instances, the
bishop listened to the proceedings
himself, with the telephone off the hook
in the room where the encounters took
place. (Haferd &Outlaw, 1993, p. 9)
In one event, Thomas orchestrated a lesbian
encounter involving a tenth grader (which he
directed via the telephone [Haferd &Outlaw,
1993, pp. 8–9]) and another young woman
reported that when she was about thirteen a
woman in the church approached her with an
aggressive offer to teach her “‘how to be a
lady’” (in Haferd &Outlaw, 1993, p. 9). The
girl knew from others that the teachings were
sexual in nature and involved touching, so she
refused the offer, only to have the same woman
“teach” and assault her the next year (Haferd &
Outlaw, 1993, p. 9). In yet another instance,
Thomas directed a sexual encounter between
sisters, one of whom was in the eleventh grade
(Haferd &Outlaw, 1993, pp. 9–10). When a
church youth worker visited Thomas in prison,
he gave her instructions about “preparing some
of the [organization’s] youngest girls—under
age 11—for sexual initiation” (Haferd &
Outlaw, 1993, p. 14). (Thomas and the visiting
women also figured out a way that they could
give him “spiritual nourishment” while with him
“in a large prison reception room with dozens of
other prisoners’ families and guards standing
around.” Wearing no underwear or bras, the
women “‘would sit in a certain way across from
each other, looking out for the moving
cameras,’” as Thomas fondled one of them
[Tikiba Kwalume, in Haferd &Outlaw, 1993, p.
14]).
The Wilbert Thomas case may be among the
more dramatic instances of adult female
followers facilitating a male preacher’s sexual
deviances toward young girls. (The general
scenario, however, of older women [even
mothers] facilitating sexual abuse against
younger women is well-known in the child
sexual abuse literature [see Matthews, 1993, pp.
70–71].) Examples of these “male coerced
offenders” (Matthews, 1993, p. 71) suggest the
tremendous power that patriarchal religion holds
over some people, and they indicate how
abusive systems of religious patriarchy can
socialize women to become active participants.
In the case of Thomas’s followers who
facilitated sexual encounters for him, for years
they “were isolated from the outside world and
indoctrinated with the belief that their only hope
of salvation lay in total submission to control”
by the preacher himself (Haferd &Outlaw,
1993, p. 6). Under these circumstances, what is
more remarkable than the fact that many women
facilitated his deviance is that any of his victims
were able to escape his manipulative control and
speak out against it.
By the mid-1970s, Thomas was apparently
pressuring women to give him “spiritual
nourishment,” which (in the language of the
group) meant sex. Moreover, he was treating
some members “like slaves,” working
congregants up to 18 hours every day in church-
owned businesses, and subjecting men and
women to severe beatings (sometimes
administered by an internal group of women
known as a “Sisterhood” [Hoffman, 1983
Meyer, 1985 Pasternack &Torok, 1983]).
During the 1985 trial, one woman testified that
the minister’s spouse, Bertha, also sexually
assaulted her (Meyer, 1985 Philadelphia Daily
News, 1985). For his role in the crimes,
Reverend Thomas received a 20-year prison
sentence, and his wife received a year
probationary term for lewdness (Siegel, 1986).
Once he was in prison, however, the
documented instances of Thomas’s sexual abuse
of teenaged girls began as he used the prison
telephone to orchestrate, and listen to, sexual
encounters involving minors.
Even after Thomas was behind bars, his unique,
but secret program of sex education remained in
place, carried on by some of his followers.
Young women who left the congregation said
they were told that learning from other church
women how to “express themselves” sexually
would help remove sexual anxieties and prepare
them to be “more beautiful women” and better
bedmates for their spouses.
All said they were instructed to keep
these special educational sessions secret.
In most instances, they said, the sessions
ended with a report by telephone to the
bishop [Thomas], detailing the student’s
sexual response. In other instances, the
bishop listened to the proceedings
himself, with the telephone off the hook
in the room where the encounters took
place. (Haferd &Outlaw, 1993, p. 9)
In one event, Thomas orchestrated a lesbian
encounter involving a tenth grader (which he
directed via the telephone [Haferd &Outlaw,
1993, pp. 8–9]) and another young woman
reported that when she was about thirteen a
woman in the church approached her with an
aggressive offer to teach her “‘how to be a
lady’” (in Haferd &Outlaw, 1993, p. 9). The
girl knew from others that the teachings were
sexual in nature and involved touching, so she
refused the offer, only to have the same woman
“teach” and assault her the next year (Haferd &
Outlaw, 1993, p. 9). In yet another instance,
Thomas directed a sexual encounter between
sisters, one of whom was in the eleventh grade
(Haferd &Outlaw, 1993, pp. 9–10). When a
church youth worker visited Thomas in prison,
he gave her instructions about “preparing some
of the [organization’s] youngest girls—under
age 11—for sexual initiation” (Haferd &
Outlaw, 1993, p. 14). (Thomas and the visiting
women also figured out a way that they could
give him “spiritual nourishment” while with him
“in a large prison reception room with dozens of
other prisoners’ families and guards standing
around.” Wearing no underwear or bras, the
women “‘would sit in a certain way across from
each other, looking out for the moving
cameras,’” as Thomas fondled one of them
[Tikiba Kwalume, in Haferd &Outlaw, 1993, p.
14]).
The Wilbert Thomas case may be among the
more dramatic instances of adult female
followers facilitating a male preacher’s sexual
deviances toward young girls. (The general
scenario, however, of older women [even
mothers] facilitating sexual abuse against
younger women is well-known in the child
sexual abuse literature [see Matthews, 1993, pp.
70–71].) Examples of these “male coerced
offenders” (Matthews, 1993, p. 71) suggest the
tremendous power that patriarchal religion holds
over some people, and they indicate how
abusive systems of religious patriarchy can
socialize women to become active participants.
In the case of Thomas’s followers who
facilitated sexual encounters for him, for years
they “were isolated from the outside world and
indoctrinated with the belief that their only hope
of salvation lay in total submission to control”
by the preacher himself (Haferd &Outlaw,
1993, p. 6). Under these circumstances, what is
more remarkable than the fact that many women
facilitated his deviance is that any of his victims
were able to escape his manipulative control and
speak out against it.
