Former Members Reveal Hidden Truths Behind Traditional Christian Community

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Content warning: This article contains references to child sexual abuse.

Watch Dateline’s The Cult of Tradwives: Part One and Part Two on SBS On Demand now.

The Cult Of Tradwives: Part 2

I arrived in Montana in early December, in search of tradwives: social media speak for ‘traditional wives’. Along the highway, a rustic, handcarved sign welcomes passersby to Greycliff Mill. This is my exit.

The tradwife movement is sweeping the United States, with women rejecting modern careers for traditionally feminine roles. On this trip, I met some of the women who say turning back the clock to simpler times has given them purpose. They believe that homemaking, homeschooling and homesteading can help make America wholesome again.

This was supposed to be the final stretch of my reporting on the subject. But in reality, it was the beginning of a more complicated path, one I never expected to venture down.

Nearly a year on, I have spent hundreds of hours investigating a controversial religious group called Homestead Heritage, with 14 affiliated communities worldwide.

The first one I encountered was Greycliff Mill.

Welcome to Greycliff Mill

Greycliff Mill, named for the flour mill operating at the heart of the community, has been cradled in the shadow of the Crazy Mountains since 2014. Around 50 families are embracing the ‘trad life’ up here communally — living, working and worshipping together on the land.

A wooden building with a sign labelled 'Greycliff Mill' sits on a green field with a river running through it. Behind the building are high rocky cliff faces.

Greycliff Mill, Montana, is home to around 50 ‘trad’ families. Credit: SBS Dateline

Between the barns and newly built homes strewn across the ranch, peach trees stand naked of their fruit.

“I wish you could see it in the summer,” Matthew Brandstadt, an elder in the community, told me as we walked through the empty orchard.

As a senior leader, Brandstadt shared more about Greycliff’s businesses and tourist operations, but told me the bedrock of the community is faith and family.

“We are about just a great atmosphere for kids,” Matthew said.

“We love some of the traditional farming and schooling and home birthing practices.”

After leaving Montana, I learned that Greycliff is not a standalone community, independent and experimental. It is an affiliate community of the controversial religious group Homestead Heritage.

Homestead Heritage: From wilderness to Waco

Homestead Heritage has gone by many names over the years, many inspired by traditional living and Christian fellowship. But its genesis was in the then deprived and crime-ridden Hell’s Kitchen neighbourhood of New York City in 1973.

Former Pentecostal minister Blair Adams had founded a small church in an old disco, seeking to preach to the ‘lost’. Many of them, he said, were trying to numb the pain in their lives through alcohol and drugs.

An old image of a man preaching behind a lectern and microphone. Behind him is a six-pointed star with text in it reading: "I will work a work in your days which ye will not believe though it be told you."

The group which would become Homestead Heritage was founded in Hell’s Kitchen, New York by former Pentacostal minister Blair Adams. Credit: YouTube / Homestead Heritage

But the streets of New York City didn’t offer Adams enough in the way of actual wilderness. Anti-authoritarian Adams yearned for a place to teach and preach without government interference.

By 1979, he had moved 3,000km across the country to a plot of land in Colorado they called Rehoboth Ranch, a biblical reference to a God-given place to thrive without conflict.

Here, they deepened their focus on homeschooling to “deindustrialise” education, and developed basic farming skills after struggling early on.

A brown sign with yellow writing Rehoboth Ranch. In the background is a bare mountain range and in the foreground below, grassland.

Homestead Heritage settled in Colorado, where they established Rehoboth Ranch. Credit: YouTube / Homestead Heritage

They soon welcomed outsiders to observe their handiwork and hospitality. Hosting their first children’s fair in 1988, they had many crafts on show, from weaving to woodworking.

But the peaceful vision of Rehoboth would soon be whittled away due to incidents of animal abuse and Child Protective Service investigations.

One letter to local newspaper, the Delta County Independent, read, “[The ranch] feeds the prideful, power-hungry lives of its head elders who use the Bible as a weapon against its unwary church members to mold and bend them to the elders’ will.”.

Founder Adams called it “religious bigotry” and likened it to the witch hunts of Salem in the late 1600s.

By the early 1990s, all of Adams’ followers had picked up sticks again — this time 1,500km south to his home state of Texas, where he had been slowly cultivating new congregations. To formalise their community, they bought some land on the banks of the Brazos de Dios (Arms of God in Spanish), on the outskirts of Waco, Texas.

A dark history of abuse

The year 2005 was pivotal for Homestead Heritage in Waco — the year of its first reported child sexual abuse case. Church member Bill Delong was convicted of sexually assaulting his six-year-old daughter in Waco.

Court records show that Delong confided in a Homestead Heritage minister named George Klingensmith. Klingensmith didn’t report what he was told about the abuse and instead allowed Delong to remain in the group for at least a year before encouraging him to turn himself in.

By 2013, a further seven members of Homestead Heritage had been convicted of child sexual abuse, many involving incest.

Leaders say these convictions marked the end of an era, but former members say child sexual abuse at Homestead Heritage remains rife and underreported.

A few months after my first trip to Montana, I returned to the US — this time to the beating heart of Homestead Heritage: Waco, Texas, where wide-brimmed cowboy hats and roadside gun ranges abound.

Waco is perhaps best known for the 51 day standoff between law enforcement officials and David Koresh’s Branch Davidians cult. Credit: SBS Dateline

Waco is a place that promotes religious freedom, but one that also bears its scars. And no one knows them better than McLennan County sheriff, Parnell McNamara.

A third-generation lawman and former US marshal, McNamara’s tagline is “riding herd on the lawless”. His office is adorned with heirlooms of a life in the law and keepsakes of cowboys — by which I mean, he had a lot of guns.

McNamara took me for a ride-along, past street flags heralding “A City To Believe In”.

I rode shotgun with his shotgun while he recounted the infamous 51-day Waco siege that ended with cult leader David Koresh burning himself and many of his followers alive, leaving 75 Branch Davidians and four ATF officers from the US Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms dead.

He warned me of “false prophets” as I pondered the pull of a wary place like Waco.

Two people, both wearing cowboy hats, are in a car. One is a young woman with brown hair. She is in the passenger seat. To her right is an older man with a mustache. He is driving, and has one hand on a large shotgun.

Credit: SBS Dateline

As we approached the grounds of Homestead Heritage, I asked the sheriff about his impressions of this group.

“They’re frickin’ weird,” he said.

“From what everybody says that has been out there, been part of it, and has left … They all describe it as a cult.”

It was time for me to see for myself.

Exclusive: Inside Homestead Heritage

The Waco property is an idyllic scene; a millwheel gently spins between the leathershop and craft barn. Women in sweeping dresses hasten into the market, their schools of children in tow.

Following Blair Adams’ death in 2021, the 1,200-strong group is now led by an all-male committee, better known as the Council of Elders.

One of those men is Dan Lancaster. He and his wife Amanda, a daughter of Blair Adams and the group’s head midwife, agreed to meet with me.

In a three-hour interview, the Lancasters spoke freely and frankly with me about their lives as leaders in the community. They shared with me the origin story, the journey from New York to Colorado and early media mix-ups with the Branch Davidians in Waco, who believed the end of the world was imminent.

They also recounted some of their own dark days, including the fallout from the group’s first convicted sex offender, Bill Delong.

“We had never encountered anything like that before,” Dan tells me before assuring me that child sexual abuse and issues with reporting are matters of the past.

But it seems not even stories from “that time”, as Dan described it to me, have been told in their entirety.

New allegations come to light

Danny Schwennesen grew up in Homestead Heritage. His first phone call to me was from prison.

He’s currently in prison on charges of indecent contact with a minor that occurred after he left the group, but Danny didn’t call to speak with me about his crime.

He rang to talk about one of the group’s most notorious sex offenders, Joseph Ratliff, who was convicted in 2009 for the repeated sexual assault of an eight-year-old boy.

Danny says that boy wasn’t Ratliff’s only victim.

Danny says Joseph Ratliff was a close friend of the family, who spent a lot of time with him and his younger brothers, hunting late into the night.

“You would kind of consider it ‘grooming’ your victim,” Danny says.

By the time he was 11, he says Ratliff began sexually assaulting him.

A picture of a young man with blonde hair. He is looking to his left and has a neutral facial expression.

Joseph Ratliff was sentenced to 99 years for the sexual abuse of an 8-year-old boy. Credit: Supplied

At the time, Ratliff had access to many children, often tasked with supervising young boys at craft fairs or on a landscaping crew.

While Danny never told anyone about his claims, four other alleged victims told Dateline they spoke directly to church ministers about their abuse, but their claims were not reported to authorities and have not since been tested in court.

After serving the minimum time, Joseph Ratliff is soon to be released on parole and has applied to return to Waco.

Danny worries for his nieces and nephews who remain in the group.

“You cannot have adults abusing children,” Danny says. “It has to stop.”

Current members and leaders at Homestead Heritage consider it a “garden”, a sovereign sanctuary free from the corrupted values of the outside world. But former members say that the group’s insular values allow predators to prey in the garden they once called home.

Homestead Heritage says it abides by its policy, Protecting Children from Abuse, but did not provide Dateline with a copy. The group says they have reported any and all allegations of child sexual abuse they have been made aware of.

If you or someone you know is impacted by sexual assault, call 1800RESPECT on 1800 737 732, text 0458 737 732, or visit 1800RESPECT.org.au. In an emergency, call 000.

Readers seeking support can ring Lifeline crisis support on 13 11 14 or text 0477 13 11 14, Suicide Call Back Service on 1300 659 467 and Kids Helpline on 1800 55 1800 (for young people aged 5 to 25). More information is available at beyondblue.org.au and lifeline.org.au.

Anyone seeking information or support relating to sexual abuse can contact Bravehearts on 1800 272 831 or Blue Knot on 1300 657 380.