Already, several legal motions have been filed challenging the decisions to place all of the children from the YFZ Ranch in foster care. FLDS Church lawyers have fired off letters to government agencies putting them on notice to preserve evidence for an eventual civil lawsuit over the raid.

The raid began April 3 when child welfare workers and law enforcement responded to the FLDS compound to investigate a phone call by someone claiming to be a 16-year-old "Sarah," who was pregnant and in an abusive marriage to a 49-year-old man. When Texas Child Protective Services workers got on the ranch, they say they saw pregnant teens and other signs of abuse.

That led a judge to order the removal of all of the children from the Eldorado community. Texas authorities are investigating whether the initial phone call that sparked the raid was a hoax, but attorneys for the children have said it does not change anything. It is what they found when they got there that led to the custody action.

Open letter

Meanwhile, an open letter to the governor of Texas and to the judge who ordered all of the children be placed in state custody has been posted on a new FLDS Web site, truthwillprevail.org.

The letter, written by 80-year-old church member Samuel W. Roundy, strongly criticizes the state for "kidnapping" the children and gathering information about their church from apostates. Roundy writes to Judge Barbara Walther that despite her comments saying otherwise, the raid is all about religion.

"I state to you and unequivocally declare that it is nothing but a religious issue. You all seem greatly concerned that we allow one man to have such great power over us, I declare to you that the one man we reverence, worship, and obey is none other than the Lord Jesus Christ Himself," Roundy wrote.

While Christ is not on the Earth, there is one man who represents him, he said. "That man with the authority to represent Jesus Christ is Warren S. Jeffs, and this is the reason he is hated, vilified, and lied about because the world in general has turned their hearts to Satan and rejected the gospel of Jesus Christ."

Roundy emphasized to the governor and judge that the FLDS are a peaceful people, as evidenced by the fact that no weapons except a bow and arrow were found during the raid. Yet, "storm troopers desecrated" the ranch with a tank, he said.