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Ashland, Oregon HOME Valley & State Sports Nation & World Opinion/Editorial Classifieds Business Columnists Local Issues Obituaries Weather Archive Revels Etcetera Backpage Hot Topics Most Viewed Forum Photo Galleries Video Readers Polls O-Zone Online Games Movie Preview Special Sections Real Estate Guide Menu Guide Shakespeare Subscribe Contact Us Rate Card Place an Ad May 10, 2006 Traveling tribe takes a day off in Ashland Religious group enjoys afternoon in Lithia Park By Alan Panebaker Ashland Daily Tidings One of the highly colorful buses of the Twelve Tribes is parked by Lithia Park on Tuesday. The group passed through town during its six-week trek across country. Alan Panebaker | Daily Tidings With a kind smile and a graying beard, Eugene Sage (Beniah), stepped out of the 1949 maroon and yellow van he has been calling a home the past few weeks. Sage is one of the original members of the Twelve Tribes spiritual community that is traveling with a group from townships across the country who all share the same belief system. “For me it started 28 years ago,” Sage said. “There was just a longing in my soul to get to know the creator.” Originally a dairy farmer in Vermont, Sage was one of the first people to join the community of religious people who live in townships inside cities and towns across the United States and in England and Australia. Now, he is traveling with a selected few who are not so much looking for new members as trying to get to know people, they said. Even in Lithia Park, Sage and the 51 other traveling members of the Twelve Tribes spiritual community create a scene that causes people to stop and ask what is going on. The group played music, made sandwiches and lounged on the grass Tuesday afternoon as they made a quick stop on their travels across the United States. While 52 casually dressed out-of-towners may not have sparked anyone’s interest, four renovated, painted antique buses may have done the trick. The immaculately furnished insides of the buses, that read “We know the way” and “We’ll bring you home” on the back are the rolling homes to the community for the roughly six weeks they will spend traveling. Some, like a young woman named Shelamah, were born into the community and have never left. Others, like a man named Daveq from British Columbia, were turned onto it through family members. Daveq’s brother found out about the community on a trip to a folk music festival in Manitoba. Daveq said he hitched a ride out to a community in Winnipeg and said, “I was floored by what I saw.” The members of the Twelve Tribes say they are simply living the way many people have always talked about sipping coffee and smoking cigarettes at coffee shops all over the world. The Twelve Tribes, also called the Commonwealth of Israel, have all donned themselves Hebrew names and worship Yahshua, the son of God. Their newsletter reads “Join the caravan” on the back. The Merrymakers Caravan, as they call themselves, will probably head north to Eugene tomorrow on their way back to the East Coast. They said they are welcome in the majority of the places they go, and the only problems they encounter are usually from religious people who do not accept their lifestyle. Dayag, a young man from Colorado on the tour, said he doesn’t mind much when people don’t accept him or his friends. He said he is happy where he is and loves the idea of his community being the church of life rather than going to a building to worship once a week. “I just saw people who were loving the way I only talked about,” Dayag said. “They looked happy.” Staff writer Alan Panebaker can be reached at 482-3456 x 227 or [email protected]. . Leave a Comment: --> Copyright © 2006 Ashland Daily Tidings and Ottaway Newspapers. All Rights Reserved.