AMY CARLSON WAS THE SELF-PROFESSED LEADER OF SPIRITUAL GROUP LOVE HAS WON
When the mummified body of awoman was found in ahouse in April 2021, it sent ripples of shock through the small community of Moffat in Colorado. Wrapped in asleeping bag with Christmas lights around her, the eyeless remains were identified as belonging to Amy Carlson, who had led acult-like group called Love Has Won for over 15 years.Better known to her followers as “Mother God”, Carlson, 45, was aself-appointed spiritual guru who claimed to be the physical embodiment of the mother of all creation, among other bizarre claims. But how had she met such agrisly end?
CULT ORIGINS
Born in 1975, Carlson was seven when her parents divorced. She and her sister Tara lived with their dad and his new wife until allegations of abuse against their stepmother surfaced. The siblings then moved in with their mum and stepdad. After high school, Carlson began working for McDonald’s, where she rose to become manager of her local branch in Dallas. “Amy had dreams. She wanted to go somewhere, be somebody. She was aleader,” revealed mum Linda in the HBO documentary Love Has Won: The Cult Of Mother God. “She was proud of how fast she moved up. She had that gift. She wanted to move up the ladder and make more money –but then something changed.”
Carlson, who had struggles with food in her teens, got pregnant with her son Cole when she was 19, before having two more children with different fathers. These relationships were described as volatile, with men who were abusive and controlling. Her unhappiness led to her seeking spiritual solace in new age philosophies. “She was on the computer all the time. She was starting to get spiritual, like she was in another world,” Linda recalled. Tara added, “I thought she was searching for something… afriend or an out. And Istarted noticing the strange talk –she started talking about angels, earth, heaven and energies.”
Amy walked out on her family in 2007, after meeting ahippy named Amerith WhiteEagle in an online forum. He convinced Amy that she –like him –had divine powers. The couple married and began calling themselves Mother and Father God. As leaders of the group Galactic Federation of Light, they started posting videos about new age spirituality and conspiracy theories on YouTube in 2009. Amy’s profile rose and, in 2012, she met Miguel Lamboy, who became her disciple after believing she had cured his cancer. He became known as Archangel Michael, her right-hand man, and was put in charge of the group’s finances and logistics. When Amerith left Amy around 2014, she struck out on her own and rebranded the Galactic Federation of Light into the group Love Has Won. By now, Amy –who was said to be always under the influence of drink and drugs
