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Rasa von Werder

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Rasa von Werder
Photo from 1981
Born
Rasa Sofija Jakstas

(1945-07-16) July 16, 1945 (age 79)
Calw, Germany
Other namesKellie Everts
Occupation(s)Bodybuilder, stripper, religious leader, guru, author

Rasa Von Werder (also known as Kellie Everts; born Rasa Sofija Jakstas, July 16, 1945) is a German author, former stripper, female bodybuilder, photographer, evangelist, mystic, contemplative, and founder of a church.

Personal life

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Kellie Everts, née Rasa Sofija Jakstas, was born on July 16, 1945, in Calw, Baden-Württemberg, Germany. Her Lithuanian parents, Stasys and Regina Jakstas, had fled from Lithuania (then part of the Soviet Union) under Stalin. The family ended up in a displaced persons camp, and in 1949, boarded the naval ship USS Heintzelman bound for the US.

Kellie's parents were sponsored to stay in an ethnic community in Newark, New Jersey. Her father, Professor Jakstas, founded a Lithuanian school in a church auditorium, having previously founded the first State Teacher's College in Kaunas, Lithuania.

When her parents separated, she moved with her father to Williamsburg, Brooklyn. A month after finishing high school, she ran away (reportedly with one of Marilyn Monroe's photographers) to Hollywood, CA, where she began a career in show business. She lived in Santa Monica next to the pier, where she married Stanley Everts in 1963 and had a daughter named Kellie. She later lived in the Pacific Palisades, then Beverly Hills, and finally Hollywood. Stanley Everts passed away in 1966.

After ten years of living in California, she returned to Williamsburg, where she spent 17 years. She started a successful business and managed to acquire $200,000 in savings, which she used to buy a house in Binghamton, in Upstate New York, where she has lived ever since.[1][2][3]

She married Richard Allan Von Werder in 2000 after being engaged since 1986, and they remained married until he died in 2002.

Career

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Female bodybuilding and strip dancing

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Everts was effectively the founder of female bodybuilding; before her involvement, it was extremely rare for women to participate in the sport. She began competing in various bodybuilding contests in the NYC area in 1972.[2] Due to her work, which included a 6-page layout in Esquire magazine in July 1975, television appearances on To Tell the Truth, The Mike Douglas Show and The Stanley Siegel Show, and inaugurating female bodybuilding in Playboy magazine in May 1977, serious female fitness and bodybuilding contests began to be held. The first was IFBB Miss Fitness 1979, and the next was IFBB Ms. Olympia 1980. After these first two, many more were held, and hundreds, later thousands, of women began to train and compete. She elaborates further in one of her many books, The Origin & Decline of Female Body Building (2011), and in a 2019 interview with David Robson.[2]

Despite having single-handedly laid the groundwork for female bodybuilding and having trained for the event, she was barred from entering the 1981 Caesar's Palace Boardwalk Regency IFBB in Atlantic City.[4][clarification needed] However, by then, she had accomplished her goal of legitimizing the sport.

Rasa won the titles of Miss Nude Universe in July 1967, by strutting and bouncing around totally nude in front in front of a nude audience, and Miss Americana 2nd place and Best Body in 1972 (on the same stage as Arnold Schwarzenegger), Miss Body Beautiful 2nd place in 1973, Miss Body Beautiful U.S.A. in 1974, and Miss Americana 2nd place & Best Body 1974 (the same stage as Arnold Schwarzenegger again).

She made nine appearances in Playboy. She was the first female bodybuilder to do so, in the "Humping Iron" edition, May 1977 (predating Lisa Lyon's appearance by three years).[5] Later, she appeared in a two-page spread titled "Stripping for God".

Her live dancing career spanned North America from March 1966 to August 1987. She quit to focus on producing dancing and female domination videos. She made enough money to purchase a large private property in Upstate New York.

On February 2, 2007, the World Bodybuilding Guild (WBBG) named her "Progenitor" of Female Bodybuilding and, in August 2007, inducted her into their Hall of Fame.[6]

Ministry

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In September 1973, Everts gave her first religious talk before dancing at the Melody Theater in Times Square. This combination act of stripping and preaching led the press to dub her the "Stripper for God".[7][8][1]

Everts traveled in the United States and Canada, giving over 1,000 sermons in burlesque theaters and nightclubs.[9][10][11][12] "Stripping for God" created public debate about the coexistance of sexuality and spirituality, and conflicted with prevailing social norms and constructs at the time. The assertion of being an ordained minister while openly working in the adult entertainment industry was controversial.

In 1988, she made one trip to the United Kingdom[13][14][15][16][17][18][19][20][21] where she notably appeared on The Morton Downey Jr. Show.[22] As a result of the egregious mistreatment of her on the show by the host Morton Downey Jr., Everts filed a libel lawsuit against both Downey and the television network WWOR-TV.[23]

Everts later changed the emphasis of her mission to the return of matriarchy and the feminine divine. On June 16, 1978, she preached a message about Our Lady of Fátima in front of the White House, intending to bring about the conversion of Russia and, by extension, preventing a potential nuclear World War III. The gist of the message was, "Pray the Rosary for the conversion of Russia, or nations will be annihilated."[24]

After shifting her focus, she founded The University of Mother God Church, which became a distinct religion for women.

Everts has done much unrelated activism, humanitarian, and community work, primarily in Brooklyn, New York.[25]

Author

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On May 24, 2004, Everts, under her present name Rasa Von Werder or Guru Rasa of the Church of MotherGod, started the Woman Thou Art God Website.[26] She has since continued publishing online on her religious beliefs. She has thirty-eight (and counting) books published on female empowerment, her biography, matriarchy spirituality, and various other subjects. Since 2014, Rasa has also had another main website as well, Embodiment of God, that further builds upon the first one.[27]

She has also collaborated with other authors as well in writing books and online articles, most notably including William Bond, who is also featured on that site.[28]

Later years

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In her later years, after 30 years of celibacy for spiritual purposes, beginning at age 63 in 2008 (according to her, God told her to stop suffering, quit celibacy and have fun – thus it was "the Will of God"), Rasa became a "cougar" and photographer of males, mainly in the college town of Binghamton, New York, to further the cause of female empowerment. At Binghamton University, she was popular overall and featured several times on the front page of their student newspaper.[3] She has written about this experience in several books (see Bibliography section).

Rasa has also expanded upon her new matriarchal religion for women, writing the book Woman, Thou Art God: The New Religion for Women in 2019–2020. She is currently working on several other books from 2021–2024. These include further volumes in her autobiographical I Strip For God book series and books containing all the guidelines, directions, doctrine, and suggestions for her Sisterhood and "New Religion for Women" that she founded.[27][29]

Filmography

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Film

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  • She Did It His Way (1968)
  • The Girls on F Street (1967)
  • Dude Ranch (1966–1968)
  • The Swinger (1966)

Television

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  • England documentary on people starting their own YouTube videos, and her dancing (2008)
  • The Morton Downey Jr. Show (1988)[22][30]
  • National: Entertainment Tonight regarding The Morton Downey Jr. Show (1988)
  • People Are Talking (1988, multiple times)[31]
  • The Sally Jessy Rafael Show (1988)[32]
  • Various international documentaries, including 60 Minutes Australia (1988) – and also appeared on shows & documentaries in Italy
  • Geraldo (1987)[33]
  • Phil Donahue (1987)[33]
  • Regis Philbin & Kathie Lee (1986)
  • San Francisco News (1984)[34]
  • Detroit TV (WXYZ Detroit) (1982)[35]
  • Tom Snyder (twice) – 1976 & 1981 – 1976 as ‘Stripper for God', and 1981 as Body Builder with Lisa Lyon, where Rasa spoke & posed in a white bikini
  • To Tell the Truth (twice) – once as impersonating the "World's Yo-Yo Champion" and second, as herself, a minister and body builder doing some bench presses at the end (1978)
  • Chicago: Warren Saunders' Common Ground (1978)
  • Chicago – Ron Hunter Show (1978)
  • AM Chicago (1978)
  • Chicago – Friday Night Live with Jay Levene (1978)
  • AM Washington (twice, 1974 and 1978)
  • Inside Edition (Florida) (1978)
  • The Bill Boggs Show (1976)
  • Real People (5 times total) for all that she did – Stripper for God, Body Builder (1975–1981)[33][36]
  • Mike Douglas (1975)
  • AM New York (many times, including once with Arnold Schwarzenegger) (1974)
  • And various other TV news shows (many coast to coast in the US as well as in Canada) from 1972 to 2017 for her various activities, Stripping for God, Body Building, getting arrested in Ohio and Toronto, and her new church[33]

Other video appearances

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  • Guru Rasa Von Werder: New Religion 4 Women (channel formerly titled "Kellie Everts 48-28-38 Conducts Night Train"), various videos on YouTube (2018–2024)[37]
  • Army of Mother God, by Female Supremacy NOW, on YouTube (2015)[33]
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As a result of her influence, Werder has made numerous appearances in numerous forms of magazine prints,[10] including The New York Post (1974),[10] D-Cup (1989),[38] The Examiner,[39] The Sun (1998)[40] and has frequently been portrayed on Playboy.[41]

Bibliography

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  • Can Female Power Save The Planet? Part 2, Women's Sexual Freedom (featuring William Bond, Pete Jackson, et al.) (2024)
  • God Waits for Them: The Souls in Purgatory (featuring William Bond, et al.) (2024)
  • I Strip for God, Part 10 (2023)
  • I Strip for God, Part 9 (2022)
  • I Strip for God, Part 8 (2022)
  • I Strip for God, Part 7 (2022)
  • I Strip for God, Part 6 (2022)
  • I Strip for God, Part 5 (2021)
  • I Strip for God, Part 4 (2021)
  • I Strip for God, Part 3 (2021)
  • I Strip for God, Part 2 (2021)
  • Woman, Thou Art God: The New Religion for Women (2020)
  • America's Most Beautiful Men (2019)
  • Old Woman, Young Man: Why They Belong Together, Part II (2019)
  • America's Most Beautiful Man (2016)
  • Old Woman, Young Man: Why They Belong Together, Part I (2011)
  • Theater of the Mind: Dreams, Symbols, & Meanings (2011)
  • Guru Rasa and her Devotees (2011 and 2009)
  • Secrets of Yoga and Christianity: Are They Compatible? (2011 and 2006)
  • The Beatific Vision: Seeing God Face to Face (2011 and 2009)
  • Theater of Justice: Celebrity Souls Appear (2011 and 2007)
  • The Future of Male-Female Relationships (2011 and 2009)
  • On the Attainment of the Divine Stigmata (2011)
  • Worship of Beautiful Women Is Hunger for Mother God (2011 and 2009)
  • Breastfeeding Is Lovemaking Between Mother and Child (2011)
  • The Origin and Decline of Female Body Building (2011)
  • I Strip for God, Part 1 (2009)
  • It's Not Over Till the Fat Lady Sings: Mother God Strikes Back Against Misogyny (featuring William Bond, et al.) (2006 and 2007)[28]
  • Can Female Power Save the Planet? The Fate of the World Depends on Women (2006)

See also

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References

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  1. ^ a b "Kellie Everts: I Strip For God". (Official Website). Retrieved April 12, 2022.
  2. ^ a b c "Campaign For Women's Bodybuilding: Interview With The True Champion Of Female Bodybuilding - Kellie Everts! (Interview with David Robson)". Bodybuilding.com. January 18, 2019. Retrieved April 13, 2022.
  3. ^ a b "The Life and Times of Rasa Von Werder". Pipe Dream. March 18, 2016. Retrieved April 20, 2022.
  4. ^ Terry Brennan. "Lady body builder fights stripping of credentials". Philadelphia Journal. Retrieved November 21, 2014 – via kellieevertsistripforgod.com.
  5. ^ "Kellie Everts: The Progenitor of Female Body Building". Retrieved November 27, 2015.
  6. ^ "Kellie Everts: The Progenitor of Female Body Building". Retrieved November 27, 2015.
  7. ^ "The spirit and the flesh". Salon. December 11, 1999. Retrieved November 23, 2014.
  8. ^ "The Binghamton Press", Binghamton, February 2, 1979.
  9. ^ Bachrach, Judy (June 16, 1978). "The Spirit Moves Her". Washington Post. ISSN 0190-8286. Retrieved April 28, 2022.
  10. ^ a b c "Kellie Everts: I Strip For God Publicity". www.kellieevertsistripforgod.com. Retrieved April 28, 2022.
  11. ^ "Stripper mixes Spiritual Light and Spotlight". NY Daily News. September 23, 1973. Retrieved April 27, 2022 – via www.kellieevertsistripforgod.com.
  12. ^ "She says God told her to strip". The Spokesman-Review. June 15, 1978. Retrieved November 22, 2014.
  13. ^ Kellie Everts (2009). I Strip for God. Lulu. p. 103. ISBN 978-0557072286. "Hot-Gospel Stripper Finds It Cool In Britain": cover image from Titbits magazine, 2–8 January 1975
  14. ^ SHE Magazine "Bird of Pray"
  15. ^ "Ihr grosses Vorbild war Josephine Baker". The Express (in German). October 8, 1979.
  16. ^ "Personalien". Stern (in German). November 1974.
  17. ^ TV Zeitung Nr.47 "Die Pastorin, die nachts in einer bar heisse Tänze zeigt"
  18. ^ "Stripper peals for Church". Montreal Star. November 18, 1977.
  19. ^ "Une Effeuilleuse amasse des Fonds pour batir une Chapelle". Journal de Montreal. July 13, 1978.
  20. ^ "The Lord moves in mysterious ways". Toronto Sun. April 3, 1979.
  21. ^ "'God's strip dancer' to shed on Hill". Ottawa Citizen. August 1, 1978.
  22. ^ a b "The Morton Downey Jr. Show" Episode dated 4 November 1988 (TV Episode 1988) - IMDb, retrieved April 28, 2022
  23. ^ "4 Movies & NY Law Journal on Rasa". Embodiment of God. April 23, 2022. Retrieved April 28, 2022.
  24. ^ "The Spirit moves Her". Washington Post Style Section. January 17, 1978.
  25. ^ "Activist, Humanitarian & Community Work Publicity". kellieevertsistripforgod.com. Retrieved April 28, 2022.
  26. ^ "The University Of Mother God Church". Woman Thou Art God. Retrieved October 11, 2012.
  27. ^ a b "Embodiment of God". University of Mother God Church. Retrieved April 11, 2022.
  28. ^ a b Werder, Rasa Von (February 2007). It's Not Over Till the Fat Lady Sings - Mother God Strikes Back Against Misogyny. Lulu.com. ISBN 978-1-4303-0620-7.
  29. ^ ""Kellie Everts -- Rasa Von Werder", Embodiment of God". University of Mother God Church. April 18, 2022. Retrieved April 18, 2022.
  30. ^ "I Strip For God - The Official Website of Kellie Everts". kellieevertsistripforgod.com. Retrieved April 28, 2022.
  31. ^ Kellie Everts On "People Are Talking" January 14, 1988, July 10, 2018, retrieved April 28, 2022
  32. ^ Kellie Everts On "The Sally Jessy Raphael Show" June 13, 1988, July 10, 2018, retrieved April 28, 2022
  33. ^ a b c d e "Kellie Everts TV Shows & Movies - YouTube". www.youtube.com. Retrieved April 28, 2022.
  34. ^ Stripper for God Kellie Everts San Francisco News, September 27, 2016, retrieved April 28, 2022
  35. ^ Kellie As Stripper for God Detroit, September 21, 2016, retrieved April 28, 2022
  36. ^ Kellie Everts on 'Real People' - 1979, December 21, 2020, retrieved April 28, 2022
  37. ^ "Kellie Everts 48-28-38 conducts Night Train - YouTube". www.youtube.com. Retrieved April 28, 2022.
  38. ^ "The D-Cup Strippers Vs Morton Downey Jr". Swanks D-Cup. June 1989. pp. 52–55, 78–81 – via www.kellieevertsistripforgod.com.
  39. ^ "The Gospel according to Cash and Kelly". Examiner – via www.kellieevertsistripforgod.com.
  40. ^ Silver, Manny (November 10, 1998). "I Strip For God". The Sun. Retrieved April 28, 2022 – via www.kellieevertsistripforgod.com.
  41. ^ "Kellie Everts: Playboy, Magazine & Tv Appearances". www.kellieevertsistripforgod.com. Retrieved April 29, 2022.
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