Escaping the Cult: One cult, two stories of survival

‘Because she’s in the End Time Army. You’ve heard your Grandpa David tell us about the End Time Army in his letters, haven’t you?’

Of course I had. For as long as I could remember it had been drilled into me that I was an elite child soldier in God’s army. Every day we were training and preparing for the End Time war, which would mark the beginning of end of the world. We were told Grandpa (which is what we children were instructed to call our leader, David Berg) had been sent a prophecy directly from God that the war would begin in 1993. My brothers assured me I would be ten by then and definitely old enough to fight.

Every day we listened to tapes of Grandpa talking to us. He explained how the Antichrist was already living on earth and making his evil plans to destroy the world. He said Europe and America were already under the devil’s control but the system people who lived there didn’t even know it. That’s why they laughed at us. They thought we were crazy but that was because they were the stupid ones.

Grandpa’s tapes also explained that when the war started, floods and earthquakes would ravage the world and a deep darkness would cover the earth. Joy showed me pictures of what this would look like. It was really sad – there were no flowers and all the buildings had been destroyed. He called this the ‘great tribulation’. At the very end of the war there would be the battle of Armageddon, which is when God would fly down from the sky on his chariot. We would fight by God’s side and die, and then we’d go to live in heaven.

I couldn’t wait to get to heaven. Art was my favourite lesson because we got to draw heaven with crayons. I especially loved colouring in the outside walls of the heavenly city because they were made of precious stones, like rubies and emeralds, so I got to use lots of different colours. The main city was shaped like a pyramid and right in the middle of it there was a giant crystal skyscraper over 600 metres high. Aunty Joy said that was twice as high as the Empire State Building, which she explained was an important government building in America. Joy said anything wicked men could build God could do twice as well.

And there wasn’t just one pearly gate like the stupid system people believed, there were twelve – three on each wall.

People didn’t need to walk anywhere in this magical city, they whizzed through the air instead. And because I was going to be a glorious martyr it that meant my family would get a solid gold house on one of the top levels of the pyramid, areas reserved only for important people like us.

But absolutely the best bit about the war was that I would have a special superpower. I wanted this more than anything in the entire world. Joy promised us God would give all the children in the End Time Army an individual power when he was ready. But first we had to prove to him how brave and worthy we were.

I turned another page of the book.

Heaven’s Girl had been captured and was about to be fed to some lions. She looked really worried and I was scared for her. But as Joy continued to read out loud I worked out that the nasty men had changed their minds about throwing her to the lions because they said they wanted a bite of her themselves instead. That really got me confused. Why would they want to eat her?

In the drawing on the next page she was being held down by the soldiers. Two of them had her by the ankles, spreading her legs, while a third loosened his belt buckle.

I suddenly felt very flushed and uncomfortable.

‘Aunty Joy, what are those men doing to Heaven’s Girl?’

I knew what sex looked like – I’d seen the adults do it in their love-up sessions lots and lots of times – but this was different.

‘Can’t you see, Natacha, my dear?’ said Joy. ‘Look at what a wonderful example Heaven’s Girl is setting for you. They want to rape her by force, but Grandpa David tells us there is no such thing as rape if we follow the true laws of nature. A woman of the Bible should submit willingly to a man and satisfy him. God created sex and he created a man’s need for sex. He created woman to serve a man’s need. Heaven’s Girl is using this God-given opportunity to share the love of Jesus with these soldiers. She is going to love them so much that she will turn them back to the path of Jesus. She shares her love with a big smile and a song in her heart like all good girls should. Isn’t that a beautiful thing?’

After Aunty Joy and I finished a few more pages of the book she closed it and promised we’d read some more tomorrow. I didn’t really mind her taking it – that picture had made me feel a bit sick. I couldn’t shake the thought of Heaven’s Girl’s smiling face as the soldiers did things to her. Would I have to do that when I was bigger? Would I be brave enough?

I began to feel a bit shaky so I tried to think about what always made me feel happy – what superpower was God going to give me? My brothers and I used to argue about it all the time. Was it better to be invisible or be able to run really fast? Did boys get better ones than girls? I bawled my eyes out when my brothers teased me by insisting that they did.

I was really into the idea of shooting thunderbolts from my eyes. I would practise my pose for hours, standing with my feet firmly planted one in front of the other, and trying to look as mean and scary as possible as I narrowed my eyes into my best thunderbolt death stare.

‘Nap time.’

Aunty Joy’s voice snapped me back to reality.

‘Children, back to your room, PJs on and get on your beds, please.’

I groaned inwardly. I hated nap time. I would much rather have been allowed out to play in the garden where there was the big flame of the forest tree. The tree had big orange feathery plumes on its branches, and whenever we got a chance the other little girls and I would skip around it pretending to be princesses in a castle.

Without a word we filed back to our room, stripped down to our underwear and put on the sleeveless T-shirts that we wore as our pyjamas, before climbing onto our bunk beds. Some of the uncles had built them out of salvaged wood. The bolts holding my frame together were loose, and whenever I moved it creaked and swayed.

Uncle Ezekiel came into the room to supervise us. I hated the way he spoke through his nose.

I closed my eyes and tried to sleep, but the images of Heaven’s Girl and the soldiers invaded my mind. I was always a fidgety child, and being mentally uneasy made it worse. I couldn’t keep still.

‘Natacha,’ barked Uncle Ezekiel. I froze at my name.

Ezekiel and Aunty Joy were sharing the single bed – she was bare breasted and her hand was moving up and down under the blanket.

‘Keep still. Go to sleep. All you children go to sleep. Now.’

I screwed my eyelids tight, willing myself to sleep, trying to ignore the squeaking and animal grunting coming from Joy’s bed. I shuffled around in a bid to get comfortable.

A strong hand clamped around my forearm. Uncle Ezekiel’s face was glaring at me.

‘You disobedient girl. Get here now.’

He dragged me out of the bed so roughly that I fell face down onto the cold floor.

Uncle Ezekiel, now completely naked, stood over me – his penis wagging like a disapproving finger. He reached towards me and pulled down my underwear. I knew better than to struggle, instead clenching my jaw for what was to come.

The fly-swat slapped down hard across my buttocks, biting at my tender skin.

I squealed, more from shock and indignation than pain, and clenched my jaw tighter, determined not to give him the satisfaction of making me cry.

‘Naughty, wicked girl,’ he cried as the swat struck again. Then a third time. ‘I hope you understand why I had to do that, Natacha. It was for your own benefit, because I love you. Now get into your bed and ask the Lord to forgive you.’

Tears silently rolled down my cheeks as Uncle Ezekiel shoved me roughly back onto my bed, my knickers still around my knees.

I lay still, my face pressing into the wall.

‘If I catch any children not sleeping then they will get the same thing,’ hissed Ezekiel, slightly out of breath.

With tears streaming I pushed my face into the pillow to wipe my snotty nose, daring not to move further. My head was throbbing and filled with images of Uncle Ezekiel cowering before me, pleading with me not to shoot him with thunderbolts from my eyes. This made me feel better, and I drifted into a fitful sleep, with pictures of Ezekiel begging for mercy.

When I woke up he was gone and Aunty Joy was smiling again.

‘Come along, children, back to class for Memory Time,’ she trilled in her sing-song accent.

In silence we climbed out of our beds, filed back into the classroom and took our seats at our little desks. My bottom still stung and my eyes felt puffy.

Joy had written some words on the blackboard and started to read them out loud: ‘Then … shall … they … deliver … you … up … to … be … afflicted … and … shall … kill … you … and … ye … shall … be … hated … of … all … nations … for … my … name’s … sake. OK, children, Bibles open at Matthew, please. Let’s all practise the verse together.’

We repeated it in unison. I couldn’t say the word afflicted. Joy saw me struggling and laughed indulgently: ‘Oh, little Natacha. AF FLIC TED. It means to suffer, like when you die.’

‘Will I suffer when I die, Aunty Joy?’ I asked her.

‘Yes, of course, little one,’ she cooed as if it was the most natural thing in the world.

‘What if I don’t want to?’

Aunty Joy laughed again, bathing me in her warm, beautiful smile.

‘Little Natacha, if you are not willing to suffer and die for Jesus how will you get to heaven?’