Born into the Children of God: My life in a religious sex cult and my struggle for survival on the outside

Copyright

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First published by HarperElement 2014

FIRST EDITION

© Natacha Tormey and Nadene Ghouri 2014

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Cover photographs © Kelly Sillaste/Trevillion Images (girl posed by model); Martin Barraud/Getty Images (group); Shutterstock.com (bus)

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Contents

Cover

Title Page

Copyright

Acknowledgements

Family Tree

Berg’s Household

Prologue: Ants Are Bitter

Chapter 1: Moonlight and Star

Chapter 2: God’s Whores

Chapter 3: Fairytales and Thunderbolts

Chapter 4: Dances for the King

Chapter 5: Terror in the Shed

Chapter 6: Candles and Confessions

Chapter 7: Torn Apart

Chapter 8: Ruled by Fear

Chapter 9: From Russia with Love

Chapter 10: Mutiny at Tea

Chapter 11: Walking with Buffaloes

Chapter 12: The Devil’s Land

Chapter 13: Stirrings

Chapter 14: A New Wine

Chapter 15: Changing Tides

Chapter 16: Happy New End Time

Chapter 17: A Door Opens

Chapter 18: A Caged Bird

Chapter 19: The Urban Jungle

Chapter 20: The Prince Is Dead

Chapter 21: Reincarnation

Chapter 22: The Woman in the Mirror

Epilogue: Buckinghamshire, 2014

Author’s Note

Exclusive sample chapter

Moving Memoirs eNewsletter

About the Publisher

Acknowledgements

To my co-author, Nadene Ghouri, thank you for your hard work and commitment to this project. With your help my story has been brought to life and I am glad I had someone to share this journey with.

To my wonderful husband, thank you for encouraging me to face up to my past. Without your love I could not have found the immense happiness I feel today.

This book is the story of my past, based on what I saw and experienced in my childhood. It was not written with malicious intent, but as part of my road to recovery. I hope that by sharing it I will help raise awareness of the long-lasting effects a cult upbringing can have on an individual.

In order to protect the identity of my loved ones I have changed names, places and personal information.

Family Tree

Berg’s Household

Prologue

Ants Are Bitter

The hot acidic smell stung my nostrils and caught in the back of my throat.

I badly needed to cough. I knew showing any revulsion would result in violence, so I forced myself to take short stabbing breaths through my mouth.

Uncle Isaiah squatted low over the campfire, tossing a heavy metal frying pan back and forth over the flames. A horrible smell floated up from his ingredients. Half a dozen of us children sat in a circle in a small clearing cut from the dense jungle of tropical ferns and leafy plants. We had our legs crossed and our backs ramrod straight, as he had ordered. Tall trees in the canopy towered over us, blocking out the breeze and concentrating the smell.

My younger brother Vincent sat next to me. I could sense his body tensing but I dared not risk turning to look at him. I glanced at the kids opposite, checking their reactions. They stared at the ground or straight ahead, expressions compliant in the mask of submission we had all learned to perfect. They didn’t fool me. I knew they were thinking the same thing as me: How am I going to keep them down?

Earlier, Uncle had shown us how to make fire by rubbing sticks together. He seemed to enjoy seeing us struggle. My hands were sore and blistered from trying. Eventually the fire had ignited, and I felt very proud of myself as I watched orange flames lick at the heavy branches we had cut down and carried through thick bush. It was late afternoon but the temperature was still searing, made even hotter by sitting so close to the fire. Isaiah was crouched over with his back to me. Stubby, hairy legs poked from his khaki shorts, making me think of the scary spiders that ran out from under our beds when we swept the dormitory.

It was April and the start of the monsoon season in Malaysia. My muddy denim dungarees and baggy T-shirt stuck to me.

The jungle terrified me. I glanced over my shoulder to see if I could make out pairs of glowing eyes in the bushes, imagining that at any second a venomous snake might bite me or a snarling tiger would leap from the trees and seize me in its massive jaws. Swarms of buzzing mosquitoes surrounded us like a hive of bees, diving at my head in waves of assault. I had itchy red bites all along my arms; trying to swat them away was useless.

Uncle Isaiah stood up with a grin of triumph, the pan clutched in his hand. He looked over at the assembled group.

He got angry very quickly. So when he held out the frying pan and gestured to us to come and inspect it we did as we were told.

Several huge black ants sizzled in the bottom.

They gave off a sickening, chemical smell that hurt my nose. Most were dead and crispy, but a few were still alive, wriggling their spindly legs in a desperate bid to escape the heat.

‘Take,’ he ordered in a thick Irish brogue.

I tried very hard not to let him see me wince as I gingerly picked up a few ants, trying to avoid any that were still alive or burning my fingers on the hot pan.

‘Eat,’ he ordered.

I hesitated for a split second but the look on Uncle’s face was stern. I took a deep breath, put the ants in my mouth and gulped. I could feel their legs tickling my throat. I felt the vomit rise up. I took a big gulp and swallowed it back down along with the ants.

They were so bitter, so completely disgusting. Yet not a single child failed to eat a handful. My brother Vincent even managed to lie: ‘Mmmm, ants are delicious.’

Clearly happy with us, Uncle smiled. I knew this was all for our own good, so that we grew up brave enough to be allowed our superpowers. But I so hoped his smile meant the lesson was over and we could go home to bed. We had been marching through trees or collecting wood for hours, and my limbs were aching and sore.

His next instruction made me weep inside.

‘Next we learn how to fry grasshoppers. Go find some and bring them back for the pan.’

Without a word we did as we were told.

Half an hour later I was munching on a crispy fried grasshopper. They weren’t too bad – kind of nutty.

Chapter 1

Moonlight and Star

It was the famously sweltering summer of 1976, with the hottest recorded weather conditions in Europe since meteorological records began. The Cold War between the United States and the Soviets was at its height. The arms race dominated the news, with the omnipresent threat of a nuclear Armageddon giving kids nightmares. On the radio, Queen’s ‘Bohemian Rhapsody’, Abba’s ‘Dancing Queen’ and the Carpenters’ ‘There’s a Kind of Hush’ dominated the airwaves. The hippy counter-culture movement that had begun in the late 1960s began to lose out in popularity to disco and glam rock, but not before the hippy ideals had swept up hundreds of thousands of youths around the world desperate to throw off the shackles of their parents’ more conservative post-war generation.

Against this backdrop, in the beautiful bohemian city of Paris, a roguishly handsome 20-year-old Frenchman called Marcel lived in a shared house along with several other young hippies. The housemates were an eclectic lot, from all over the world and from lots of different backgrounds. What they had in common was a hatred of established convention, a desire not to work for a living and a fervent faith in Jesus. They passed their days in a euphoric blur of guitar strumming, tambourine shaking, folk singing and pounding the streets of Paris trying to persuade others to share their faith.

That afternoon, Marcel had walked along the river Seine, attempting to sell radical Christian pamphlets which warned of the end of the world to bemused passers-by. Marcel believed the Antichrist was everywhere, busily plotting the downfall of a human race too stupid to realise it. His warnings were genuinely heartfelt and passionate, but to the hot and bothered grey-suited commuters more concerned with catching the next metro home after a long day at the office, he was a weirdo.

By the end of the day he had sold only a handful of pamphlets, earning just a few francs. He was only allowed to keep 10 per cent of that to buy food for the day; the rest of his takings went to his overseer – a kind of manager. He looked despondently at the coins in his hand and decided, despite being extremely thirsty, that he didn’t have enough to buy a cold drink. ‘Get the victory, Marcel, get the victory,’ he repeated to himself determinedly, before heading off down another boulevard.

As the rush hour ended and the streets emptied out, he saw no point in staying and headed for home, hoping for a lie down. But it wasn’t to be. His overseer was in the hallway waiting for him. Unsmiling, the man handed Marcel a smart shirt and trousers and ordered him to change out of his T-shirt and red velvet bell-bottoms. Perplexed, Marcel did as he was told. Next the overseer told him to go into a quiet side room and write out a report detailing his movements throughout the day as well as admitting to any wicked or impure thoughts he’d had.

Two hours later he was still sitting in the room wondering why. He didn’t dare leave without permission but he had no idea why he was there in the first place. He was getting nervous.

Eventually the man came back. Stony-faced, he ushered Marcel into the main living room. As Marcel entered he saw all of his housemates standing in a circle. They began cheering and clapping. Marcel felt a rush of relief that he clearly wasn’t in trouble, but he still had no idea what was going on.

A beautiful green-eyed woman wearing a long cotton dress walked out from behind the circle. A ring of daisies crowned hair that fell to her waist like a golden waterfall. The overseer broke into a huge grin, clapped him on the back and announced the evening’s entertainment.

Marcel was my dad and the beautiful woman my mom, Geneviève. It was to be their wedding.

And that, without warning, was how their life together began.

The shared house Marcel lived in belonged to the Children of God, an evangelical Christian cult which later changed its name to The Family of Love, or The Family. My mother, who was 18 at the time of her marriage, had been a member for just a few months. My father had joined three years earlier, when he was 17.

The group was founded and led by David Berg, an evangelical preacher’s son from California. The Children of God were unashamedly Christian but also tapped into the hippy anti-establishment zeitgeist of free love, East/West spiritualism and philosophy. That mixed-up combination was popular at the time, and Berg wasn’t the only well-known spiritual guru to emerge in those years. Berg was, as successful gurus always are, a charismatic and powerful orator with the ability to influence others. He was also a sexual predator who liked his disciples to send him videos of themselves having orgies. He preached that Jesus was a man who liked sex, therefore it was not something to be ashamed of.

Across the USA and Europe, tens of thousands of young hippies like my parents eagerly signed up to the Children of God, believing the group represented the greater good – love, freedom, peace and a desire to save the world.

My mom and dad didn’t know it then, but their wedding day was just a taster of how the group would go on to define every single aspect of their lives in future. And of mine.

My dad had a very tough upbringing. Family life was difficult for him because his family was very poor. But he did well at school and was the first person in his family expected to go to university.

His elder brother, Frederique, had encountered a Children of God commune in Switzerland whilst on a long hiking trip. He regaled his younger brother with his adventures. The teenage Marcel was stifled by country life and desperate for a way out. His brother’s tales had opened his eyes to the possibility of a much wider and more exciting world, and school no longer seemed as interesting.

Then he met a group of travelling musicians in Toulouse. They weren’t much older than him but they were funny and full of life. They invited him to join them for dinner. He was overwhelmed with their warmth and concern for him. When they told him they belonged to a group called the Children of God he remembered the stories Frederique had told him about the fun he’d had staying at their Swiss commune. The next day, when the musicians checked out, he asked if he could tag along. They whooped and hugged him.

A day later he found himself in the bustling capital city of Paris, where the Children of God had their French headquarters. The group had grown in number very rapidly from its inception in California in 1968 and now boasted thousands of young members from all around the world. They included the parents of actor brothers River and Joaquin Phoenix and the parents of Hollywood actress Rose McGowan. Even the celebrities of the day joined up. One of the most famous bands of that time was Fleetwood Mac. After playing a live concert one night guitarist Jeremy Spencer suddenly disappeared without telling his bandmates. Some Children of God devotees had been in his audience, and after talking to them for a while he had joined up that same night, cutting his long hair and renouncing all his material wealth.

In the French HQ lived 200 under-25s. They were well organised, with song and dance troupes whose job it was to spread the word and raise funds. People slept several to a room and referred to each other as brother and sister, giving my dad an instant sense of kinship. Girls floated around in flowing skirts and translucent tunics (those were the days when young women burned or threw off their bras as a political statement). In the group, females were encouraged to be free and without inhibition. For the lost and lonely country boy this new life was nothing short of a revelation. When it was explained to him that followers were expected to cut off all ties with their biological families in order to devote themselves to the group, he had no qualms whatsoever. The Children of God were his family now, and he couldn’t have been happier about it.

The group had a very strict no drugs or drink rule. Instead followers were encouraged to ‘get high on Jesus’.

A few weeks after arriving in Paris, Marcel received the news that his brother Frederique was dead. About a year earlier Frederique had been committed to an asylum. In those days they could be brutal places where doctors often tested out experimental drugs or treatments, like lobotomies, on patients. Frederique had been unable to survive this torture. He had escaped through a barred window and killed himself by jumping into a quarry. They found his body three days later. For Marcel this was tragic news.

He was baptised shortly afterwards within the cult and renamed Moonlight.

All new recruits were expected take part in several hours of Bible study each day. They read the New Testament and took part in ‘inspiration’ classes, where disciples sang, danced and gave out group hugs. They even had a special term for the hugs – love bombing.

At the weekends they went out with more experienced group members who taught them how to raise funds by selling flyers or begging for donations. They also went on evangelical road trips to different cities to preach the word of God. On these trips they were encouraged to ‘live by faith’, which basically meant not spending any money and attempting to solicit free meals and lodging. More often than not they didn’t have much success and would find themselves huddled up in their thin sleeping bags in freezing basements or car parks. Most thought that this was all incredibly exciting.

Whatever funds they did raise they were expected to bring back to the group. Only a maximum of 10 per cent could be set aside for subsistence. That meant if they raised 100 French francs a day, only 10 francs went towards their food.

Children of God leader David Berg was at this time based in California, but he very quickly became a huge influence on his young followers overseas. They were encouraged to read Berg’s prolific writings, known as Mo letters, and to listen to his tape-recorded sermons. He became a role model, almost like a parent, who gave his disciples guidance and advice about life.

Mostly, Berg’s writings were a treatise on the evils of the ‘system’ world – governments, corporations and people who had jobs. Berg claimed to be a prophet, saying God had personally given him a message, which foretold the end of the world. The End Time Tribulation, as it was known, would be marked by a series of wars and natural disasters. He used the threat of nuclear war and imminent global financial crisis to back this up. To a naïve hippy like Marcel this was all too easy to swallow. Berg promised his followers that when the End Time came they would be God’s Chosen Warriors at the battle of Armageddon. They would fight the Antichrist in the skies and be the saviours of a new, more peaceful world. He backed it up with a series of sci-fi-style posters depicting the fight. Antichrist soldiers in grey uniforms and helmets zapping scantily clad young women into oblivion before they float up to a heavenly paradise, their faces ecstatic with joy.

His young devotees lapped it all up, whipping their tambourines to new heights of frenzy as they hung onto his every word.

Marcel was a fast and enthusiastic learner, carrying out each new task with a joyful smile on his face. His eagerness to please caught the attention of the French leadership, and after a few months he was given the responsibility of leading a small fundraising team. At the end of each month all funds raised within the house were totalled up, less the 10 per cent spent on evangelism costs. Half of what was left was kept back to pay for the house bills – food, heating and clothes. The other 50 per cent was posted to Berg’s headquarters. No one questioned why this was.

New recruits – meaning new mouths to feed – arrived all the time. When supplies fell low followers were simply instructed to pray, and if they went without they were told they hadn’t prayed hard enough.

After a year or so my dad was promoted again, this time to Home Shepherd, meaning he was responsible for ensuring the good behaviour (no alcohol, drugs or sex) of his housemates. He was charming and popular, but he could be stern and command respect when needed, so he excelled in this new role.

He climbed the ladder even higher at the age of 19 by reaching the rank of Regional Shepherd. His role was like that of a roving manager, creating new communes in different towns and leading a musical troupe around the country singing folk songs in restaurants, schools and old people’s homes. He was expected to spread himself across several different communes, often hundreds of kilometres apart. The group didn’t provide vehicles or pay for transport, so he had to hitchhike everywhere. He often arrived at a house after days of travelling and sleeping rough to find himself bedded down in a corridor or on a cold kitchen floor. But he didn’t care because for the first time in his life he had a purpose. The fact that Children of God missionaries were young beautiful people who seemed to love their life and exude a sense of fun and passion meant it wasn’t too hard for them to win over others. Marcel would tell anyone who listened how God and the group had saved him from a life of despair. Every recruit he brought in was seen as a soul saved and another brownie point for him in the eyes of the leadership. His ascent through the ranks seemed assured.

In the early summer of 1976, Marcel was leading a team of four ‘on the road’ disciples. They had hitchhiked across the west coast of France, busking in bars and selling the ‘prophet’s messages’ – pamphlets written by David Berg. By now Berg’s stature had grown, so much so that his followers referred to him as either Moses David, King David or Father David.

One of Marcel’s team members left due to ill health so he requested that the leadership find him a replacement.

Earlier that spring he had gone to a training centre for new recruits in the city of Bordeaux to stock up on boxes of pamphlets. As the troupe performed a few songs a new ‘babe’, 18-year-old Geneviève, danced for them. Marcel found her alluring but, wary of breaking the rules, he held back. Luckily, she was to be his new team member.

The pair soon fell in love.

Chapter 2

God’s Whores

‘I want to play! Let me. They won’t let me play. Mommy, tell them!’ I stamped my feet in the sand and stuck my bottom lip so far out it could catch flies.

‘Who, ma chérie? What’s the matter?’ smiled my mother absently from where she was sitting on a blanket tending to my baby half-sister, Thérèse. She didn’t look up but continued to blow big fat raspberry kisses on the baby’s face, causing her to gurgle with pleasure. Seeing that added jealousy to my anger.

‘Them,’ I yelled, pointing angrily at my elder brothers who were jumping up and down on a driftwood log, pretending it was a pirate ship. ‘They won’t let me play with them.’

‘So play something else, Natacha,’ she replied without taking her gaze from the baby.