Have you heard of the cult next door

[Music]

there’s a buddhist teaching

that says to cultivate compassion we

should look at all beings as if they

were our mother

as if they were once somebody who cared

for and nurtured us

and when i first heard that it was so

impactful but then i thought

well wait are we talking about my mother

my mother forced me to wear a pink cast

when i broke my wrist

even though i was a tomboy and i wanted

a blue one

and when she took me to work with her

she told me to go outside and chase

lizards even though outside happened to

be a lumber yard

with acres of towering wood stacks and

machinery

and strange men she used to lay hands on

and try to cast out demons because she

thought my strong-willed nature

was of the devil affection

wasn’t natural for either of us and in

those moments we tried

it just felt obligatory and

uncomfortable

and so our efforts were often

i never doubted my mother’s love though

she just showed it in her own way

like when she bought me a tetherball

pole even though i was an only child

i don’t think she understood the game or

she came to all of my soccer matches and

no matter what was happening

i could hear her on the sidelines

yelling be there

and for some reason without question she

let me name her black cat

after the disciple simon peter

you could say we had an unorthodox

mother-daughter relationship

but it worked for us because all we had

was each other

my dad left before i was two years old

leaving my mom

heartbroken alone and divorced

by the time she was 22.

she showed her pain the same way she

showed her love

which is to say it wasn’t evident

i knew she was aching because i was

witness to her search for acceptance

first we tried a mega church hoping to

find community

and answers but it was easy to go unseen

there

in the thousands of people and then we

tried

a christian singles group and i remember

loving it as a kid because we went on

camping trips but for some reason that

didn’t work out either

and then one day we found ourselves in

someone’s

living room and in many ways my mom is

still there

sitting on that living room couch stuck

i don’t know who invited us but i wish

that i did

i wish that i did so i could scream at

them

at first it seemed like an ordinary

house church

it was a group of christians gathering

together once a week

to worship and to pray and to sing

harmless right until it wasn’t

it didn’t seem like a cult

we lived in regular houses right next to

your house

we went to public school with your kids

we sat impatiently right next to you

at that same red light only we didn’t

an imam or a rabbi or even a priest

we followed an apostle who said he was

getting direct revelation from god

and god was telling him to tell us

that we were set apart from you we were

chosen

god was telling him to tell us to turn

our backs

on the sick on the poor or the gay

or anybody who argued with our beliefs

because it was too late for them they

had lost god’s favor

to my mom whose life had been shattered

by my dad

who had been thrown into single

parenthood

the apostles living room wasn’t such a

bad place to be

he promised her guidance so she wouldn’t

have to do this alone

and offered her belonging without

judgment

he seemed to see her when she felt so

unnoticed

by everybody else i remember when i was

a kid once someone asked me

what my superpower would be and of

course i said to be invisible

but my answer would be different now

because i saw what invisibility did to

my mom

it didn’t matter how much i stared up at

her

my blue eyes mirrored my father’s blue

eyes

which were reminders of rejection of

being erased

we’ve all felt this longing for

connection

to be noticed by somebody that we admire

to be cared for them

is elevating it can become the only

thing that matters

especially when reeling from abandonment

i’ve interviewed dozens of theologians

about what a cult is and i’ve received

dozens of definitions

my research has led me to define it this

way

cults are controlling the leader claims

to get a special god-given knowledge

there’s group think indoctrination

cognitive dissonance

and oftentimes isolation

someone who is raw like my mom was when

the apostle found her

was perfect bait growing up

my mom was in survival mode and so i

never thought to ask her what her dreams

were

she never thought to ask mine either but

i think

her dreams were to be married have more

kids

have a job she enjoyed and be surrounded

by friends

her journey though stopped when she

walked into that living room

there she found kinship she became

friends with the apostle

and his wife and we were assigned a

pastor to watch over our family

i suppose that was the first strange

turn our group

took family pastor

apostle today my mom is in the pastor or

the apostles inner circle

which is a very esteemed place to be

they drink expensive wine together in

cognac and to go on retreats

to wine country and on alaskan cruises

the apostle says he’s called to the rich

and so my mom pretends to be

it wasn’t always like this though the

oddities evolved over time

in elementary school i told my friends

to rid their homes of native american

art

because such symbols were evil in middle

school

i told my friends to stop going to their

christian churches

because any organized religion was

misled

in high school i told my friends that

any bad thing that was happening to them

whether it was their bad grade and math

class or their parents devoirs

or their boyfriends breaking up with

them that was god’s way of speaking to

them

punishing them my mom was remarried by

now

to someone she had met in the group and

we had outgrown the apostles living room

we had expanded to homes throughout the

city

throughout the state even and we were

gathering once a month in a large

auditorium to hear the apostle speak

and his teachings were then distributed

through pdfs and cassette tapes

and i hated it because i too wanted to

be seen

i too had been abandoned when my father

walked away

but the apostles living room offered me

no healing

and so i escaped but not in an exciting

fleeing in the middle of the night kind

of way more of a slow

painful feeling the band-aid off kind of

way

it started by going to college i was the

first to do so in my family

i was only allowed to go with the

agreement that i would meet weekly over

the phone with our pastor

and so i did so reluctantly but it

allowed me to study

religion and journalism and when i

finally got that job

first newspaper job i took a stand and i

refused to hand over my paycheck to my

stepdad

that was supposed to be a requirement

because i wasn’t married

and then i continued to inch away

further by becoming a religion reporter

you can imagine my career choice was not

looked upon with favor

journalism was grievous but religion

reporting

that was spiritually dangerous going

into mosques and temples

they said open myself up to demons

but i thought it opened myself up to

compassion and understanding

today i run my own religion news

publication it’s called spokane faves

stands for spokane faith and values

myself and a handful of reporters

cover religion news in the inland

northwest and i have 40 columnists who

write for me

atheists buddhists quakers hindus

they’re all writing from their faith

perspective

but you can imagine the tension

continued to build between my mom and i

as i forged my own path and as i began

to speak out

against the cult my hope was that we

could agree to disagree

but to her or at least to the men who

oversee her

that was impossible one day

she sent me two ups boxes filled with my

childhood things

my soccer trophies my baseball cards

even my own

baby photos and with it was a letter

that said because i continued to disobey

god’s law

we could no longer be in relationship

i’m confident she did not write that

letter she only signed it

the story of my mom and i begins with

her

wanting to be seen eventually she was

but she lost her own sight and her voice

in the process she wanted community

but she sacrificed her family

too many vulnerable people find a

safe and comfortable couch one they can

sink into and forget their wounds

but they don’t have to stay there i wish

that i could sit next to my mom and we

could be awkward together again

but i can’t be part of a faith community

that tells people to leave their

children behind

and she can’t be part of a

mother-daughter relationship

that tells people to leave the apostle

behind

i waited 19 years

before i finally met my dad

i have interviewed cult survivors people

find their way out

every single day lives can be repaired

and relationships can be restored

if i hold on to hope hard enough

i believe that one day just like i met

my dad

i can meet my mom again if i hold on to

that hope

i think that hope is powerful enough to

pull people off of the couch

and through the front doors of the colt

next door

and i believe that if i hold on to that

hope hard enough

she’ll be there one day to hit that

tetherball back to me

thank you

[Applause]

you