March 23, 2023 • 35 mins
In the final episode of False Profits, Noemi asks “has Hillsong changed?” And is it ready to talk to people like Noemi and listen to their stories?
We put our questions to the church. And Noemi enlists the advice of a leading lawyer specialising in abuse. Campaigner Ashley Easter gives advice on how to advocate for victims. And cult survivor Dr Steven Hassan explains how all of us can become better critics of religious groups. Noemi and Elle meet up again and Elle shares the inside track on Hillsong. There are some big changes and the church is keen to move on from the Brian Houston era. But will it address the issues raised in the series? And Noemi heads to Pride New York to take back control and explains why she is not quite done with Hillsong yet.
False Profits: Hillsong is produced by Storyglass for iHeartRadio
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:05):
Here's the question. Has Hillsong changed, Has it listened to critics,
has it listened to people like me? I left Hillsong
two years ago. I started working on this series more
than a year ago, and now I know a whole
lot more. In the past seven episodes of False Prophets,
we've heard stories of all kinds of abuse, spiritual, sexual,
(00:30):
and economic. The Hillsong I knew did not challenge abuse
of behavior by star preachers instead of protected the brand.
I'm no Emmy would ebit. And this is the final
episode of False Prophets, and I'm asking can there be justice?
(00:51):
It's a Sunday, which means that today Hillsong had their service.
And I don't feel like I owe the bunny thing.
I don't feel weird being here anymore. This is the
Boston Commons, the park where I took my dog Teddy.
(01:13):
We're not far from Royale, the nightclub that gets transformed
into Hillsong Church every week. After leaving the church, for
some time, I wouldn't go out. I was living outside
of the city and I would get panic attacks if
I ran into someone, and I wanted it to be
(01:33):
my home again and not feel like I was invading
a place, or I was out of place, and so
I moved into the city, into the Back Bay area,
close to this park. And I've been here for a
year or so, and honestly, now I feel so much
(01:55):
more confidence to just walk on the street. And now
I'm able to contin They need to live in the
city knowing that Hillsong Church is still here. You know,
my hope speaking out is that they will cease to
exist as a church organization. But for now, for now
(02:15):
Boston is my city again. I can enjoy life. Hillsong
has made it clear they are not prepared to engage
(02:37):
with people who want it to close down, and they
won't discuss individual grievances. Hillsong needs to face a simple fact.
When people get hurt by religion, there's no quick fix.
The church wants to move on. Brian Houston is out,
a new leadership is in, but that's not the end
for many of us. Trauma stays with you. I'm going
(03:01):
to go back to a guy named Andrew to help
you understand. In March of twenty twenty two, and media
reports of Brian Houston's stepping down from church, those media
reports created a setup in so many different ways for
my body to relive exactly what it was like at
(03:21):
twenty to come out and lose everything. It's nearly twenty
years since Andrew was shamed, tormented, and rejected when he
came out as a gay man in Hillsong. He's built
a successful and happy life since then. But when Hillsong
scandals hit the news headlines, the past came flooding back.
My body felt like a prison. I had rashes all
(03:45):
over my feet, a rash all over my face. My
body became inflamed. My chest felt like it had metal
wire trapping it. And it is astounding to me that
after all of these years, my buddy is remembering that isolation,
(04:08):
that threat to my existence. I can see why some
people have not been able to survive these experiences. Andrew
never had an apology from Hillsong, and I don't think
he ever will. We asked Hillsong to respond to the
issues raised in this series. So far, Hillsong has decided
(04:30):
not to respond on the record or on tape. The
church wants to tell a story of renewal and change,
but for me, renew means a lot of hard work.
Healing takes time, and it comes at a financial cost.
You can't talk about Hillsong for long without bringing up
(04:50):
money because it's obviously a really big issue. And if
I could, I would definitely submit an invoice for a
refund for all the day images and all of the
work and free labor that I gave. That would be amazing.
I would definitely get a lot of money back. So
I did put together an Excel spreadsheet with all my costs,
(05:13):
and so I like to now jokingly say that it's
my invoice for that one year that I spent recovering
from being at Hillsong, Texas twenty twenty medical expenses here
we go. So I divided it between medical expenses and
(05:34):
ESA expenses because Teddy at the time was my emotional
support animal. Just for Teddy. The grand total was one thousand,
seven hundred and fifty six with sixteen cents and for
medical cost this included just regular PCP visits, and I
(05:55):
needed more than the usual in going to my psychiatric doctor,
going to my therapist, dental. A lot of people don't
talk about this, but mental health can really affect your
teeth with grinding and your gums swell. It could be
pretty dangerous. I had to get a lot of work done,
(06:15):
and I still go every three months. The usual is
every six months, so I actually have a lot of
costs that add up there. So with all of that
together in twenty twenty added to two thousand, five hundred
and six dollars with fifty seven cents, And honestly, that
seems really low to me because I had a good
(06:35):
insurance that year, luckily, and it covered a good portion,
but I still had to pay twenty five hundred dollars
out of pocket. Twenty five hundred dollars is a lot
to me, It probably wasn't a lot to some of
the Hillsong pastors. Remember we reported Hillsong pastor Carl Lentz
(06:57):
in New York was happy to blow five thousand dollars
on a dinner with celebrities. But for people like me,
a financial reckoning is probably not going to happen. No
one's going to get their tides back, are they or
get help with therapy. But a simple acknowledgement of the
past might be a start, because I don't see how
(07:18):
Hillsong can fix things until it owns its past. Smoke
and smoking beers. The track is Gritten and performed by
my friend Janice Legata it's called Disneylands. It's all about
her Hillsong experience. You don't have to believe to just
(07:44):
drinking deep and don't forget to sing were Janice isn't
hopeful that Hillsong will change, so she keeps on using
her music, her blogs, her podcasts, and her videos to
call out mega church culture. You can here. So in
(08:16):
the beginning, it would have been enough for it to
just just go out of business, But now it doesn't
help as much as I would like. Because of every
Hillsong campus closed tomorrow and they were just gone, probably
eighty percent of those people would just gravitate to the
next mega church like I'm not special. There are a
(08:37):
thousand means Hill Songs not special. There are a thousand
hill Songs like it's it's the system. We need to
see the system kind of face justice. The leadership of Hillsong.
Those people should have to account for what they did
and offer true repentance and again reparation. But you know,
so far a lot of these people, these bad actors
(09:01):
Carl Lentz include it, right, They kind of have their moment,
oh I'm no longer in Hillsong, and then they they
just disappear and they go off and they continue living
off of the money of the people they abused. Legally, Yeah,
there's very little at this point they could be done
to make them pay up. But you know, if they
(09:22):
want to keep moving from church to church, or they
want to keep existing, I think it's just to keep shouting, well,
hey what about these people over here. Hopefully people just
see how they're treating the people who have left, and
just see how they're not willing to help people heal. Hopefully,
as more people see that, you know, if you want
to stay in Hillsong, stay but stop giving your money.
(09:45):
Some people have stopped going and some people have stopped giving.
Hillsong finances have taken a hit. COVID has been a
big factor. The annual report for Hillsong in Australia shows
revenues was more than twelve percent in twenty twenty one.
But here's the thing. Hillsong is being replicated by other
(10:06):
churches and the Fallen Stars. There's always a shout at
Redemption and Hillsong Church itself. They didn't want to talk
on the record, but this is what we know. They're
working to promote the message that it's a church again,
it's not a corporation. That the message is about God
and that God is cleaning out the church. This is
(10:28):
l Hardy, the journalist has been with me throughout the series.
I've spoken to people close to the new Hillsong Board
and they believe that they've implemented a new culture and
that they're putting in place a more robust set of
policies and procedures that's going to stop some of the
problems happening again. They said that the Hillsong today is
(10:48):
absolutely different from the Hillsong of a year ago, and
Hillsong without Brian Houston doesn't look like the Hillsong of
Brian Houston. They say that the services are different, that
the celebrity cultures go on the expenses of being cut back.
They're also saying things like Brian Houston was a micromanager.
Everything had to go through him, no one ever knew
(11:09):
really what was going on, and that it was this
culture under Brian's leadership that became detrimental and toxic. They're
keen to tell people that financial oversight has changed, that
the old board was gutless. They're also saying that the
big thing is that under the old system, the senior
pastor had all the control. This is no longer the case,
(11:30):
and complaints about senior passes should be dealt with externally
and independently. They're talking about things like having psychological assessments
come in for candidates and ministry, and they're pretty explicit
that their old system failed. Well, what about the specific
issues you raison the series we reported on serious allegations
(11:51):
of abuse at Hillsong, New York. We know from the
reports leaked to you that Hillsong's own lawyers recommended changes.
It's really interesting to me because that report that came
out of everything that went wrong and Hillsong on the
East Coast was so damning about their culture and made
some really explicit recommendations. But speaking to my contacts within Hillsong,
(12:14):
it's really unclear whether these recommendations by their own lawyers
have actually been implemented. And now some people are saying, oh,
we've had a new review and we're putting in a
whole lot of recommendations and procedures and policies in place
based out of this new review. And this is being
implemented right now. In fact, it should be complete by
(12:35):
around August twenty twenty three. One thing that Hillsong is
clear about is that a hypercharismatic preacher like Carl Lentz
isn't going to happen again. They can't let someone get
out of control and damage the church, no matter how
many souls they bring through the door. It sounds to
me like the messages the bad stuffers in the past. Yes,
(12:57):
people got hurt, but trust us, it's all going to
be different. But I still don't hear much acknowledgment of
the hurt cause to people who've left. I'm talking about
what i'd call spiritual abuse. Bostravijian is a lawyer who
works with victims of church abuse. He's had professional experience
with Hillsong. Yeah, so I wanted to ask a bit
(13:19):
more of what does spiritual abuse or religious abuse? A
lot of people define it differently. A lot of people
use those two words interchangeably. But what does that look
like for you in the legal sense. Yeah, I'm not
sure if there's a set working definition of spiritual religious abuse.
I think in the work that I've done, if I
(13:40):
was to try to unpack that a little bit, I
would say that it is the use of spiritual matters
which could include community theology, teachings to abuse or disenfranchise others. Now,
what does that mean? That can mean so many different things. So,
for example, I believe that any form of sexual abuse
(14:02):
is also a form of spiritual abuse, especially within the
faith community. There's no way that you can have a
spiritual leader engaging in sexual abuse of somebody under their
care and there not be profound aspects of spiritual abuse.
People believing that this is what God God wants, or
(14:22):
that it's okay with God, or that you know, a
twisting of theology to say and to justify that type
of conduct which does just devastates individuals emotionally, physically, but
also spiritually. I think that legally there really isn't a
(14:42):
cause of action in the United States for spiritual abuse.
I think that courts generally stay far away from that
because courts generally don't like to get involved with theological
disputes or ecclesiastical matters. So to say something spiritually abusive
can be a nebulous term. I mean, I think anybody
(15:02):
who's been spiritually abused gets it. But you know, there
would be some people in the Christian world. You talk
about a particular conduct and say that's spiritual abuse, and
they would have no clue what you're talking about. They
would say, no, that's not spiritual abuse. That's part of
our belief or our faith system. And there'd be others
who would say, oh my god, that's about as spiritual
abuse of as you can get. Often in the work
(15:24):
that you do, what is the most common type of
case that you've seen in which you're able to find
some form of accountability or justice. One thing people have
to understand is a difference between criminal and civil law.
Criminal law is when the government comes in and prosecutes
(15:45):
or holds an individual or individuals accountable for committing crimes,
and the ultimate consequence of a criminal case can be incarceration.
On the other end, you have civil cases. Civil cases
are private actions where one person and sues another based
upon what we call a recognized cause of action, and
(16:05):
in a civil case, the ultimate consequence is compensation, not incarceration.
And the big difference between civil and criminal case is
that in a civil case, the victim is in the
driver's seat in the case, making the decisions. But what
I look back on my cases were I think most
of my clients and I think they would say this,
(16:27):
that was the most positive and healing aspect of the process,
and it's a difficult process, was the fact that they
were empowered through the process to be a party, to
step out of the shadows, to file a lawsuit with
their name on it against that church or against that institution,
to hold them accountable in some fashion, and to force
(16:50):
them to higher lawyers, to force them to come to depositions,
to force them to answer questions. That's very empowering and
in essence healing. Who a lot of my clients who
as you know, as a as a survivor, so much
is taken away from you. Yeah. Often, power is like
the biggest thing that I have to work on in therapy.
I've been hearing a lot of folks, mainly on social media,
(17:13):
when different things come out. The biggest thing that comes
up is there a possibility for a class action lawsuit
if we were to all come together to present the case.
I know the burden of proof would be on us
to show that there was intent, but what would that
look like. I'm not a class action lawyer. Having said that,
(17:34):
I really don't believe that these type of cases lend
themselves to class action lawsuits. And the reason is that
the primary objective of a class action lawsuit is really
not financial. It's really to hold whatever entity, whether it's
a you know, a company, business, a car manufacture, whatever,
to hold them responsible to fix a problem. And what
(17:55):
the secret about class action lawsuits is is that lawyers
are the ones who benefit the most from class action lawsuits.
Boz doesn't believe class action lawsuits are an answer, but
he says individuals can bring legal action, and he believes
that this can be a part of taking back power.
The monetary damages can be economic and can be noneconomic,
(18:17):
So pain and suffering damages. How do you even put
a dollar a figure to that. One of the things
that we think about, because a lot of my clients,
which is which is a good thing, one of the
things that get really uneasy talking about is money. And
what I have to sort of gently push back on is, no,
this is about money, because if you sat down and
(18:37):
counted up the financial cost that this abuse has cost
your life, it's significant, It's beyond significant. And so why
in the world should you be, as the victim, be
pulling out money from your wallet or your bank account
(18:58):
many survivors who don't even have it. Why should you
be having to do that when the one that's responsible
or the entities that are responsible, should be doing that.
That's part of why we sue churches and sue organizations
because we're saying, listen, one way we hold you accountable
is to make sure that you are going to compensate
(19:18):
me for all of my loss, financial and non financial.
When it comes to law and religion, accountability is elusive.
Doctor Stephen Hassan is trying to come up with an answer.
He spent more than forty years helping people get out
of all types of authoritarian groups, religious cults, political cults,
(19:39):
therapy cults, and multi level marketing groups. He's best known
for his work on something called the Bite model. You
can check it out on his website. But to explain
it simply, it's a list of red flags, a checklist
of characteristics of mind control. Well, I believe everyone should
understand stand the influence continuum and Bite model, and they
(20:04):
should understand the qualities of most cult leaders is malignant narcissism.
And what I advocate is people be good consumers. So
if they're being invited to something that they should do
an independent investigation, not depend on the recruiters. To give
(20:24):
you information. And the simplest thing these days with Google
is to put the name in quotes of the group,
the name of the leader in quotes. Then you do
plus cult or plus scam, plus brainwashing, plus x members.
And don't just settle for the first page, go ten
(20:46):
pages in because most of the big cults manipulate search
engines because they know most people won't look more than
three pages on Google. But the other thing is so
research the leader, the story, and so you want to
ask hard questions. And most cult leaders go for power, money,
and sex, and some want all three. And you want
(21:10):
to get involved with a religious group where the leader
isn't me me, me, Me, Me me. You want the
centrality to be focused on helping lift up members and
support them and teach love rather than hate. And if
a group's legitimate, it will stand up to scrutiny. So
you know, allow your inner gut or your inner voice,
(21:33):
it's saying there's something wrong here, listen to yourself and
reality test. When he was nineteen, Stephen was recruited into
a cult, the Moonies. His experience motivated him to try
and change the legal system. He wants those who exercise
destructive mind control to be held criminally accountable. It's become
(21:55):
a mission and a crusade for forty six years, and
the last seven years I've been focusing on getting a
doctorate and trying to create a formula that judges and
juries can use to evaluate undue influence in courts of law,
because I feel that what is being done should be illegal.
(22:18):
There's a long way to go before we see any
legal changes. But Stephen Hassan's focus is also on recovery,
and a part of that is dealing with guilt. So
I think that one should own the fact that you
did interfere with other people's lives and perhaps cause great harm,
(22:39):
but also acknowledge you were doing the best you could
with the information and experiences you had. You were believing
you were doing a good thing. And so it starts
with not having a black and white judgment on your
younger self. But here's what I tell all of my
clients as a therapist. I say, the key to recovering
(23:03):
from destructive mind control is controlling your own mind. I
ask people to answer, if they knew then what they
know now, what would they have said or done differently. So,
in the case of the younger me when I was nineteen.
If Steve knew these women were moonies and they were
(23:24):
going to ask them to drop out of college and
become a right wing fascist, I would have told them, no,
you can't sit at my table. In fact, get the
hell off my campus. I'm calling security. So the idea
is I'm empowering my clients to heal themselves. And the
critical thing is to be in your body, to be
(23:45):
in the now and have goals for the future that
can be very positive and attractive to you that you
have a future you want to live. We can rewire
our brains to be the way we want to be now.
I was told by a professor at this forensic think
(24:05):
tank I've been a part of at Harvard. He said,
if you really want to change the law, you need
a doctor at Steve, and you need to do a
quantitative study or in your model to prove that it
has efficacy. And I said, Michael, I'm sixty three, and
he said I'm seventy seven. Do you want to change
the law or not? And I was like, damn, I
(24:27):
guess I'm gonna go back to school and crack the
textbooks and learn. And it turned out to be one
of the best choices I made because I got smarter.
And that's one thing I hope you'll take away from
false prophets. All of us, even the smartest people, can
fall for stuff. But what about some of the people
(24:48):
we've met in this series. How did the Hillsong experience
affect their lives and faith? Oludharado was part of Hillsong,
New York, New Jersey, and Los Angeles. So my relationship
to faith is that you know it exists. I still
believe in Jesus, but I'm definitely not part of a church.
(25:08):
I don't plan to be part of a church ever. Again.
I do believe churches do do good, but for me,
the damage that can be done to the individual supersedes
the good that it does overall. So for me personally,
I can't do it. I just can't be a part
of a church at all. I really just don't think
(25:28):
they are safe spaces for people who aren't white. And
after I left the church, I definitely was scared that
I wouldn't be as close to God or my faith,
and that was proven wrong. I didn't necessarily need to
be part of a church to be close to God
(25:49):
or to have strong faith. Racism came up a lot
in this series. Who Song says on its website that
it's woken up to diversity and inclusion issues. Also says
that their new board is more diverse. And what about
people who work for really low wages for Hillsong pastors
and left feeling exploited? How do they feel now? Megan
(26:12):
Fallon was one of the nannies and volunteers at Hillsong
New York. She moved to San Francisco and she gave
birth to twin daughters soon after talking to us. I
don't know the answer that what Hillsong could do to
get better, but I know it starts with like listening
to the people that they've hurt. And I just am
a firm believer that like, if your intentions are good,
(26:32):
you can go into any situation and spin it around.
But you know, this church and these people are hurting
or have hurt a lot of folks, and so just
be careful and if you did feel like it's time
to leave, like trust that gut feeling the first time
you feel it. And there's a lot of us kind
of on the other side that there's like a lot
(26:54):
of support out there now, which is really awesome. Hillsong
isn't going to engage with us. We are the past.
I guess it says the Hillsong of today is not
the Hillsong of Brian Houston. Ashley Easter has been with
us through the series. She's an abuse survivor and an
advocate for victims. In her experience, powerful people don't change.
(27:17):
The people that you're dealing with in these church systems
are not like you most of the time. They do
not have the same kind of empathy you have most
of the time. They're not driven by the same care
for other people that you are driven by. And so
don't be disillusioned that talking about the problem and bringing
(27:40):
up these issues is going to some help tug at
their heartstrings and they're going to want to do the
right thing. So focus more on what you can do
for survivors and to advance the cause of survivors and
protecting other people from getting in these situations. In the beginning,
I used to think that AVOCA to see work. The
(28:01):
goal was to maybe change the systems or the churches,
or maybe get the pastors to listen. I don't believe
that that's the goal anymore. I think the goal that
realized now is really just to empower the survivor community
and to sound the alarm so it doesn't happen to
other people, so they can make decisions to keep themselves safe.
(28:22):
And to be able to have your story told and
validated by a community, and to warn other people. I
think those are some huge winds that we're seeing in
the survivor community as a whole. What about my personal
story and queer identity? No sign of change there from Hillsong.
(28:44):
Will Hillsong affirm gay people? The message we're getting is no,
will gay people be accepted in leadership roles? No? Will
Hillsong be more clear on their message? The sign we're
getting is no. But the message is still welcome home,
you belong here. It's time for a final catch up
(29:05):
with Oh Hardy. We're not surprised that Hillsong doesn't want
to talk on the record. From your perspective, does it
look any different to the Hillsong that you left? To
be honest, I guess different in terms of the leader
at the front, the person holding the mic, But in
terms of systems, I see it the same, Like nothing
(29:26):
has changed. The system was founded the way it was
and they liked it the way it was and it's
not going to shift from that. Yeah, I've also been wondering,
I mean, for you, is there going to be a
point where you draw a line and say, Hillsong is
so far in the revision mirror now I'm not thinking
about it talking about it anymore, Like are you ever
gonna have you ever sort of set that point for
(29:46):
yourself or are you just kind of just kind of
rolling with it. That's a great question. I think as
a person of color, as a queer person, when you
go through experiences, you often and to use your story
in order to advocate for change, and knowing that things
(30:07):
are not going to change in terms of LGBTQ policies,
if they were to change our LGBTQ policies, then I'd
be like, Okay, my work is done. But if they
didn't until the day they change their LGBTQ policies and
actually say we do not affirm LGBTQ people within their website,
make it loud and clear that they are homophobic, then
(30:30):
I will stop talking. I think that's the line I'm
going to draw, But for now that hasn't happened, So
I'm going to continue to do it. That's really admirable.
I think it's really cool if you're still energized by it.
And yeah, I think like you have to have a
good sense of division within your life. I have the
Noemi that goes to work, the Noemi that goes to
(30:52):
advocate for LGBTQ people within the work that I do
outside of all of this, and then there's a Noemi
that speaks out within this podcast or within Hillsong Realms.
Once I walk out of here, I'm gonna take a
deep breath and say, Okay, now let's go have fun.
I don't need to carry this all day with me.
(31:14):
But it takes years for things to change when you're
speaking out, and it hurts and it's sad, but it's
the reality of how Hillsong had us before, where Hillsong
was our whole life. So then to now have it
only be a small part of your life where you're
speaking out, that's really hard to make that division. But
I think it's also empowering to do that, to place
(31:36):
that situation in a little box and to be able
to go have fun. I think, honestly, that's the best
form of revenge. That's the best form of justice and
accountability that I have found within to be able to
pick up and be happy. Yeah, you got a smile
an her face. Man, it's the hard work of healing. Awesome. Yeah,
(32:00):
should we see? Yeah, let's go. Look. I want to
get a flag. This is New York Pride twenty twenty two,
my first time here. For me, it feels like the
best end to my story. We started the Pride Parade
just a couple of blocks from Hillsong Church. It no
longer has the power to hurt me. It's fun. Welcome
(32:22):
to my life. It all came together and it all
became even more special and monumental in my life. When
I was able to walk in the Pride Parade, I
got to take back the start and finish where I
wanted to finish, without someone telling me where to go
(32:44):
or what to do, and telling me who I could
or couldn't love. I think that for me was very special.
You could hear Teddy barking in the back. He also
believes it was special, even though he didn't go. It
brings me to tears because I went through so many
(33:06):
dark nights and to just hear myself embrace all of
me in that parade and just like seeing the people
around cheering and like embracing and yelling and accepting me
was like a very big contrast in comparison to my
experience at a Hillsong where I was told to complete opposite.
(33:30):
So yeah, a lot of emotions. I started the series
wanting to do this, get answers from Hillsong. I'm still
waiting to shine a light on things Hillsong didn't want
to see. We've done that, and to take back power.
(33:52):
This march and this series was definitely a take back
from me. I'm nomoibe and this is false prophets, and
I want to thank everyone who shared their stories with me.
Special thanks to l Hardy. The series producer was Louise Cotton,
(34:13):
Assistant producer was Leo Schick. Thanks to our executive producer
Alex Holland's sound design was by David Thomas. Location production
in Australia was by Sharon Davies and thanks to our
production manager Carrie Louder. The development producer was Naomi Harvey.
(34:36):
False Prophets Hillsong is a story Glass production and is
distributed by iHeartRadio. The executive producer from iHeartRadio is Dylan Fagan,
with special thanks to beth N Macaluso.
Here's the question. Has Hillsong changed, Has it listened to critics,
has it listened to people like me? I left Hillsong
two years ago. I started working on this series more
than a year ago, and now I know a whole
lot more. In the past seven episodes of False Prophets,
we've heard stories of all kinds of abuse, spiritual, sexual,
(00:30):
and economic. The Hillsong I knew did not challenge abuse
of behavior by star preachers instead of protected the brand.
I'm no Emmy would ebit. And this is the final
episode of False Prophets, and I'm asking can there be justice?
(00:51):
It's a Sunday, which means that today Hillsong had their service.
And I don't feel like I owe the bunny thing.
I don't feel weird being here anymore. This is the
Boston Commons, the park where I took my dog Teddy.
(01:13):
We're not far from Royale, the nightclub that gets transformed
into Hillsong Church every week. After leaving the church, for
some time, I wouldn't go out. I was living outside
of the city and I would get panic attacks if
I ran into someone, and I wanted it to be
(01:33):
my home again and not feel like I was invading
a place, or I was out of place, and so
I moved into the city, into the Back Bay area,
close to this park. And I've been here for a
year or so, and honestly, now I feel so much
(01:55):
more confidence to just walk on the street. And now
I'm able to contin They need to live in the
city knowing that Hillsong Church is still here. You know,
my hope speaking out is that they will cease to
exist as a church organization. But for now, for now
(02:15):
Boston is my city again. I can enjoy life. Hillsong
has made it clear they are not prepared to engage
(02:37):
with people who want it to close down, and they
won't discuss individual grievances. Hillsong needs to face a simple fact.
When people get hurt by religion, there's no quick fix.
The church wants to move on. Brian Houston is out,
a new leadership is in, but that's not the end
for many of us. Trauma stays with you. I'm going
(03:01):
to go back to a guy named Andrew to help
you understand. In March of twenty twenty two, and media
reports of Brian Houston's stepping down from church, those media
reports created a setup in so many different ways for
my body to relive exactly what it was like at
(03:21):
twenty to come out and lose everything. It's nearly twenty
years since Andrew was shamed, tormented, and rejected when he
came out as a gay man in Hillsong. He's built
a successful and happy life since then. But when Hillsong
scandals hit the news headlines, the past came flooding back.
My body felt like a prison. I had rashes all
(03:45):
over my feet, a rash all over my face. My
body became inflamed. My chest felt like it had metal
wire trapping it. And it is astounding to me that
after all of these years, my buddy is remembering that isolation,
(04:08):
that threat to my existence. I can see why some
people have not been able to survive these experiences. Andrew
never had an apology from Hillsong, and I don't think
he ever will. We asked Hillsong to respond to the
issues raised in this series. So far, Hillsong has decided
(04:30):
not to respond on the record or on tape. The
church wants to tell a story of renewal and change,
but for me, renew means a lot of hard work.
Healing takes time, and it comes at a financial cost.
You can't talk about Hillsong for long without bringing up
(04:50):
money because it's obviously a really big issue. And if
I could, I would definitely submit an invoice for a
refund for all the day images and all of the
work and free labor that I gave. That would be amazing.
I would definitely get a lot of money back. So
I did put together an Excel spreadsheet with all my costs,
(05:13):
and so I like to now jokingly say that it's
my invoice for that one year that I spent recovering
from being at Hillsong, Texas twenty twenty medical expenses here
we go. So I divided it between medical expenses and
(05:34):
ESA expenses because Teddy at the time was my emotional
support animal. Just for Teddy. The grand total was one thousand,
seven hundred and fifty six with sixteen cents and for
medical cost this included just regular PCP visits, and I
(05:55):
needed more than the usual in going to my psychiatric doctor,
going to my therapist, dental. A lot of people don't
talk about this, but mental health can really affect your
teeth with grinding and your gums swell. It could be
pretty dangerous. I had to get a lot of work done,
(06:15):
and I still go every three months. The usual is
every six months, so I actually have a lot of
costs that add up there. So with all of that
together in twenty twenty added to two thousand, five hundred
and six dollars with fifty seven cents, And honestly, that
seems really low to me because I had a good
(06:35):
insurance that year, luckily, and it covered a good portion,
but I still had to pay twenty five hundred dollars
out of pocket. Twenty five hundred dollars is a lot
to me, It probably wasn't a lot to some of
the Hillsong pastors. Remember we reported Hillsong pastor Carl Lentz
(06:57):
in New York was happy to blow five thousand dollars
on a dinner with celebrities. But for people like me,
a financial reckoning is probably not going to happen. No
one's going to get their tides back, are they or
get help with therapy. But a simple acknowledgement of the
past might be a start, because I don't see how
(07:18):
Hillsong can fix things until it owns its past. Smoke
and smoking beers. The track is Gritten and performed by
my friend Janice Legata it's called Disneylands. It's all about
her Hillsong experience. You don't have to believe to just
(07:44):
drinking deep and don't forget to sing were Janice isn't
hopeful that Hillsong will change, so she keeps on using
her music, her blogs, her podcasts, and her videos to
call out mega church culture. You can here. So in
(08:16):
the beginning, it would have been enough for it to
just just go out of business, But now it doesn't
help as much as I would like. Because of every
Hillsong campus closed tomorrow and they were just gone, probably
eighty percent of those people would just gravitate to the
next mega church like I'm not special. There are a
(08:37):
thousand means Hill Songs not special. There are a thousand
hill Songs like it's it's the system. We need to
see the system kind of face justice. The leadership of Hillsong.
Those people should have to account for what they did
and offer true repentance and again reparation. But you know,
so far a lot of these people, these bad actors
(09:01):
Carl Lentz include it, right, They kind of have their moment,
oh I'm no longer in Hillsong, and then they they
just disappear and they go off and they continue living
off of the money of the people they abused. Legally, Yeah,
there's very little at this point they could be done
to make them pay up. But you know, if they
(09:22):
want to keep moving from church to church, or they
want to keep existing, I think it's just to keep shouting, well,
hey what about these people over here. Hopefully people just
see how they're treating the people who have left, and
just see how they're not willing to help people heal. Hopefully,
as more people see that, you know, if you want
to stay in Hillsong, stay but stop giving your money.
(09:45):
Some people have stopped going and some people have stopped giving.
Hillsong finances have taken a hit. COVID has been a
big factor. The annual report for Hillsong in Australia shows
revenues was more than twelve percent in twenty twenty one.
But here's the thing. Hillsong is being replicated by other
(10:06):
churches and the Fallen Stars. There's always a shout at
Redemption and Hillsong Church itself. They didn't want to talk
on the record, but this is what we know. They're
working to promote the message that it's a church again,
it's not a corporation. That the message is about God
and that God is cleaning out the church. This is
(10:28):
l Hardy, the journalist has been with me throughout the series.
I've spoken to people close to the new Hillsong Board
and they believe that they've implemented a new culture and
that they're putting in place a more robust set of
policies and procedures that's going to stop some of the
problems happening again. They said that the Hillsong today is
(10:48):
absolutely different from the Hillsong of a year ago, and
Hillsong without Brian Houston doesn't look like the Hillsong of
Brian Houston. They say that the services are different, that
the celebrity cultures go on the expenses of being cut back.
They're also saying things like Brian Houston was a micromanager.
Everything had to go through him, no one ever knew
(11:09):
really what was going on, and that it was this
culture under Brian's leadership that became detrimental and toxic. They're
keen to tell people that financial oversight has changed, that
the old board was gutless. They're also saying that the
big thing is that under the old system, the senior
pastor had all the control. This is no longer the case,
(11:30):
and complaints about senior passes should be dealt with externally
and independently. They're talking about things like having psychological assessments
come in for candidates and ministry, and they're pretty explicit
that their old system failed. Well, what about the specific
issues you raison the series we reported on serious allegations
(11:51):
of abuse at Hillsong, New York. We know from the
reports leaked to you that Hillsong's own lawyers recommended changes.
It's really interesting to me because that report that came
out of everything that went wrong and Hillsong on the
East Coast was so damning about their culture and made
some really explicit recommendations. But speaking to my contacts within Hillsong,
(12:14):
it's really unclear whether these recommendations by their own lawyers
have actually been implemented. And now some people are saying, oh,
we've had a new review and we're putting in a
whole lot of recommendations and procedures and policies in place
based out of this new review. And this is being
implemented right now. In fact, it should be complete by
(12:35):
around August twenty twenty three. One thing that Hillsong is
clear about is that a hypercharismatic preacher like Carl Lentz
isn't going to happen again. They can't let someone get
out of control and damage the church, no matter how
many souls they bring through the door. It sounds to
me like the messages the bad stuffers in the past. Yes,
(12:57):
people got hurt, but trust us, it's all going to
be different. But I still don't hear much acknowledgment of
the hurt cause to people who've left. I'm talking about
what i'd call spiritual abuse. Bostravijian is a lawyer who
works with victims of church abuse. He's had professional experience
with Hillsong. Yeah, so I wanted to ask a bit
(13:19):
more of what does spiritual abuse or religious abuse? A
lot of people define it differently. A lot of people
use those two words interchangeably. But what does that look
like for you in the legal sense. Yeah, I'm not
sure if there's a set working definition of spiritual religious abuse.
I think in the work that I've done, if I
(13:40):
was to try to unpack that a little bit, I
would say that it is the use of spiritual matters
which could include community theology, teachings to abuse or disenfranchise others. Now,
what does that mean? That can mean so many different things. So,
for example, I believe that any form of sexual abuse
(14:02):
is also a form of spiritual abuse, especially within the
faith community. There's no way that you can have a
spiritual leader engaging in sexual abuse of somebody under their
care and there not be profound aspects of spiritual abuse.
People believing that this is what God God wants, or
(14:22):
that it's okay with God, or that you know, a
twisting of theology to say and to justify that type
of conduct which does just devastates individuals emotionally, physically, but
also spiritually. I think that legally there really isn't a
(14:42):
cause of action in the United States for spiritual abuse.
I think that courts generally stay far away from that
because courts generally don't like to get involved with theological
disputes or ecclesiastical matters. So to say something spiritually abusive
can be a nebulous term. I mean, I think anybody
(15:02):
who's been spiritually abused gets it. But you know, there
would be some people in the Christian world. You talk
about a particular conduct and say that's spiritual abuse, and
they would have no clue what you're talking about. They
would say, no, that's not spiritual abuse. That's part of
our belief or our faith system. And there'd be others
who would say, oh my god, that's about as spiritual
abuse of as you can get. Often in the work
(15:24):
that you do, what is the most common type of
case that you've seen in which you're able to find
some form of accountability or justice. One thing people have
to understand is a difference between criminal and civil law.
Criminal law is when the government comes in and prosecutes
(15:45):
or holds an individual or individuals accountable for committing crimes,
and the ultimate consequence of a criminal case can be incarceration.
On the other end, you have civil cases. Civil cases
are private actions where one person and sues another based
upon what we call a recognized cause of action, and
(16:05):
in a civil case, the ultimate consequence is compensation, not incarceration.
And the big difference between civil and criminal case is
that in a civil case, the victim is in the
driver's seat in the case, making the decisions. But what
I look back on my cases were I think most
of my clients and I think they would say this,
(16:27):
that was the most positive and healing aspect of the process,
and it's a difficult process, was the fact that they
were empowered through the process to be a party, to
step out of the shadows, to file a lawsuit with
their name on it against that church or against that institution,
to hold them accountable in some fashion, and to force
(16:50):
them to higher lawyers, to force them to come to depositions,
to force them to answer questions. That's very empowering and
in essence healing. Who a lot of my clients who
as you know, as a as a survivor, so much
is taken away from you. Yeah. Often, power is like
the biggest thing that I have to work on in therapy.
I've been hearing a lot of folks, mainly on social media,
(17:13):
when different things come out. The biggest thing that comes
up is there a possibility for a class action lawsuit
if we were to all come together to present the case.
I know the burden of proof would be on us
to show that there was intent, but what would that
look like. I'm not a class action lawyer. Having said that,
(17:34):
I really don't believe that these type of cases lend
themselves to class action lawsuits. And the reason is that
the primary objective of a class action lawsuit is really
not financial. It's really to hold whatever entity, whether it's
a you know, a company, business, a car manufacture, whatever,
to hold them responsible to fix a problem. And what
(17:55):
the secret about class action lawsuits is is that lawyers
are the ones who benefit the most from class action lawsuits.
Boz doesn't believe class action lawsuits are an answer, but
he says individuals can bring legal action, and he believes
that this can be a part of taking back power.
The monetary damages can be economic and can be noneconomic,
(18:17):
So pain and suffering damages. How do you even put
a dollar a figure to that. One of the things
that we think about, because a lot of my clients,
which is which is a good thing, one of the
things that get really uneasy talking about is money. And
what I have to sort of gently push back on is, no,
this is about money, because if you sat down and
(18:37):
counted up the financial cost that this abuse has cost
your life, it's significant, It's beyond significant. And so why
in the world should you be, as the victim, be
pulling out money from your wallet or your bank account
(18:58):
many survivors who don't even have it. Why should you
be having to do that when the one that's responsible
or the entities that are responsible, should be doing that.
That's part of why we sue churches and sue organizations
because we're saying, listen, one way we hold you accountable
is to make sure that you are going to compensate
(19:18):
me for all of my loss, financial and non financial.
When it comes to law and religion, accountability is elusive.
Doctor Stephen Hassan is trying to come up with an answer.
He spent more than forty years helping people get out
of all types of authoritarian groups, religious cults, political cults,
(19:39):
therapy cults, and multi level marketing groups. He's best known
for his work on something called the Bite model. You
can check it out on his website. But to explain
it simply, it's a list of red flags, a checklist
of characteristics of mind control. Well, I believe everyone should
understand stand the influence continuum and Bite model, and they
(20:04):
should understand the qualities of most cult leaders is malignant narcissism.
And what I advocate is people be good consumers. So
if they're being invited to something that they should do
an independent investigation, not depend on the recruiters. To give
(20:24):
you information. And the simplest thing these days with Google
is to put the name in quotes of the group,
the name of the leader in quotes. Then you do
plus cult or plus scam, plus brainwashing, plus x members.
And don't just settle for the first page, go ten
(20:46):
pages in because most of the big cults manipulate search
engines because they know most people won't look more than
three pages on Google. But the other thing is so
research the leader, the story, and so you want to
ask hard questions. And most cult leaders go for power, money,
and sex, and some want all three. And you want
(21:10):
to get involved with a religious group where the leader
isn't me me, me, Me, Me me. You want the
centrality to be focused on helping lift up members and
support them and teach love rather than hate. And if
a group's legitimate, it will stand up to scrutiny. So
you know, allow your inner gut or your inner voice,
(21:33):
it's saying there's something wrong here, listen to yourself and
reality test. When he was nineteen, Stephen was recruited into
a cult, the Moonies. His experience motivated him to try
and change the legal system. He wants those who exercise
destructive mind control to be held criminally accountable. It's become
(21:55):
a mission and a crusade for forty six years, and
the last seven years I've been focusing on getting a
doctorate and trying to create a formula that judges and
juries can use to evaluate undue influence in courts of law,
because I feel that what is being done should be illegal.
(22:18):
There's a long way to go before we see any
legal changes. But Stephen Hassan's focus is also on recovery,
and a part of that is dealing with guilt. So
I think that one should own the fact that you
did interfere with other people's lives and perhaps cause great harm,
(22:39):
but also acknowledge you were doing the best you could
with the information and experiences you had. You were believing
you were doing a good thing. And so it starts
with not having a black and white judgment on your
younger self. But here's what I tell all of my
clients as a therapist. I say, the key to recovering
(23:03):
from destructive mind control is controlling your own mind. I
ask people to answer, if they knew then what they
know now, what would they have said or done differently. So,
in the case of the younger me when I was nineteen.
If Steve knew these women were moonies and they were
(23:24):
going to ask them to drop out of college and
become a right wing fascist, I would have told them, no,
you can't sit at my table. In fact, get the
hell off my campus. I'm calling security. So the idea
is I'm empowering my clients to heal themselves. And the
critical thing is to be in your body, to be
(23:45):
in the now and have goals for the future that
can be very positive and attractive to you that you
have a future you want to live. We can rewire
our brains to be the way we want to be now.
I was told by a professor at this forensic think
(24:05):
tank I've been a part of at Harvard. He said,
if you really want to change the law, you need
a doctor at Steve, and you need to do a
quantitative study or in your model to prove that it
has efficacy. And I said, Michael, I'm sixty three, and
he said I'm seventy seven. Do you want to change
the law or not? And I was like, damn, I
(24:27):
guess I'm gonna go back to school and crack the
textbooks and learn. And it turned out to be one
of the best choices I made because I got smarter.
And that's one thing I hope you'll take away from
false prophets. All of us, even the smartest people, can
fall for stuff. But what about some of the people
(24:48):
we've met in this series. How did the Hillsong experience
affect their lives and faith? Oludharado was part of Hillsong,
New York, New Jersey, and Los Angeles. So my relationship
to faith is that you know it exists. I still
believe in Jesus, but I'm definitely not part of a church.
(25:08):
I don't plan to be part of a church ever. Again.
I do believe churches do do good, but for me,
the damage that can be done to the individual supersedes
the good that it does overall. So for me personally,
I can't do it. I just can't be a part
of a church at all. I really just don't think
(25:28):
they are safe spaces for people who aren't white. And
after I left the church, I definitely was scared that
I wouldn't be as close to God or my faith,
and that was proven wrong. I didn't necessarily need to
be part of a church to be close to God
(25:49):
or to have strong faith. Racism came up a lot
in this series. Who Song says on its website that
it's woken up to diversity and inclusion issues. Also says
that their new board is more diverse. And what about
people who work for really low wages for Hillsong pastors
and left feeling exploited? How do they feel now? Megan
(26:12):
Fallon was one of the nannies and volunteers at Hillsong
New York. She moved to San Francisco and she gave
birth to twin daughters soon after talking to us. I
don't know the answer that what Hillsong could do to
get better, but I know it starts with like listening
to the people that they've hurt. And I just am
a firm believer that like, if your intentions are good,
(26:32):
you can go into any situation and spin it around.
But you know, this church and these people are hurting
or have hurt a lot of folks, and so just
be careful and if you did feel like it's time
to leave, like trust that gut feeling the first time
you feel it. And there's a lot of us kind
of on the other side that there's like a lot
(26:54):
of support out there now, which is really awesome. Hillsong
isn't going to engage with us. We are the past.
I guess it says the Hillsong of today is not
the Hillsong of Brian Houston. Ashley Easter has been with
us through the series. She's an abuse survivor and an
advocate for victims. In her experience, powerful people don't change.
(27:17):
The people that you're dealing with in these church systems
are not like you most of the time. They do
not have the same kind of empathy you have most
of the time. They're not driven by the same care
for other people that you are driven by. And so
don't be disillusioned that talking about the problem and bringing
(27:40):
up these issues is going to some help tug at
their heartstrings and they're going to want to do the
right thing. So focus more on what you can do
for survivors and to advance the cause of survivors and
protecting other people from getting in these situations. In the beginning,
I used to think that AVOCA to see work. The
(28:01):
goal was to maybe change the systems or the churches,
or maybe get the pastors to listen. I don't believe
that that's the goal anymore. I think the goal that
realized now is really just to empower the survivor community
and to sound the alarm so it doesn't happen to
other people, so they can make decisions to keep themselves safe.
(28:22):
And to be able to have your story told and
validated by a community, and to warn other people. I
think those are some huge winds that we're seeing in
the survivor community as a whole. What about my personal
story and queer identity? No sign of change there from Hillsong.
(28:44):
Will Hillsong affirm gay people? The message we're getting is no,
will gay people be accepted in leadership roles? No? Will
Hillsong be more clear on their message? The sign we're
getting is no. But the message is still welcome home,
you belong here. It's time for a final catch up
(29:05):
with Oh Hardy. We're not surprised that Hillsong doesn't want
to talk on the record. From your perspective, does it
look any different to the Hillsong that you left? To
be honest, I guess different in terms of the leader
at the front, the person holding the mic, But in
terms of systems, I see it the same, Like nothing
(29:26):
has changed. The system was founded the way it was
and they liked it the way it was and it's
not going to shift from that. Yeah, I've also been wondering,
I mean, for you, is there going to be a
point where you draw a line and say, Hillsong is
so far in the revision mirror now I'm not thinking
about it talking about it anymore, Like are you ever
gonna have you ever sort of set that point for
(29:46):
yourself or are you just kind of just kind of
rolling with it. That's a great question. I think as
a person of color, as a queer person, when you
go through experiences, you often and to use your story
in order to advocate for change, and knowing that things
(30:07):
are not going to change in terms of LGBTQ policies,
if they were to change our LGBTQ policies, then I'd
be like, Okay, my work is done. But if they
didn't until the day they change their LGBTQ policies and
actually say we do not affirm LGBTQ people within their website,
make it loud and clear that they are homophobic, then
(30:30):
I will stop talking. I think that's the line I'm
going to draw, But for now that hasn't happened, So
I'm going to continue to do it. That's really admirable.
I think it's really cool if you're still energized by it.
And yeah, I think like you have to have a
good sense of division within your life. I have the
Noemi that goes to work, the Noemi that goes to
(30:52):
advocate for LGBTQ people within the work that I do
outside of all of this, and then there's a Noemi
that speaks out within this podcast or within Hillsong Realms.
Once I walk out of here, I'm gonna take a
deep breath and say, Okay, now let's go have fun.
I don't need to carry this all day with me.
(31:14):
But it takes years for things to change when you're
speaking out, and it hurts and it's sad, but it's
the reality of how Hillsong had us before, where Hillsong
was our whole life. So then to now have it
only be a small part of your life where you're
speaking out, that's really hard to make that division. But
I think it's also empowering to do that, to place
(31:36):
that situation in a little box and to be able
to go have fun. I think, honestly, that's the best
form of revenge. That's the best form of justice and
accountability that I have found within to be able to
pick up and be happy. Yeah, you got a smile
an her face. Man, it's the hard work of healing. Awesome. Yeah,
(32:00):
should we see? Yeah, let's go. Look. I want to
get a flag. This is New York Pride twenty twenty two,
my first time here. For me, it feels like the
best end to my story. We started the Pride Parade
just a couple of blocks from Hillsong Church. It no
longer has the power to hurt me. It's fun. Welcome
(32:22):
to my life. It all came together and it all
became even more special and monumental in my life. When
I was able to walk in the Pride Parade, I
got to take back the start and finish where I
wanted to finish, without someone telling me where to go
(32:44):
or what to do, and telling me who I could
or couldn't love. I think that for me was very special.
You could hear Teddy barking in the back. He also
believes it was special, even though he didn't go. It
brings me to tears because I went through so many
(33:06):
dark nights and to just hear myself embrace all of
me in that parade and just like seeing the people
around cheering and like embracing and yelling and accepting me
was like a very big contrast in comparison to my
experience at a Hillsong where I was told to complete opposite.
(33:30):
So yeah, a lot of emotions. I started the series
wanting to do this, get answers from Hillsong. I'm still
waiting to shine a light on things Hillsong didn't want
to see. We've done that, and to take back power.
(33:52):
This march and this series was definitely a take back
from me. I'm nomoibe and this is false prophets, and
I want to thank everyone who shared their stories with me.
Special thanks to l Hardy. The series producer was Louise Cotton,
(34:13):
Assistant producer was Leo Schick. Thanks to our executive producer
Alex Holland's sound design was by David Thomas. Location production
in Australia was by Sharon Davies and thanks to our
production manager Carrie Louder. The development producer was Naomi Harvey.
(34:36):
False Prophets Hillsong is a story Glass production and is
distributed by iHeartRadio. The executive producer from iHeartRadio is Dylan Fagan,
with special thanks to beth N Macaluso.
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