Faith After the High-Control Church: Rebuilding What You Believe

Music Hello and welcome to another episode of the William Bram Historical Research Podcast. I'm your host, John Collins, the author and founder of William Bram Historical Research at William-bram.org, and with me I have my co-host and friend, Christian RC, former charismatic and Latin America. Christian, it's good to be back and to tackle this very difficult subject that you've given me. You know, it's one that people have requested. It's one that I... I don't go there too often because actually it's a little painful for me to talk through it. I don't know about you and we'll get into that as we talk, but

when you leave the high-control church, there is this painful journey that you go on. And the question that people ask and I'll ask it right now is how do you keep your faith while you're leaving the high-control church. And I'll admit it's very, very difficult, especially if you're in one of the more destructive ones like I came out of. Every single aspect of the Bible was taught incorrectly right down to the plan of salvation. In fact, whenever I left, what we came out of and we went to a new church, they were explaining the plan of salvation and I

said, no, you guys are wrong. And then he opens up the Bible to the New Testament. He reads it like almost a verbatim and I'm like, oh man, how did I miss that? That's like the most important part of Christianity. So your view of what Christianity is is wrong. And then you're grasping it straws trying to hold on to your faith, but what you're grasping to hold on to usually isn't actually your faith. It's the cult indoctrination. So with that, I'll let you introduce it, but this is a topic that has been requested quite a bit.

Yeah, I've seen a trend that it's called like faith, the construction, the problem that I've seen at least under surface. Because I don't believe it in essence, it's the wrong thing. I think that you should be able to go very and to be very honest with your faith and examine what you believe and just examine if that's true according to the Bible or if it's just something that somebody else told you. The problem that I've been watching lately, it's that a lot of famous people started saying that, hey, I used to be a Christian and now I want to a faith deconstruction process and I am not

of a believer anymore. And yes, that is a risk. Part of it, at least in my case, and we were joking previously of others, is that you get so bitter when you understand that you have been part of a cult or a denomination that was not entirely correct. And maybe you spent many, many years working there and making your entire life and building your identity around this belief, set of beliefs, and that it gets really hard and painful to go back and just realize that a lot of the things that you used to believe were wrong. So that is the most painful part of a process and we're

going to discuss some of the things that it implies later on. However, I think that yes, out of that bitterness that it can produce and out of that pain and grief, a lot of bad things can come out. But if you do it in the right way, it will be the one thing that will save your life.

You know, I've had this conversation with multiple people from multiple high control groups who have escaped. And I'm one of the people that I'm very open whenever I have an opinion and I'm very open to a difference in opinion. So in my opinion, there are certain people that really have to deconstruct. But in the cases that I have spoken to some of the people in the high control groups, they're right on the edge of maybe they really don't need to. So here's the example that I gave on one of the podcasts recently. It's like the Jenga game where you pull the blocks out,

say the entire base is correct. You have the plan of salvation correct, you have grace, you have all of these things correct, but you bolted on top of it, spiritual warfare and some of the gnar stuff.

Well, the base is correct and you can kind of replace the pieces at the top. But what if the foundation is wrong? What do you do with this? And I have been in situations where I've been dealing with people who have escaped and their entire core is wrong as was mine. And what you try to do is you try to do the Jenga thing at the top and you're replacing pieces up here and they never fit because the base is incorrect. And there came a point in my life whenever we were, so I left the the high demand group that we were in, the brand and called. And I started entering it to

mainstream Christian churches and I told my family, I'm leaving a Christian. I am not giving up on God, I'm giving up on brand, I'm that's what I told my family. Here's the problem. When you're in a very highly destructive group, leaving the church to them is leaving Christ. And so we were taught, I was taught that I was leaving God. And what do you do with it?

you leave. And immediately that question goes in your head and you're thinking, am I really? Am I really leaving God? So what I did was I took the journey away from the cult into the church and I tried to rebuild what I had and build it back correctly. And there came a point. It took me about a year or two years. I realized that I was never going to fix my foundation. It was just so vastly wrong. And so I'll never forget to look on the minister's face. It took me about to lunch one day. And I said, okay, I'm messed up. I am totally wrong in so many things. I'm going to start with

a clean white slate. I know nothing. Teach me Christianity. They're scratching their... What? What the John just say? That's really how I did it. I started from square one. You believe the virgin birth white, do you believe it? So then they talk about that. You believe Jesus died on the cross white, do you believe it? And I just went through the basic fundamentals that every Christian should go through. And what I was doing was I was building back to the Jenga blocks. I was building it back up from the core. So for me, it was so wrong. I had to deconstruct. However, we've had guests on the

podcast who their core was kind of right. Some of them actually were even in mainstream churches and got sucked into an R and then escaped. Well, you can just take that little piece off the top that's wrong and you can build from your base. So all of this to say, I think it's not a yes or no thing. It's a broad spectrum that you have to deal with. I totally agree with that. It's funny because in Costa Rica, it would be really interesting to ask many questions and to many people regarding that because it feels like, let's say you're living a church because this is so

not and it's obviously wrong in some of their teachings and it's the worship is based on experiential Christianity and more in the new age thing than just a true worship. But then you would leave and the question will arise. Well, where will I leave because everything's pretty much the same nowadays. Like this going into the unknown thing, it's one of the worst thing that can happen because you kind of have to be prepared to face the same issues everywhere. And my answer to that was actually my therapist told me this at some point and she said, Hey, Chris,

you know, the very first thing that God gives you when you know that he exists when you have an encounter with him is freedom. Why would you want to be sounded to anything else than him after that.

And whatever puts on your shoulders any kind of slavery, that's not gonna come, it's not coming from him. So that's my key thought to start the podcast.

Well, even though we have a few moments stuck in now for a few minutes, but yeah, the first thing is, God will give you freedom. Why wouldn't you want to lose it being part of one of those groups on high control group?

And that is in some cases what awakens the person. Absolutely. And the group that we came out of, there was a core doctrine that had entered into the healing revivals. So this would have been broader than just branimism, but we heard it very clearly in branimism that a Christian must forfeit their rights.

I heard that over and over. There was a sermon talking about it. In other words, we're going to ask you to get rid of your freedom. And we're going to tell you what to do.

That when you start to hear this, you're in a high demand group because they're demanding that you obey their rules. And that's not really how Christianity is. Whenever I started to learn the basic fundamentals of Christianity after I left the church and started going to new churches, it was more of a come as you are mentality because if you try to impose rules like this, how are you going to attract the center?

They're going to say, well, no, I'm not going to forfeit my freedom. And you can never even spread the gospel like this. So even logically, it doesn't make sense. What I came to realize is that type of mentality where you're forfeiting freedom is not to spread the gospel and grow the church.

It's to corral those who might escape. So it's really a container. That's all it is. What happens if that very thing that you just said is the same thing that is happening in any church, but nobody is openly saying like that, saying it like that.

Because at the end of the day, you're going to get involved in church serving as we call here in Costa Rica is a very common term. It's said to be Doris or Ukiyedis, or just basically the people that have some kind of responsibility within the church.

They will ask you to do something and you're going to do it in the best way you can because you're serving God. What's going to happen is that you're doing it so good that somebody else is saying, oh, he has potential.

Let's give him this responsibility as well. And sooner than later, you're going to be 24-7 there with a lot of responsibilities and forfeiting you're at freedom at the end of the day. But yeah, I totally agree with you.

And it's something very common in nobody. Well, not a lot of people seem to know that nowadays. And I noticed, I've scanning through the notes that you sent me, I noticed this one. This is one of the most important ones that I have not ever talked about on this podcast, but it is in leaving, it is part of your journey that you must embrace.

And that is all of the fear that's going to come, the guilt, the second thoughts, the doubts. I mean, you could almost spin off a new podcast entirely on that one subject that you had to do this.

Totally. Think of this. So I have children. And children go through phases, especially when they turn into their teenage years, it's, if you have boys like I do, it's pretty hard. There comes a point whenever they're going through the changes in life internally and they're adjusting to now becoming a young man.

And they get, they get a little headstrong. And sometimes if they're very emotional, some kids will say, you're not my father. And they'll just, they'll say things like this, they'll question you, they'll do all of these things.

Does it mean that they're not my son? And the first time that that happened when we were out of the cult, I thought my world had crumbled because we were in a weird fantasy world where you cannot question anything.

You cannot doubt. If you do, we've talked about this, you and I, unbelief is sin in the group. They don't allow you to think. So by that same logic, I would have to tell my son, okay, you're not welcome in my house ever again.

Get out. You're no longer my son because I'm going to cut you off. That's what a cult or a high demand group does. But what you do as a father, you say, no, I love you.

I am your father, you can go through these things and I'll help you go through it. Well think of you as a Christian, leaving something so horrific, you're going to be emotional. You're going to think things that you'd wouldn't normally think, do things you wouldn't normally do.

And if you're a Christian, when you leave, or even if you're not, you have to believe that if there is a God, he's not going to be this, I almost used a four-letter word.

It's pretty bad what they treat you to do, train you to do in these groups. If you believe in a God that's that evil, it's not really the God of the Christian Bible. I'll just say it like that.

It's a God that is a different God that you really don't even want to serve. So for me, that is part of the journey. You have to embrace it. Like you said, it becomes one of the things that will decide how you grow later, how you handle the journey, how you handle the fear, the guilt, all of these things.

That is going to determine how successful you are. And if you embrace it, you have a strong chance for success. Yeah, one of the things that I would say very openly is that killed may be the results of years of conditioning.

a simple as it sounds. The problem is that everything you are, everything you think has been permeated some way or another by the idea of God somebody else have. So it implicitly changed your perspective.

And yes, you're going to be fearing that you're doing the wrong thing. You will have second thoughts just as any human would have, because you don't have to punish yourself, you know, because you're having second thoughts. And I would think actually that it is the perfect opportunity for you to learn if you, if you, if what you believe is right or wrong, because anytime you have a second thought about something, try to find the root of what it is. Maybe it is, it's a doctrinal foundation that is wrong. Maybe it's a relationship thing where you believe that if you are not part of this

group, it's like the us versus them, right? We are the ones who have all truth. The rest of the people have no idea how this thing is or how faith works or who God is because they're wrong.

So we are right. They're wrong. Therefore, if you go outside this group, you're going to be wrong as well. Yeah, that black and white mentality. That's another thing that's part of the thing that's fueling the fear and the guilt is you realize when you get into the real world that there's not really many things that are black and white. You go back to the 10 commandments, they'll shout not kill.

Well, what if you were in a war and the people of the immune forces are coming to attack your wife and children? Are you going to step up and fight the battle? There were Christians who, during the world wars, they did not do that because very black and white, it's, it's a black and white mentality, we will not fight. I'm not going to argue or debate whether that was right or wrong, but the point I'm making is not everything is black and white. There are usually situations that you have to think through. When you go through that, suddenly you realize that my black and white world

didn't really exist. We just pretended that it did and everything that they told us that we must do, it really was not for my good, it was for their good. And let's do just a pretty simple exercise here. I'm going to ask you a question, what is bigger? Any congregation here on earth or God? That answer is very simple. Yeah, of course. So why should we think that our protection or our safety comes from a congregation, a church, or a group. If we know and understand that God is above everything. So, you know, there's that is a really simple answer, but for somebody

who's escaping or leaving a congregation or a high control group or any kind of denomination where there's this things happening. It's amazing, but it's a really common thing to feel. You're going to feel that you don't have any support, that you have no covering, that the devil's going to get you and he has power over you because you decided to leave. That's pretty much how it feels. The next thing that you had in the list is something that I never really thought about while we were in the movement that we came out of. So in the modern New

Apostolic Reformation, there's this concept of a spiritual covering and you have to submit to a leader and the leader gives you the covering. There's a lot of weird doctrines out there. We actually looked down on those types of doctrines. We thought that this was crazy. At the same time, we had it. If you were part of the group, you were under the covering, you're under the blessing. If you weren't part of the group, you weren't part of the blessing. And they took it a step further. If you were not a Christian, you might even be Buddhist. If you were

a Buddhist and you were kind to somebody who's under that covering, they too might make it into heaven because they were kind to us. So it's a weird thing. We're salvation really meant nothing.

What Jesus did on the cross meant nothing to the people. I had that mentality because I was under the shelter of the high control group. After I left and I discovered that, wait a minute, what we had is very eerily similar to all of these new charismatic churches. I took it a step further.

I wanted to know, well, how far does that go? And so I started looking beyond the New Apostolic Reformation. That's part of what drove me through the Pentecostal journey of studying all of the Pentecostal extreme groups. And in many of the extremist groups, it's the same way. If you're part of our group, you're under our covering. If you're not part of our group, you're not. Well, once you leave and you're no longer under that covering, oh my gosh, the fear that hits you is instantaneous.

You feel like you have just stepped out into a body of water. The ship has left you and you're swimming with the sharks. Yeah. I 100% agree with you because there was a time where I left one specific church and I went to another just in the meantime. There were some friends that I have and these other congregation. And I needed this time just to think and to understand what just happened. And when I left the first church, I had this feeling of Oh my God, I am alone.

I'm like, what is this? I'm surrounded by my family and I still have friends from that specific church. But I feel so lonely. It's so weird that probably only if you have ever experienced that you know what I'm talking about.

The problem is that we tend to see things like if this is happening and this is how I feel, that must be the product of me leaving God or being away from God. And that is, of course, coming from the experiential Christianity where you based everything you do and everything you think on how you feel, which is, of course, wrong.

But over time, you realize, yet hey, after all Moses wasn't a desert alone by himself, right?

So you don't need to be surrounded of people and you don't need to be in a congregation to have a wonderful relationship with God. And this fear of being alone in your faith is coming from maybe a different perspective that you were taught.

And I agree with you, anybody of the levers will be a great thing for you once the time is right. Because if you just jump from one to the other, again, I mean, the second church that I was visiting, I was there for the time.

I was not intending to be like, okay, so that's gonna be my church, my congregation, made friends and everything. But I knew that I was going through a process and I was actually grieving a lot of the things what happened at the first one.

And the only thing that I'll say to that is I differ from some of my peers in that I don't think that everyone immediately enters into the right time to enter a new church after they've left their previous church.

I believe that some people are so bruised they really have to take a step back and just heal first and then try to join a church. It's much like if you were in a situation where your spouse and your spouse was abusing you, if you go to your therapist, they will tell you don't immediately start dating again because every face that you see is gonna be the face of the man who hits you.

Yeah, and I'll go deeper than that. Probably you're gonna choose the same people, the same mindset in a different person. It's the same with churches. You're so used to it that the one thing that will make you feel right is pretty much the same pattern again.

Absolutely. It was very painful for me, even still today. I have learned that... church was made for me, not me made for the church, and that's the opposite of the mentality that you're trained when you're in the Hyde a man group. The Hyde a man group will tell you that you were made to serve the church. Well, there's nothing in the Bible that says this. It just simply does not exist. And so when I realized that, my world kind of lightened, my load that was on my shoulders lightened, because if I feel safe, if I feel secure, I'll go. If I feel like

this is really going to be painful if I go, I don't go. I have a question for you, another one. I've been asking a lot of questions to you lately. So you told me something about the inner child and one of our previous podcasts. And one of the things that happened when you're on a high controlled group is the last of connection with oneself. So that, of course, the inner child and everything. But you stop leaving for yourself and start leaving for the church, for the grip, for the pastor, for your disciples, for everyone but you. And at the end of the day, and I remember

this was so common within church, people were tired. Like you would ask any leader, you would ask any pastor and just, hey, how are you? Oh, brother, I'm tired. And it's funny because at the end of the day, service to God was done in such an extreme way that neglects oneself. So that is a huge problem. And that is because one of the topics that I have in the list is, who will I become after I leave? Because the one thing that you should do is try to reconnect with yourself.

And you also set something that whatever you like to do, whatever you like to hear music or movies or whatever that's from the devil, you should not do it. And of course, you know, your group was really extreme. Nowadays, it's not so hard in Costa Rica. I remember when it was like a sin if you dance or if you listen to any kind of music that is not 100% Christian worship.

Right. But yes, you lost the connection to yourself because you're trying to live a life so godly that you will neglect his own creation, which is you. We were told that all music that wasn't the old timey Christian music was of the devil. And especially the Beatles. The Beatles were number one.

Because remember, I grew up hearing recordings from 1947 and 1965. Beatles was like public enemy number one among all the evangelicals back then. So I grew up in a world where Beatles was public enemy number one.

And one of the first things that I did when I was able to conquer the fear was I went and I got the collection of the Beatles greatest hits. And I listened to it. I made myself listen to it.

I actually didn't like it at first. I do now, but I didn't like it then. But the first thought that came in my head won't resonate with any of the younger crowd today. The older people will know what I'm talking about.

Back whenever I was a kid, when you go into the elevator, they played what's called elevator music. And it's this old calm soothing, not too exciting music, a hum drum music. That's the thought that you went through my head. When I heard the Beatles, I was like, what is this? This is like elevator music to me.

Now I have progressed. I listened to other music. If you look at my Spotify collection, it's literally everything from classical music to jazz. I do not like rap. I don't know if I can make myself like rap.

But I do like I like a wide variety of music. And that's a new freedom that I never had when I was in the group. You know, it's it's those little things that you lose over time that keeps adding one to to the other.

And at the end, you lose your identity because you're becoming something else. And I agree with you that there's a lot of things that when you come to Christ, you repent and stop doing.

And if for like let's take, for example, the music, I was really into heavy metal and really dark music before I came to God. It took me years. And I mean like good 15 to 18 years to go back and you know, analyze those kind of genres without me like having the same feeling that I had with when I was really into it.

And of course, I'm there's a lot of bands that I'm not going to listen because it's pretty obvious that there are cans. Everything I believe now. But there's a lot of bands that does not, you know, and that's just a really simple example of that.

But what if if you like to do anything that you stop doing because you don't, you can use that time for teaching somebody or to discipling someone or you end up losing yourself and losing your identity.

And that's a really sad thing because that's one of the things that hit hardest to anyone leaving high control group. And pretty much the only way. E that I was able to go on with my life was going to therapy, basically, because I'd coming from a group like that, you don't have the tools to assess yourself.

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One of the biggest things that a high control group will rob from you is your opinion. They will tell you that your opinion must match the central figure's opinion if there's a central figure.

Sometimes there is an array of central figures, apostles or prophets, whatever you want to call these guys. But when it really comes down to it, their doctrines are mostly based off of their opinions.

If you look back at the post-World War II healing revival, there was a lot of change happening in America and some of the old timers were just so reluctant to change that they started preaching the change literally as of the devil.

And all these new things that are coming, these newfangled things that are coming, that's the devil's tools. And what happened was it bred a lot of people, there were people who were raised in it, like me, who was not allowed to have my opinion.

And one of the freedoms that I have, you're talking about the music and some bands are good to listen to, some have total polar opposite views of what we believe. I learned to have my opinion in all things, because as long as your opinion isn't doing something destructive, I'll put a boundary around my opinion.

For example, one of the bands that almost every Christian hates, and they will be hate mail in the comments whenever I say this, the band KISS, Christians had, they spread this propaganda saying it was knights in Satan's service, all of this stuff, none of which is really true if you know the history.

But they say this is an evil band you shouldn't listen to if they paint their face like clowns and they, you know, whatever it is. Anyway, I listened to the music, I wasn't really that much of a fan.

Until somebody gave me the song Beth, somebody said, hey, you need to listen to the song. the Beth by the band KISS. And so I listened to it. One of the most beautiful songs that I've ever heard was Beth by KISS. And I came to realize that it is my opinion. I like that song.

It's my opinion. Most of the other stuff I don't like. But I'm allowed to have that opinion.

We were in the mentality where it's all or nothing. Just because somebody didn't like the way that they dressed or painted their faces or whatever, or the name they tried to imply it was knights in Satan's service, you had to match their opinion and you were forced into their opinion.

And what it does is it robs you of your identity. If you don't have an opinion that you can claim as your own, you don't have an identity. Totally agree with you. Now there's an interesting thing that happened to me a few days ago. I was talking to a friend and he told me, hey, the reason I left my church was because I was having issues with my marriage.

It was getting hard to, you know, just to get by. No big issues, no real big big issues, but we were having just a bad time after so many years and debts and whatnot.

And I left the church because they were not prepared to help me. They were not prepared. To deal with things that I was going through with my marriage. And I, and this person told me I realized that they were not professionals and that they were not capable of handling trauma.

And this is something that I'm very aware of, like just because you're a leader or a pastor, doesn't mean that you have all the necessary tools to deal with domestic violence issues or with medical issues or addressing any kind of traumatic event. So you should, and knowing that, seek qualified help for those kind of things. And the problem is that they will tell you, oh yeah, yeah, professional help is very important. But go to this person and they will tell you right away who you can go to and who can and who you can't because probably they share the same mentality

of them. So one of the things that I highly encourage is going and seeking qualified help of a professional, even if it's not of a labor. Absolutely. And I want to stress that last part.

I am actually of the opinion that if you have been bruised and spiritually abused by a high-demand group, a cult or destructive group, you probably shouldn't go to a Christian counselor. And I'm saying that I know that there are people who will argue with me.

They will say, yes, but if you do this, they'll try to talk you out of belief in God. I can assure you that if you go to a good counselor, they're trained not to do that.

That is, that goes actually against the code of conduct of going to a therapist. They aren't allowed to do that. So if you go to somebody who is a Christian counselor, what happens is sometimes they'll use language that triggers the programming in your head.

And suddenly you can't communicate at the level you need to with a therapist because you have been so bruised that now your language shuts down. And it just simply, in many cases, does not work.

So I recommend at least start with somebody who is not advertising his Christian counseling. And what you'll find is the one that I went to is not by no means a Christian counselor, but what you find out later is, well, he actually is a Christian.

They just don't advertise that way. So everybody has to feel their own, find their own way and make their own choices, but I do recommend against it just because of the triggering. Yes, I 100% agree.

Now, one more topic that for me, it was really important and it was actually the hardest thing for me to do for many, many reasons. But have you ever heard this saying that like forgiveness or unforgiveness is like drinking a poison, expecting somebody else to die?

No, but it sounds very similar to what actually happened when you do this. Yeah, well, you have to forgive. That is one of the hardest things because, of course, there's so many wrong things, but you have to understand that leaving physically does not always mean that you're going to leave emotionally that specific group because anger and resentment and unforgiveness can keep the former leader at the center of your life even if you're not there.

So one of the things that, well, it's actually one of the things that God asked us to do is just to forgive, right? And it is so hard and I understand it. I validate the anger that comes with realizing that you've been in a group that is way off, bevelically, and that you have been groomed or you've been bruised, but I understand that and I validate that.

And I agree with you that, you know, maybe in the early stages of you living the last thing you want to do is just to forgive, but eventually you're going to have to do it because it's part of your healing process.

How was your experience with forgiveness, John? Because my experience was hard and it was hard. art for me. It took me a good amount of years to start forgiving people and going back even in some cases and talking to those people. But how was your experience? Because in your case, it was way much extremist, right?

Yeah, it was a very destructive group and a lot of people who leave the group that I left, they really struggle even to talk to somebody who was in it even if that person is being kind to them because the group was so incredibly destructive. I'm different because I'm an empath and so I'm actually going to give different advice than you. There's like I said, there's a broad spectrum of things that can happen when you leave. There are people who struggle with forgiveness and you have to work through that because if you can't forgive, you're never going to move on. You'll be stuck in your journey and you go no further.

There are other people like me who instantly forgave. I had no problem. In fact, my first thought was, oh my gosh, what have I done? It's my fault. It's not even their fault. And so I had to forgive myself first and then try to move on beyond that. And the problem that you run into if you're an empath is that you try to fix it. That's the first thing that comes in your head. I must fix this. Honestly, that's why I have this whole weird world where I'm helping all these people because I'm that much of an empath. When you're that way, there comes a

point when you have to realize that not everybody wants to be fixed. And it took me a long time to learn this lesson because I wanted to fix it. I thought the very first thing that I published that, you know, they believe this guy is a prophet and there's not a single successful prophecy. How can you say this? The moment I published this and showed clear examples, I thought, well, there's going to be this mass exodus. Everybody will leave. And then they didn't. And so I'm stuck there as an empath thinking, well, what's the next thing I do? And the next thing and the next thing. And

it developed into this massive thing that exists today. So part of it is good in that it's now helping a lot of people. But the problem for me was it nearly destroyed me because I could not I could not grasp having a situation that I could not fix. And I wanted to fix it so badly.

And it took me years to move past that. I'm past it now to some extent. But there's this part of me that thinks I don't want any more children to be raised in this destructive thing. I must help them. And I'm still going to go after it. So there's two sides of the coin. If you're like me, you're an empath, you have to work through that and you're probably going to have to get into some sort of a therapy to get past it. Yeah. And I would like also to just to mention a couple of things

of what is not. forgiveness. And it's not returning back to the same group, believing that you have a different mentality and that you have to go back. And as you said, fix everything or at least show them anything. It's not going to go well. And it's not to restore the trust in anyone who harmed you in any way. And it's not eliminate legal or institutional accountability or consequences if you've phased any kind of abuse. And it does not require reconciliation with an unrepentant or unsafe person. Because guess what's going to happen when you go back to that person,

he or she is going to try to do the same thing he did. And most likely, he's going to success.

And it's not your fault. It's probably it's not time or you don't have yet the tools to stop that from happening. So those things are not forgiveness. But I think, as you said, it's a very, very important thing. And the other thing that I'll say is it does not have to impede your boundaries or your new freedoms. We came out of a very destructive sect that was based off of Pentecostalism. So the ladies had to have the Pentecostal dress code, the long dresses, the long hair, all of the stuff. And once they left, they tried to reconcile and fix things like

I do. And they wanted to fix the family relationship. And what they found was the family said, you are only allowed in our house if you're wearing a dress. If you're wearing pants, you're not welcome. And so what the family has tried to do is try to rob them of their new freedom. You can't wear these pants. You can't wear these shorts. And I'm going to control you when you're my house.

That's essentially what they're saying. And the first question that I have is, have you responded to them? Well, that's fine. But if you come to my house, you have to wear pants and you can't wear those skirts. That's an example of boundaries. They're trying to overstep their boundaries. And they're wanting to do it without you setting your own boundaries. And you can't allow this. You have to stand up and say, that's not the way things work in the world. Yes, I agree with you.

That's actually a very common thing that happens in Costa Rican churches. They will right away tell you, okay, here's what you have to do. Here are the rules because we want to honor God. It's not even because of us. It's because we want to do the godly thing and we want to honor God. And that's how it goes. So don't take it personally. It's not me. It's just how God likes it. Or it's the God.

godly way. The other thing that I'll mention is when you begin this journey, there's a psychological thing that happens. You suddenly experience trauma. And sadly, there's no way around it. Trauma changes how the brain works. And I'm not a professional psychologist, so I'm not trying to overstep my bounds. You can go to a psychologist and learn this in the same way that I did. But there are there are tools you have to use psychological tools to help overcome your trauma. Because it will change the way you think. It will change the way that you react. One of the things that I still

actually struggle with today, although it's far decreased, is the same thing interestingly that my dog has. My dog, when it gets agitated, when it gets scared, its first reaction is to bark. And that's something that I have learned I have to do with this dog. When my dog is afraid of another dog, it will lunge at it. That's really how weird this is because that's how they're reacting. Well, I'm the same way. Whenever something happens that makes me uncomfortable, my very first thought is I want to get red in the face. I want to get hot under the collar and say something

I shouldn't say. And that was happening a lot when I first left. I was not looking back. I was not a person that I would have even liked to be around. And I couldn't help it. So one of the things that a therapist will work through with you is, well, you have just experienced trauma. What is happening is the things that you are reacting to are not actually what your brain is telling you, you're reacting to. You're actually reacting to your trauma, but you're taking it out on the person who is getting confrontational. So I had to deal with this. And it is something that a lot

of people I think will because they're like anything. There are varying levels of trauma that you experience when you leave. Some people, they leave and it's not a lot of traumas just a little.

But for me, it was probably the most traumatic thing that I ever went through my entire life. Yes. And I agree. And I have one last question for you, my friend. And I know it's a very open question you can spend anytime. But the question is, and I'm going to answer first before you answer, who did you become after you leave? In my case, I became a father and a husband, a better professional.

I grew in so many areas. Interestingly enough, I thought that it was not ready to do anything, any of those things when I was in church because I was not ready. The thing that was, the teaching that I got was, well, if you want to form a family here's what you have to do, this is what you need to do.

This is set of things, set of rules, this is exactly what you need to do in order to become a father, a husband, a better professional. This is what I left it the group and I became all of those things, I'm not perfect by any means, but what I'm saying is don't ever think that because you'll leave a group, you're not going to be able to achieve any kind of success in those areas because it's not just your relationship with God, what is affected within those groups is your entire personality.

If you have a complex, if you don't think that you're enough, probably one of the things that you're going to fear the most when you leave is not being good enough to be alone in the journey of faith with God.

So when I was in a group that trained us to believe that we had all mysteries opened, the leader had given us all secret knowledge, we had this thing that nobody else in the world had.

So what you left is this mentality of not only pride, but pride and instant knowledge of everything. You are a know-it-all, simply put your know-it-all. And at the same time, you're rude, obnoxious, you don't treat people with respect, all of that indoctrination.

I could go right down the list of all of the flaws that were part of the indoctrination process. I left as that person, and I left and I remained that person. I probably remained that person for two or three years, and I realized after leaving and thinking it through, I really didn't like who I was.

And I think the only way that I can answer this, I find myself on a journey where I actually know very little, and in my lifetime, I may never even scratch the surface of the things that I want to know.

And at the same time, I wasn't a good person, and I'm trying to train myself how to be a good person, and I realized that that may also be a lifetime to achieve, because not everybody can be perfect in this life, it's just that simple.

So I guess the best way to answer it is I find myself on a journey, and that's part of what we're discussing here. You begin this journey when you leave the High Command, High Control Group.

Yeah, definitely. I think one of the greatest things of podcasts like this, and YouTube channels like this, and etc, is that as soon as? Even as a person who's experiencing this kind of situations, no, no is aware that somebody else is going through the same situation, it immediately gets better for them.

It's easier to find information, to relate to a different person in this case in a different country or in Costa Rica, but it's pretty much the same all everywhere. So this is one thing that I want to thank you, and thanks everyone who's watching the podcast, and I wanted to say that if you are leaving a high control group, do not fear.

I mean, at the end of the day, God is loving God, is a caring God, is a caring Father that will protect His sons and daughters. And at the end of the day, if you trust God, He will make everything fit.

He will make a way you're going to get better. Everything's going to be better, eventually. Don't fear if you're going through a phase of uncertainty or pain or grieving everything you left behind. It's a very normal thing for everyone of us.

So just keep going, God will help you, and I hope this kind of content will help you as well. If you've enjoyed our show and you want more information, you can check us out on the web.

You can find us at William-Brandom.org. From more about the dark side of the new Apostolic Reformation, you can read Weaponized Religion from Christian Identity to the NAR, available on Amazon, Kindle, and Audible.