Cult radio

Three women with in-depth knowledge of cults have launched a homegrown podcast aiming to address issues here

When Caroline Ansley started the Centrepoint Restoration Project in 2016 to help other former children of the Albany community share their stories, it was a daunting and lonely mission. Five years later, the Christ church doctor went public in a television documentary and with an open letter published in the New Zealand Herald and on the project’s website.

Last month, she launched another project into the cultsphere, “Cult Chat”, a new podcast on Christ church-based access radio station Plains FM, which she hosts with two other passionate educators who have plenty of cult recovery expertise.

One is former schoolteacher Liz Gregory from the Gloriavale Leavers’ Support Trust (GLST) in Timaru. Since 2013, the GLST team of four has helped resettle more than 200 people who left the fundamentalist Christian enclave, inland from Greymouth on the West Coast, offering them a tailored transition plus housing and legal support.

The other is Lindy Jacomb, who was excommunicated at age 20 from the Exclusive Brethren community she grew up in and shunned. In March, the Wellington mother of two founded Olive Leaf Network, not just for ex-Brethren but everyone from similar high-demand religious groups. Her fledgling volunteer organisation was inspired by GLST and groups such as Pathways, in Melbourne, for those leaving Orthodox Judaism.