I never told you this. But I used to be in a . . cult.

I’m talking what must possibly be the most sophisticated theological con-job in history since the Mormons, run by non-criminal, initially dedicated, well-meaning Christian . . normal people.

Who somehow got corrupted.

By one man’s – make it two – hideously presumptuous obsessions.

I’m still a believer.

But I hate them.

Or at least their way.

No, I hate them. Sort of kidding. Forgiveness is complicated when they’re still doing it. At the least, it’s a work in progress.

Somehow I got out after 33 years and almost regained my humanity. I lost almost everything else though.

It all happened in suburban ‘Melbourne Christian Fellowship’, a restorationist ‘born again’ church originating in the 1950s in that Australian city’s inner and eastern suburbs.

I name them intentionally to defame them.

They deserve it. I lost the best 33 years of my life there from age 17–49.

I can never get it back.

Can an adult really expect sympathy?

They didn’t force me to stay there.

But in effect they did.

It started out great

I was in it for the grassroots Christianity. No robes or ceremony.

Straight Sermon on the Mount stuff.

Just living out the book of Acts.

In sincerity.

In the early 1980s it was refreshingly down to earth.

It was like ‘The Chosen’ in real life. I allude to the incredibly compelling streaming free TV show from Angel.com that recreates Jesus and the disciples as realistic people.

That’s how Christianity can be.

I’ve experienced it.

At MCF we were on mission and at every meeting and working bee. Because we wanted to be there. Bringing our friends along. And they stayed.

We shared a simplicity of life.

And incredibly clear and insightful Bible teaching. Pointing out how egalitarian church was supposed to be. A priesthood of all believers. A church actually run by an equal circle of elders.

And a global church of all denominations that was supposed be unified. It was our hope, expressed by Jesus in John 17, that it would literally occur.

The home groups were fantastic celebrations of fellowship.

We led perfectly free lives.

Yet slaves of Christ.

Just like in The Chosen.

It was near Utopian.

The leaven

But, all along, there was a leaven in the lump.

While we gave our lives to Christ, and confessed our sins sincerely one to another, the leader, all along, Ray Jackson Snr, an American (yeah, true) was deeply flawed.

He was seducing women young and old. And a few of his cronies were in on it and some doing the same.

And the inner circle had been controlled by him. It wasn’t really a circle of equal elders.

This all got revealed in 1988.

A second fall

It was devastating.

But because we thought the place was a ‘multiple eldership’, half of us stayed.

We thought, isn’t a multiple eldership enacted precisely for this reason? A few bad apples shouldn’t destroy us.

I wasn’t worshipping Ray Jackson Snr, I was worshipping Christ.

But, that eldership, controlled for so many years by Jackson, had become impotent. They were no longer thinking for themselves whatsoever.

So they sought another father figure, other than God.

It was the Brisbane chapter’s, BCF’s, Vic Hall.

A fascinating, verbally charming, intellectual Australian Christian leader up there.

But just as flawed as Jackson, not sexually, but in psychological control.

He’d secretly wanted to run the whole show for years.

Well, what happened next was the classic gradual switcheroo bait and hook.

Hall now controlled the 5000 person Australian mini-mega church.

And changed things imperceptibly every year for 5 years from 1992 to 1996.

Until the place, by 1996, became the exact opposite of a vibrant Christian community living the gospel in simplicity.

We got boiled like lobsters in an initially warm pot.

What started out as ‘taking up our cross’, following Jesus, became lunatic-level prescriptive control of our lives where your local elder would CREATE your ‘cross’. Himself.

The troubles and persecution of Christian life weren’t enough for Hall.

They had to create existential tribulations for us.

The teaching became all about navel gazing, denying oneself and psyching ourselves and each other out.

Spreading the gospel? What’s that?

But the theology was hideously intricate. Much more so than other ‘harsh shepherding’ discipleship movements. With 100 books to get lost in.

Mesmerisingly Biblically satisfying.

Oh, that’s what it meant!

Everything suddenly was interpretable as Christ healing us through our self denial. As guided and interpreted dutifully for you by your local elder.

And it didn’t matter if they got it right or wrong. The important thing was that we obeyed. And God knew anyway, so He’d fix it up. Maybe in the afterlife.

But, ultimately it was, of course, jibberish.

25 years of mind games

So, in my case, my academic life in biophysics and all my plans in biotechnology, business, AI and tech startup land got labelled . . a self-named idol.

I had to renounce my near life-long held dreams. Kind of the only talents I had.

That was my sacrifice to take up my cross.

Like the Rich Young Ruler that Jesus asks to sell all and follow Him.

I cried weekly. Bitterly. Take this cup from me.

They banned me from doing a US postdoc. They insisted God had something else.

But Australia wasn’t interested in a theoretical physics biologist who thought he could solve the protein structure prediction problem. After one grant, with no overseas postdoc pedigree, I became unemployable.

Then, next, they wouldn’t let me start my biotech or AI startup.

The initially kindly elders became assholes. Utter bastards. ‘Truthing in love’ they called it.

After lots of delays and hedging around David Bonham, alongside his two side-kick high school-dropout apprentices, announced to me:

No man can start a business without an elder asking them to

So I had to wait until he – an elementary school teacher – came up with a business I could start.

The fact we listened to crap like this at all proves the brainwashing, group think and manipulation we were under by that time in 1997.

They delayed my startups by beteeen 5 and 7 years. By that time the advantage I had was gone of course.

We couldn’t leave because, firstly they had prepped us that the self-denial was going to be hard.

And secondly, that church had been incredibly good for us. Initially. And was the lives of us, all our best friends, my parents, my sister’s family and for my 4 kids.

I was miserable for twenty-five years and was only 3/4s present in my marriage.

We got out in 2016.

It was like breathing again.

To do something – anything – I wanted to!

As a 49 year old for the first time since I was 29.

We’re all still together, and Christians, myself, Justine and the four kids, and somehow survived.

But we’re scarred for life.

We lost everything other than ourselves.

Zero savings. Lost the house. Lost all our friends. And my colleagues all think I’m a fruit cake. I lie. I have a few great colleagues outside of Christendom who have stood by me who I’m very thankful for.

Mission

We are our missions. Our life careers. More than people think at least.

To be robbed of that for 20 to 25 years is devastating. I am still getting over this.

To be mind-raped.

And to be manipulated into thinking that was the true Jesus.

I refer to MCF as the Satanic Church of the Vegetative State now. The plans and activity of our friends in that church are Satanically zero.

You are not allowed to have plans at MCF. That is ‘self-naming’, the worst sin possible.

And as of 2023 they’re shunning ex-members much more severely than previously. Our friends who left with grown-up kids still in there can no longer talk to them. Others cant contact their nieces and nephews or grandchildren. Our old friends in there mostly pretend we don’t exist.

The feeling of loss of opportunity is palpable. Waste of effort and great ideas. Just not being able to even try! For years. Loss of youth. The forced restrictions. Loss of friends.

God is healing us.

But the restoration is slow.

It took me a half-decade of slow ladder climbs in my 40s to retrain in professional AI, jumping from startup to startup. We might own a house, er mortgage, again by the time we hit 60.

In-between I worked for pennies in menial jobs.

It is indeed hard to trust again.