Gerald Flurry was my “pastor” while in WCG from 1977 to 1981 in Pasco, Washington. His wife Barbara was my best friend. We used to go walking together. Dennis Leap and Deborah Leap were members. They invited us over to their home for dinner. I believe I was told Gerald’s father committed suicide. His mother lived in Pasco. I remember her as well as Laura and Stephen, his children.
Gerald was very controlling and authoritative. I remember one time he eyed me up and down and I felt violated. He came to counsel me one time because my then husband was having an affair and one of the PCG members noticed my then husband’s car in front of another woman member’s house. They had been having this affair for 2 years. Gerald and Barbara came visiting to tell me. He said to me, referring to my husband, “I don’t care if he’s doing it with Lonnie Anderson on the front lawn.”
One time I was told to stay away from services for 2 months because I was “sowing discord among the brethren.” What I had done was tell another member the truth about some discrepancy between what we were being told to do and the ministers getting away with the same thing.
Through a 12 step program and working those steps, I was able to be restored to sanity enough to leave. That was in 1987. I was a broken, demoralized, brain-washed woman. My husband, who was then 41 and had been in the cult since he was 11, left the same day I did; however, he left because I did and didn’t have his own “AHA” moment. He was a Narcissistic Sociopath and left our marriage of 20 years 4 years after our exit from WCG.
In 1996 I entered an inpatient rehab in Albany, Ohio, called Wellspring Retreat. It is no longer in operation. It provided healing for victims of cult abuse. I was there for 2 weeks trying to heal from WCG as well as my marriage to this other imposter. Even all these years later, when I read these stories, I am triggered and feel dissonance.
I am amazed at my own recovery. I am a Christian, healed from the trauma enough to share my story with others and touch lives with love and compassion. I would call myself a wounded healer. There is hope for all of us abused by WCG and evil people like Gerald Flurry. We cannot only survive, we can thrive, because God promises He will never leave or forsake us, even when we are deceived by wolves in sheep’s clothing.
By Caroline (Former member of WCG)
May 8, 2022
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