All language subtitles for Inside.the.Cult.of.the.Jesus.Army.S01E02.1080p.iP.WEB-DL.AAC2.0.H.264-RAWR_track3_[eng]

We're going to carry on
this process.

What happened to you
within the cult,

it sits in you and
causes discomfort.

It's a journey.
You know, it's challenging,

but it really is worth
grasping the nettle.

There were so many different kids,
so many things that happened.

It's just mad that it's repeated.

What about children now?

Yes, we're very keen on children,

and we're keen to see them
brought up

in the ways of Christ Jesus,
of course.

Jesus!

We battle against evil powers,

hosts of spiritual wickedness.

PERSON SPEAKS IN TONGUES

Expelled from
the Baptist Union

and disqualified from
the Evangelical Alliance,

to some, they're a dangerous cult.

In addition to this gruesome death,

there was another death in unusual
circumstances 18 months ago.

This Jesus Army is something that,

well, frankly, it disgusts me.

There are voices.

What have they said?

What damage have they done?

What gossip has come from them?

What lies have they told?

Lord,

we surrender our voices to you.

Welcome.

Nathan, we'll start with you.
What was your night like?

- Er, I fell asleep very quickly...
- Did you?

..but then I woke up at half three

- and just had everything repeating
itself.
- Was it buzzing?
- Yeah.

One thing in my head is
if it started up again,

there's no doubt that I'd go back
to that, because it is a security.

- That I feel unsecure being outside
of it...
- Really?

..living in the world. I don't feel,
it's not natural to me.

BOY SHOUTS

Whoa, whoa!

I was born into a church house
in Bugbrooke,

where the church first started.

Noel lived there.

So it was my whole life, basically.

In the name of the Lord, the prayer
of faith will heal the sick one.

Do you believe that
Jesus can do that?

- Yes, Lord!
- Yes!

As a kid, like, you spend hours

in meetings with Noel
shouting that you're going to hell

for doing stupid little things.

But there's nothing else
that I wanted to do

but be a disciple and be
in this church forever, basically.

THEY SING

With Noel, we all loved him.

For me, he was this character
that set a bar.

CHEERING

He had really high standards.

So it's a weird one, in a way.

He's still someone that I respect
for what he did.

The Jesus Army

has around 50 houses

for communal living.

They're now extending their network
across the country.

In that stage,
when I was growing up,

the Jesus Army was definitely
attracting younger people,

and he'd already built
a massive empire, basically.

But it was never enough for him.

He just wanted more
and more disciples,

and I think he would do that
any way that he could, really.

Before I joined Jesus Army
in the '90s,

I was into the punk movement

and I got involved in a band,

living that sex, drugs and
rock-and-roll lifestyle 24/7.

So when I became
a part of the church,

it began to get fed into me
about Noel having a focus

on getting more young people
into this organisation.

The leadership talked to me
about the rave scene,

like the house music dance scene,
and how to bring the message

to the masses using popular music.

So I said,
if we're going to do this properly,

let's do it properly.

We don't want to be
a second-rate knock-off.

We'd like you to come
onto the stage, Noel,

and receive the commissioning
to enter a new generation,

the change from Generation X
to Generation J -

Generation Jesus.

LOUD RAVE MUSIC PLAYS

A Jesus explosion!

# Now that we're Christian

# Jesus is our Saviour... #

They used to hire out warehouses

and have, like, warehouse parties
at that time.

It was just raving every weekend,
basically.

And because it was part of
the church,

I wasn't going to hell for it.
So, yeah, that's all good!

# Generation

- # Jesus is the way
- The way

# We are Generation J. #

SONG CONTINUES QUIETLY

Of course, the church,

traditionally, we'd always had

a general suspicion

of anything that comes
from the outside world.

And then, all of a sudden,

in the '90s,

we introduced this kind of music.

You know, on the one hand,
you're saying,

you know, we want to stay away
from the world.

On the other hand,
Noel's saying, we're prepared

to use worldly culture

in order to reach out to people.

There's that contradiction,
isn't there?

I think I was somewhere
in the middle,

in that recognising that it wasn't

the days of the '70s hippies,

peace and love, and what was

possible then any more.

Things had changed, and so

the means of communication
needed to change.

It's a completely new direction.

But, you know, Noel,
for some reason,

that's what he wanted to do.

And at the end of the day,

it was his vision.

OK! Now, will you rejoice
with one another? Go on!

Yeah!

CROWD CHEERS

The Jesus Army will go
where others will not go

to help the poor and the needy.

This is a holy war, and the Jesus
Army are committed to sacrifice,

hardship and danger.

Hi, my name's Sarah.

I live in Bugbrooke,
where the church first started,

and I've been a member of
the Jesus Army for six years.

At the beginning,
I was just buzzing.

It was just like a high,
like a natural high.

There were so many
young people there.

I've never been to a church
where you get worship like that.

Never, never, never.

I suppose that was
part of the excitement.

You know, there was something
that felt like a movement in it.

So how did, how did you
become part of this?

Well, I suppose,

I was kind of into all sorts of

general youth things, like drugs.

I was lost.
Erm, things in my life.

I knew that I was lonely,
that things that I'd built up

were just shallow.

I was 17 when I first met them.

Looking back, yeah,
I didn't know who I was.

Parents had passed away.

Losing my parents, I had to feel
like there was somewhere for them

to go, so I had a kind of
God thing anyway.

And I was quite
an impulsive young girl.

So I was just like,

"I really like it, I'm going to move
into Community." I just did that.

I chose the house

that I was going to stay at.

I was dropped off by one of
the leaders from Birmingham.

And I do remember them saying,

"Just stay close to the wife."

And I was like, OK, weirdo.
You know, don't know what

you're talking about.
I was like, "Yeah, whatever."

Tell me about the virtue names.

Does everyone have a virtue name?

- Erm...
- Not everybody, no.
- Not everybody, no.

Virtue names are like
sort of kind of nicknames.

Basic qualities that have been

recognised in people. So...

Who's got a virtue name here?

- What's yours?
- Trustworthy.

- Trustworthy?
- Yeah.

- Have you not...?
- I have got one,
actually, yeah. Watchman.

Watchman.

- What's yours?
- Submissive.

Submiss... Oh.

Yeah, yeah.

Why submission?

Erm...

Well...

I was very...
I was a very individual person.

I was very dominant.

I always wanted to be in charge
and in control.

But underneath it all, I think

I desperately actually wanted

to be led. So I suppose it was

a bit of a kind of thing
that they saw in me

and thought it would
be good to see grow.

At the time,
I don't think I realised,

but it's changing who you are
very quickly.

Most people

who leave a cult are like,

I don't know who I am and

I don't know what my identity is.

So what we're going
to look at today is

who you had to be

to be a member of the group.

Sarah, you've got loads on there.

Could you share some of that
with us?

A massive word for me is submissive.

- I never was before I joined
the church.
- Oh, really?

I am not submissive.

But, yeah, it was something
that they always...

It was my virtue name.

But I remember you being
such a bubbly, loving person.

- And then, like, by the end,
you were just...
- Broken.

- OK.
- Yeah, yeah.
- Yeah.
- Totally broken.

I think at the point where
I moved into Community,

that was the beginning of me...

I'm sorry.

I mean, I think you have
to change your identity

to be part of a high-control group.

You can't remain
what you were before,

because you're expected
to be a certain thing

and act in a certain way.

And we need to break free
of all of those.

It's not always that
straightforward, though, is it?

Abi, what have you got?

I think the big one's Jezebel.

Yeah. There was a lot of talking
about Jezebel spirit.

I know that's a big one
for Sarah as well.

It's just a horrible word.

CROWD CHATTERS

Right. You can hear me now.

As a girl,

there was a massive thing on

kind of your appearance
and how you should dress.

I remember being 14 and
turning up in a T-shirt

and, you know, slim trousers.

And a gentleman walked over to me

and handed me a scripture on modesty

and kind of bent down in my ear
and said, you know,

men are abusing you in their minds.

One of the things
we were always told

was we don't want to put stumbling
blocks in front of each other.

And so this particularly
came out with how our sisters,

how our ladies dressed,

and saying,
well, they ought to be modest.

And you can read stuff in the Bible

which supports that position.

If you see someone in
a bikini or something,

then that's like, yeah,
you might get turned on

or something by it,
and that would be getting stumbled.

If someone was to do that, like if
they were to come into your space

and, like, wear a bikini,
they'd be stumbling you.

It wasn't the done thing, was it?
It wasn't...

You don't lure men

- into your web of...
- Yeah, yeah.

- ..Eve's web or something.
- Very Eve-ish, yeah.
- Yeah.

- You know...
- It was never...
- Nothing
to do with the men, obviously.

No. It was almost sinful
to be a woman.

- Yeah.
- Wasn't it?
It wasn't actually just...

It wasn't just, it wasn't just
how you were labelled.

It was almost, as I saw it,
it was sinful just to be a woman.

At the time, I was quite childlike.

And emotionally, I was probably
looking for this father figure.

He was so obvious
about what was going on.

Like, he would put his hand

on my thigh under the table

whilst his wife was opposite.

He would intimidate you
and he would...

..belittle you.

And who's going to believe you...

..if you say it?

You know, it's a person
of authority.

He just shut me down
and shut me down,

until I felt like it was my fault.

I was 14 when I ended up
being sexually assaulted.

One of the things
he used to say was,

you know, if you didn't ejaculate,
it's not rape.

And that was, er...

That's obviously
a very hard thing to hear.

Erm...

This guy, he was only 15.

It kind of got spread

what had happened to some of
the leaders in the church.

And you kind of hope
that there'd be this...

..like, kind of welcoming arms
and kind of like,

"Oh, my God, that's really awful."

But instead,
you're kind of met with,

"Isn't she a Jezebel?"

It doesn't apply to you.

It's nothing to do with you.

These people knew about it
and chose to kind of hero the men

and shame the girl.

It was...

- Yeah.
- ..that's you.

The leaders, they're all saying
the same thing.

So you kind of go,
oh, I must be wrong.

I must be in the...wrong.

I'm clearly kind of no good
and I've done something really bad.

And you just kind of learn to cop it

and deal with it, really.

APPLAUSE

Who's got real freedom?

Yeah!

OK.

The final touches
to the brushwork,

the last carpets are laid,

but there's still much to be done

at the old Cannon.

£5 million, it's all cost,

to bring a building back to life.

The Jesus Army hopes
everyone in the town will use it.

With Jesus Centres,

the emphasis is on forgiveness.

That even if people mess up,

well, there is God in everybody,
there is God in you.

Come forward and be forgiven,

for all of us are sinners.

And I thank God that Jesus

is the sinner's friend.

And we here, in this company,
are amongst friends.

There's none of us
better than another one.

When we had Jesus Centres,

that was a great thing to do,

is to reach out to
the disadvantaged.

We had one in Coventry,
and I worked there

and I worked in the drop-in,

and that was incredibly fulfilling.

If you've got problems,
you can talk to the brothers.

They take you for what you are.

Take you for who you are
and what you are.

It's like instead of getting drunk

- on actual spirits...
- You're drunk on the Holy Spirit.

..you're getting drunk on
the Holy Spirit.

SINGING

At that time, you had so many

new people join the Jesus Army,

it's kudos, it's credibility.

It drew people in.

THEY SING

Personally, the fact that you can
actually be part of something

that is bringing salvation

to thousands of young people,

it really gave me such

a positive feeling in my heart.

One of the things that I had to hear
from these young people,

as a shepherd, was confession.

So somebody may confess
going out and taking drugs,

getting violent, swearing,

falling out with people...

..that over time,

I got to hear about all sorts of
dark activity happening

to young people within the church.

I got to hear about abuse,

I got to hear about rapes,

sexual activity with minors.

And when I tried to find an avenue

of what to do
with that information...

..it was dismissed as
the power of that sin

was under the blood of Jesus
and therefore cancelled out.

Very black-and-white statement
that was made -

under the blood
and therefore forgiven.

I have
a responsibility, obviously,

to ask you the difficult questions,
and there will be some people

that will sit at home and say,

"What on earth were you doing
not reporting it to the police?"

Right, OK, yeah. Erm...

Yeah, that's a good question.

That's a very difficult thing

to reconcile yourself with.

You have been bought with a price.

Redeemed.

Jesus has paid the price.

You are not your own.

It's like there was a spell,

like a collective spell.

A coercive pressure

that you can't escape from.

I do not belong to me,

old me, any more. Praise God.

You feel like
you have to embrace it.

Will you say, I want?

I, I, I, I, I, I!

Don't you dare.

The central power
of their coercion is,

you go against us,
you go against this,

this is against God.

We are redeemed.

Put a hand up if you're redeemed.

Nobody wants to feel
they're defying God.

We're going to do a whistle-stop
tour of trauma theory -

what happens to us
when we get traumatised.

So in an abusive cult,

we're likely to go into
fight and flight

or freeze and submit.

Often, we blame ourselves

for not acting, fleeing or fighting.

Why didn't I fight back?
I should have done that.

In a cult, we see people appeasing.

That is pleasing others
to reduce harm or potential harm.

We see this in dogs, when
they roll over onto their backs

to avoid attack.

Do you recognise that at all?

Yeah, yeah. You all do. Yeah.

Sarah, are you OK?

- What's happening?
- Er...

- I'm feel like I'm going to be sick.
- What did you say?

- I feel like I'm going to be sick.
- Oh.
- Like...

What's happening? Can you tell us?

That bit where it talks about,

- I think the appeasing.
- Yes.

It's just I knew that
that was the behaviour that I did.

I would do things to appease him,
and then it would just...

..all start again. Again.

SHE SOBS

It was the best you could do.

It was the best you could do.
You did OK.

Aw! Aw!

Aw! Sh... Just breathe. It's OK.

It's OK.

I might just need a moment,
if that's OK?

- Yeah. Do you want to go out?
- Yeah, I just...
- Yeah, yeah.

SARAH EXHALES DEEPLY

How are you doing now?

I don't really want to
talk about anything.

SHE CRIES

It's just sad, isn't it,

- to see that coming out?
- Yes.

- Yeah.
- But healthy. It's good.
It's good. But it's just...

..sad, isn't it?

LIVELY CHATTER

Lay hands on people.

Speaking in tongues.

Come, Holy Spirit.

Thank you, Father,
for doing it here now,

and we rejoice in it.

Even by that point,

what this Elder had
done to my friend...

..it was not common knowledge.

The number of people who knew about
any of this was very small.

The leadership knew.

But the rest of the community
just had no idea.

He was sentenced to three months.

SHE SIGHS

He was welcomed back
into the community,

into a leadership position,

as if nothing had happened.

It was so emotive.

I couldn't process it.

I had these seizures.

I ended up with carpet burns
all down the side of my face.

I just fell into a deep depression.

Erm...

I wasn't managing.

I wasn't coping.

So I had to leave the community.

I just decided,
if I've got to survive this,

I've just got to cut it all off.

I can't have any contact
with anybody

because I won't survive otherwise.

Once I'd left the community,
I felt really strange.

I suppose I disappeared
into myself for a while.

It was a long time until I found out
that there were further allegations.

I just remember being
so knotted up on the inside...

..and it scared me.

I mean, I just didn't want it
to exist any more.

I wanted it to be wiped out.
I didn't want anybody else

to face any more harm,
and that included the people

who were still there,
who were vulnerable.

CHATTERING

# You and me forever

# And ever

# And ever and ever and ever

# And ever and ever and ever

# Woo!

# Love and tears, laughter and fears

# And even socks are shared

# This is Community, yeah

# The family lovingly

# Overflow with love

# Love and tears, laughter and fears

# And even socks are shared

# This is Community, yeah. #

When I lived with him,

I definitely felt privileged.

I was lucky.

The thing about Noel...

..he always had an aura about him.

OK, come on. We believe...

We believe in Jesus Christ,

the Saviour of us all.

By then, he'd spend
a lot of the time in his bedroom.

OWL HOOTS

Yeah, he was a lot more fragile.

He'd lost a lot of weight.

He was an old man, basically.

He didn't like people
knowing he was ill,

but because I lived with him,

I knew that he was in a bad way.

I didn't know what he had, whether
maybe it was cancer, I think,

that it progressed quite quickly.

CHEERING AND APPLAUSE

Even at the very end,

he still controlled everything.

He had to have control,
cos he felt like it would crumble.

We have to retain

our radical revolutionary culture.

If we cannot build the church, we
are saying Jesus is dead and gone.

Don't continue to live a lie,

Jesus fellowship.

If you can't produce, pack it up.

And if you think about
when he died...

..it was absolutely, that was like
a real light-switch moment for me

because everyone was kind of
wailing and crying.

Yeah.

And I don't think I stopped sobbing,
the whole thing. I was just...

- Wow.
- Mm.

That's why the funeral was so weird.

- Right.
- Because I didn't realise
that I viewed him like that.

Yeah, I was distraught. Erm...

Yeah, it was a weird,
weird, weird feeling.

It felt a bit like
part of me dying as well.

Having entrusted our brother Noel...

Everyone felt so lost without him.

I could tell that this meant

something new, and I could tell
that the church

was never going to be the same.

This was a man of God,
a prophet of God,

who burnt out for Jesus.

The flame's going to burn
in your heart, from now on,

brighter than it's ever burnt.

Let's bring love in

and let love be birthed afresh.

HUBBUB

After Noel died,
what did you feel?

It's really good to do this...

..because I may have avoided
doing it, erm, before.

I think relief,

you know, that would be my
kind of primary reaction.

Erm...

..because I think
things needed to change.

There was, in my view,
a high risk of things changing

quite dramatically after Noel died,

a high risk that we'd

split into two camps.

One who wanted to keep
everything as it was,

according to the mould
which Noel had laid out,

and nothing should change.

Another camp could easily say,

well, now Noel's gone,
we can change so many things.

As the church moved on,

we felt freer. Definitely.

SINGING

So this was living in
Christian fellowship -

group activities, no telly,

no sex without the say-so
of the shepherds, no booze.

It was like a 1950s
family Christmas.

# It pulls from somewhere

# Deep inside

# And all at once, a precious gem
shines through. #

After Noel had gone,

one of the things that happened
is we had safeguarding training,

we had a Safeguarding Officer.

Also, there was generally

this kind of more

open attitude to consulting
with people outside.

Of course, in many ways,
this was completely new to us,

as safeguarding
was virtually unknown.

I remember one of the things
we asked was for

anybody to come forward
who'd got knowledge of abuse,

so that we could make a register.

Anything in the past.

What sort of things
were you becoming aware of

that had happened?

Very little.

All I knew, really, was that
there were some reports submitted.

What they covered

was totally unknown to me.

I hadn't suspected anything,

but then I say, I've possibly been
a little bit naive.

The Jesus Army had been around
for a good 40 years.

In all that time, they hadn't
had much police attention.

One day, one of my officers

was off to a safeguarding meeting

with the Jesus Army,

so I decided to go along

and find out what it was all about.

So I went up to New Creation Farm
with a couple of my officers,

sat down and discussed
how we could reduce the risk

and ensure that a vulnerable person,

you know, wouldn't be preyed upon.

I remember there was someone there

who had a big file of papers.

I couldn't take my eye off

this massive file of papers,
asked what it was...

..and he basically outlined
that these were allegations

that were made to the leadership
of the Jesus Army.

And I asked to have a look
at the file.

And it wasn't a push me,
pull you type thing.

He gave me the file,
I had a scan through.

And for me,
it just rang some alarm bells,

in terms of, we've got a crime,
we've got another crime,

it's an allegation of another crime.

I asked to keep the file,

so that I could take that back
to the police station.

And it was just extremely,
extremely naive of them.

One of them said to me,
"Do you think we're criminals?"

And I said, "Oh, I'm not sure.

"I'll let you know
in a few months' time."

My Sergeant approached me and said,
"Got just the thing for you here."

I'd had some dealings
with sexual offences,

but it's by far the most victims
I'd seen in sort of one go.

What struck me as shocking
was that the lion's share,

if not all, of the victims
I recall were children.

At that point, I didn't know
that there was even

a police investigation ongoing.

I've no idea what was going on,

but I decided to set up
a Facebook group.

People started talking

and started disclosing things.

They were discussing their abuse

from people in the community.

And within a week,
we had 115 members.

So I got added to this group.

We started talking

about our experiences

for the first time,
actually, for me.

And I was just like, OK.

I did have a reason to be angry.

It wasn't just me

and it was that bad.

It just snowballed from there.

It basically opened the floodgates.

They were coming forward
in their droves.

There's normally some in here.

Cheers.

OK, thank you
for coming in today.

So I need as much detail from you
as you can give.

I just need to know

what it is that you can remember.

It's such a long time ago.

I just suppressed
all of the memories.

Just ignored them
and locked them away.

But I guess I had a conflict
inside of me,

knowing that something wasn't right.

Erm, this was over many years.

This was probably over about eight
years, from when I was really young.

I remember him always asking me
to sit on his lap...

..and I could feel that
he had an erection.

How old would you have been then?

I would have been about ten, 11.

He used to put his hand
in my groin area.

With other people seeing?

Yeah. He'd do it discreetly.

This is coming back to me now.

We'd be sitting
in the room with people.

- He'd put his hands down there.
- OK.

- Are you all right to carry on?
- Yeah.
- Yeah?

- Erm...
- Oh.

With Nathan, at first,
it was Nathan sitting on his lap,

then it was pressing him
up against the cooker,

and then he would
take him on road trips

and touch him then,
and ask Nathan to touch his penis.

Speaking with the police...

..yeah, it's, through all of it,

that was the hardest thing
for me to do.

You were a kid again.

You're just a frightened little kid.

HE CRIES

It's weird, but I didn't see it
as being

the church's fault at the time.

When I first tracked this man down,

he denied the allegations,

saying that it just hadn't happened.

It was then discovered

he had previous sexual offences.

We only got five members of

the Jesus Army convicted.

I think two went to jail,

and the longest sentence was for

three years for an anal rape.

It was really challenging.

There were lots of others
that we couldn't get to court

because, effectively,
we didn't have the evidence -

one person's word
versus another person's word.

Although there were a few Elders

that wanted to help,

the difficulty that we had
in the end was closing of ranks.

They were worried about the effect
it would have on the church.

And, of course, you know,

some of them were personally
implicated as well,

so they had other reasons
not to help us.

Operation Lifeboat, at the time,

to me, that said two things.

Firstly, we have to acknowledge
that we didn't

pick these things up
well enough. We didn't...

We didn't realise early enough that,

actually, our kind of community,

our kind of set-up,
was quite attractive to those

who wanted to abuse people.

It gave them opportunity.

But secondly,
just five people convicted.

To me, that kind of figure said
that it wasn't institutionalised.

It's...

It happened, but it wasn't regular.

We were just outraged
that these people

who had all these allegations
against them

and, yet, it wasn't quite enough
for the police to prosecute.

I mean, basically, it was
a sweet shop for paedophiles.

I mean, you know...

And, of course,
during this whole time,

the church had been still running,

still having meetings.

We baptise you now!

Most of its business
is still going strong.

That just...

..added fuel to the fire, basically.

By then, we'd had various advice

from solicitors.

We were trying to work out
if we should do a group action

or, you know, what would
be the best thing to do.

I went up to Northampton,
advocating that there needed to be

some type of compensation scheme.

When I met with this
group of survivors,

I was horrified, obviously.

I haven't dealt with
this large a number,

all from the same institution,

who were abused
in so many different ways.

We actually went to
New Creation Farm

with a whole load of our own
allegations from the Facebook group.

Some of the stories
were just so awful,

I mean, it just seemed crazy.

We had a meeting with the leaders.

Obviously, they were very defensive.

They didn't want to accept anything
we were saying. And...

But we were putting it to them,
"Look, you can't say

"this is just a few bad apples,"

which the church
didn't want to hear.

We put down all the allegations
from the Facebook page

into a document.

This time, Noel himself

was amongst those allegations.

He was preaching to everybody else

about all this supposed goodness

and holiness and godliness
and, yet, he was the one

who was abusing people
in the...in the farmhouse.

His...

..his kind of victim tended to be,
you know, mid-to-late teens.

You know, he liked young boys.

He sought out young boys
and he abused them.

So many people have
got the same story.

I mean, we've got it written down
in a document.

Noel being abusive,

sexually weird,

an unrepentant paedophile.

It was clear, not only that
he had assaulted

boys, but also...

..that the Apostolic leaders

had been clearly covering up

Noel's abuse, as well as

other instances of abuse.

A lot of things came out
in that meeting.

We told them,

"You saw shit happening to people

"and you brushed it under the
carpet. That was wrong."

Now, the issue they have is,
they knew it and we knew it.

We challenged them and said,

"You can't seriously continue."

And they were absolutely fuming.

I remember there was a particular
meeting at that point.

The leader stood at the front
and said, you know,

"There are some accusations
against Noel."

I was actually sat next to a woman

who stood up and she jeered
and she almost, like, heckled.

"That can't be true!"
and, "Oh, poor Noel!",

and, "He's not even here
to defend himself!"

It was just, "No, that's wrong."

Because it was Noel,
like, it couldn't be true.

I remember having meetings

to discuss...Noel was suspected

of sexual abuse.

And I said to others at the time,

I said,
"Well, I don't believe that."

You know, he was a lot of things,
I didn't like him that much,

but, erm, I think he was
kind of an honourable man.

You know, I've now kind of, like,
feel I've had realisations, erm...

..you know, about things
that I was blind to.

Is it hard to imagine
that Noel was capable of that?

HE CLEARS HIS THROAT

HE CLEARS HIS THROAT

Yeah, it's distressing, you know,
and I was part of something

that he was a key,

erm, he was instrumental
in bringing that about.

Next, a controversial
church fellowship

at the centre of an abuse scandal
has decided to disband.

The Jesus Army,
as it's widely known,

was set up in Northamptonshire
in the 1960s,

but leaders have now decided
the church has no future.

At the top of the church,

one man pulled the strings -

the late founder and former
businessman Noel Stanton.

He was a firebrand, who preached

daily about sins of the flesh.

But children were being harmed
on a prolific scale

in communal houses
throughout England.

I think the feeling was

that it was, erm, too broken to fix.

A leaked independent
review, commissioned by the church,

finds that each of the five
senior leaders colluded

with sexual offenders through
their handling of complaints.

I still, in many ways,
believe in the vision

of a people living
according to God's plan.

A wholesome people, who can
create a better society.

And in that sense,
I've got no regrets

about being part of
the Jesus Fellowship.

I've got regrets about the things
which went wrong, yes.

I don't know if I could ever
have done anything differently

that would have really
affected that.

I... I realise, with hindsight,
that I was sufficiently close

to some of the situations that,
potentially, I could have,

if my eyes had been open, if I'd
somehow or other managed to detect

that there was a problem
at that time. I didn't.

And one possible reaction to it
is to bury your head in the sand

and say, basically,
this can't have happened.

I don't want to say something can't
have happened if it does happen.

If I meet somebody who's been
abused by Jesus Fellowship,

I want to be able
to get alongside them

and, ideally, to put an arm
around them and to love them.

And I can't do that if I deny
what's happened to them.

And therefore, I have to accept it.

I have to start from saying,
what they went through is real.

Yeah.

PHONE RINGS

- Hi there, Nathan. How are you?
- Yeah, good, thank you.

Good, good. OK, so, er,
what we're going to do today

is we're going to put together
your statement,

to find out what happened to you,

to find out what damage it's done,

and we're looking at the impact
on you as an adult,

the impact on you now.

I still believe I'm going to hell.
I can't get that out of my head.

- Right.
- And that was from
hours of Noel preaching

that we were going to hell.

Just have a wander,

see if there's anything here
that could symbolise

some of these horrible ideas

that you've been left with
all these years.

Just see what speaks to you.

Even though now,
I can see it for what it is,

I hate not being able
to detach myself from it.

And I felt like if I'd left earlier,
I could have...

Yeah, I could have had
a different life.

It's hard to accept that...

..someone's actions
and someone's viewpoints

are entirely evil or entirely
intended to hurt people.

And I think if you accept...

..that, you know, there was
never any good intention,

there was never any real reason
to be there,

I think it would
absolutely destroy me.

It's a process of unpicking stuff.

Because I don't like the idea
of being indoctrinated at all.

I really don't like the idea
of doing things

that have been put in my head
that don't belong there.

- Do you think that
you are still indoctrinated?
- Yeah.

I've just been on another planet
for 13 years.

I've got no credit history,

I've got no bank details,
I've got no...

..financial history, I haven't
paid any bills. I don't exist.

I don't... I'm not there.
I'm not there. And, erm,

you don't feel like you fit in...

..quite. You just don't.

Yeah.

So it takes time to adjust
and kind of be part of...

..life again, you know?

Tell us what you're
getting rid of, Nathan.

- Mine is the, erm,
high-jump bar.
- Yeah?

So explain what that's about.

The bar that I can never reach.

So what are you going to do with it?

Kick the fuck out of it.

We love a bit of...

Yeah!

That went miles! Woohoo!

Sorry, we didn't get that.
Can you do it again?

I was looking for something
like ivy, or something like that,

because ivy wraps around everything
and chokes.

For me, this symbolises a lot
of the oppression that I felt

and how it's bound me for years

and years and years and years

until, like, this weekend.

This is me kind of chucking it off,
freeing myself,

not letting the spikes
bother me any more.

Just getting rid of that,
and the root is just gone.

- Woo!
- That's it, gone.
It's not in me now.

- Doesn't belong to me any more.
- Hooray, it's not yours!

- Yay! Hooray!
- Oh, yeah.
- Yeah.

- Nice.
- So, yeah.