Children of the Cult documentary

 The five-part documentary series, Children of the Cult, charts the remarkable true story of three British women born and raised in the infamous cult Children of God, now known as The Family International. Hope, Verity, and Celeste speak out about their years of abuse within the cult and their incredible fight for survival, escape, and quest for justice. Hope and Verity both successfully brought criminal convictions against their abusers, a very rare outcome for survivors of that cult. I participated in this documentary, primarily by giving many hours of interviews to the producer's research assistant for background information. I appear briefly in a couple of these episodes. I consider it the best documentary on that cult so far. It is no longer available anywhere, so I am making this important documentary series available on my new Substack page. Subscribe for free and you will receive emails with links to each video or article I post.

Episode 1 - Welcome to the Family
https://perrybulwer344598.substack.com/p/children-of-the-cult?r=1ig6b

This episode covers the founding and early years of the doomsday cult, Children of God, aka, The Family International. From one family in California in 1968, it quickly spread to thousands of members in over 100 countries. Hope, Celeste and Verity were born and raised in the cult, and they recount their parents' stories of joining the cult and their devotion to their leader. They describe the systemic child abuse in the cult based on twisted biblical interpretations in the writings of the self-professed endtime prophet, David Berg. Their quest for justice begins.

Episode 2 -  For Grandpa
https://perrybulwer344598.substack.com/p/children-of-the-cult-episode-2-for?r=1ig6b

Starts with a shocking story of a 3-year-old child bride, “married” to cult founder David Berg, who was on the run from the FBI and Interpol. The psychosexual aspects of Berg's childhood described, which led to his perverted sexual doctrines in the cult. Children were denied a regular childhood and were raised in a highly sexualized abusive environment. They were not raised as children, but as endtime soldiers in a spiritual war, so they got no real education. The cult's Music With Meaning ministry begins, child performers exploited. Celeste, Hope and Verity describe the horrific child sexual abuse they suffered, which was systemic and normalized in the cult. Scotland detectives begin investigations into Hope and Verity's cases.  

Children of the Cult – episode 3 – Teen Rebels 
https://perrybulwer344598.substack.com/p/children-of-the-cult-episode-3-teen?r=1ig6b

It is the early 1990s, police and child protection authorities in many countries conduct raids of the cult's communes. Hundreds of children were taken into custody, but children of the cult were heavily indoctrinated to deceive and lie to outsiders, including authorities, so they were all soon returned to the cult where they continued to experience systemic abuses. As the children become teens, many begin to rebel against their abusive upbringing and receive brutal corporal punishments. Teen training camps were set up to indoctrinate them even more, forcing them to be Christian child soldiers in their parents' fantasy of a spiritual endtime war. So-called delinquent teens were sent to a Teen Detention compound in Macau. Members who had joined the cult to escape the oppression of their parents, churches, governments, etc, became the oppressors of their own children. Teen Verity, desperate to escape the cult, has a brilliant tactic: purposely collecting contraband items then laughing in the faces of her abusers when they attack her as being demon possessed. Finding her own power, Verity physically fights back and sets herself free, but life after the cult won't be easy. David Berg dies, none of his so-called endtime prophecies fulfilled, and Karen Zerby takes over the cult.

Episode 4 – Escaping the Family
https://perrybulwer344598.substack.com/p/children-of-the-cult-episode-4-escaping?r=1ig6b

This episode starts and ends with disturbing clips from the murder/suicide video of Ricky Rodriguez, the son of cult leader Karen Zerby. Early 1990s, global media scrutiny intensifies as many in the second generation escape and expose child abuse in the cult, which is now rebranded as the Family. Fearing persecution, members are ordered to burn all incriminating evidence of abuse in the cult's documents, photos and videos. Children and teens are coached on how to deceive and lie to media and authorities.

The largest ever UK child custody case exposes mountains of evidence of extreme child abuse in the cult.  Celeste's sister testifies against the cult, Celeste is forced by cult leaders to oppose her sister's testimony and defend the cult, which causes her great psychological distress. The judge believes Karen Zerby's lies that they now denounce the perverted sexual teachings of the deceased David Berg, so he allows 3 year-old to remain in the cult with his mother. 

Teen Hope is trapped in Europe and sex-trafficked by the cult. She secretly plots a dramatic escape from Prague back to the UK and sets herself free. Celeste is recruited into Karen Zerby's secretive household in Portugal and discovers Zerby is still sex-obsessed. Celeste meets Zerby's son, Ricky, who is disgusted by his mother's leadership and tells Celeste they are in a cult. Ricky leaves the cult. Celeste gets pregnant and doesn't want to raise her child in that environment, so asks to leave Zerby's home, but she's told she can't because she knows where Zerby lives. When Zerby moves, Celeste leaves the cult and returns to the UK, where she has the support of her mother and sister. Many of the second generation didn't have that support when escaping the cult, so life after the cult was very difficult, with many spiralling into dark paths, including suicide.

Second generation survivors organize to expose the cult's systemic abuses, and provide the FBI with evidence, but the legal system fails to bring justice to those survivors. Ricky, recognizing there would be no justice for most survivors, plots to murder his mother, Karen Zerby, but unable to find her he murders her assistant, one of his abusers, then kills himself. It made headlines around the world. Zerby has no remorse, she blamed Ricky for yielding to the devil. Verity and Hope begin their quest for justice by separately reporting their life-long abuse to Scottish police, who believe their stories and start their investigations.

Episode 5 – Fighting Back
https://perrybulwer344598.substack.com/p/children-of-the-cult-episode-5-fighting?r=1ig6b

Finding justice becomes a compulsion for Hope and Verity, a necessary step towards their healing. They tell their stories to Scottish detectives. Up to then there had been no criminal convictions of COG/Family cult child abusers in the UK, and only a few in other countries, because of the cult's secrecy, multiple aliases, frequent moves and other legal obstacles. Hope assists the investigation by trying to identify the locations of the cult's communes in Scotland where her abuse occurred. Verity becomes a witness in Hope's case.

After leaving the cult Celeste seeks justice against her main abuser, a top leader in the cult. She receives a letter of apology from him admitting his guilt. She sends the letter to her dad who is still in the cult. Although that top leader admits to systemic sexual child abuse in the cult, Celeste's dad remains in denial of child abuse in the cult and continues to fully support it. Celeste reconnects with her sister and begins a happy life with her real family.

Verity speaks with her brothers, who both gave statements to the police about their childhood abuse. She tells her father she is bringing a legal case against him. He apologizes and begs her not to, but tells her he will plead guilty. At trial he changes his mind and pleads not guilty, but does eventually plead guilty to four sex assault charges as part of a plea deal. Verity is shocked to learn his sentence is merely 240 hours of community service and being on the sex offender registry for only 3 years, despite his extremely cruel sexual abuse of his daughter and another girl. It was the first criminal conviction of a COG/Family child abuser in the UK.

Hope's abuser is arrested in France, extradited to Scotland and charged with 9 sex assault offences against Hope and another girl. He pleads guilty to 7 of the charges. Hope screams for joy, “that's justice”, on hearing that he was sentenced to 11 years 6 months in prison and put on the sex offenders registry permanently. Hope: “He took around 12 years of my life, and justice took around 12 years of his.”

Verity: “Every single court case that's successful, every single conviction, is a little bit of justice for everyone that grew up in that environment. Even if it wasn't their abuser, it's an acknowledgement that the abuse happened and these people should be punished.”

Verity's brother Ken: “Surviving and thriving is the best revenge you can ever have, it's the best victory you can ever have against your abusers.”

Hope: “My call to arms to second generation survivors who have suffered like I have suffered: 'come forward, speak out, speak your truth, you're not alone anymore.'”