Have you or your kids been to Soul Survivor?

[Coffeeandcards]

You might want to read this if so:
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2023/04/12/mike-pilavachi-soul-survivor-charity-watchdog/

@Sameynamey yes I was shocked to get to uni to find these groups of Iwerne Minster house party peoples. There was another group I can't remember too.

All the same circles...

Oh, it absolutely is. There's all sorts of senior ministers in the Church of England who have sorted out nice jobs for curates in return for dodgy sexual favours of the type they warn you against from the pulpit every week.

Yep I remember even in my time (90s/00s) I was aware there was a clear in crowd route between those churches. Get favoured in one/do yr out in another and back for curacy in the first...

I've found this group so helpful. Thankyou all. Aside from Mike Ps bringing it to the fore again it really did a lot of damage at a critical stage of my development I think 😔. Oh to have enjoyed my youth! At the time I thought I was special/set apart ...

Yeah, that's what I was constantly told too, and for a long time it really did feel like I was part of something big and good. I lost so much and missed out on so many things because of it, and I've done things that have really hurt people.

It's very, very hard to process. It's especially difficult because those responsible for doing the damage to me are still out there doing it, thirty years later, and will never be held to account.

I guess we're processing it in different ways. I should point out that I'm not a Christian any more, have properly come to terms with that, and have no intention of ever being a Christian again. The well is far too poisoned for me to return.

I absolutely respect that you're still a Christian, but I'd like to politely request that you, and anyone else reading this, doesn't pray for me.

It really is hard to process. I've put it all in a box and my kids have no concept really of what life was like for me at their age!

I dont really mix with people who lived it (amd have come out the other side) often so this is so helpful. There were just sp many of us. And yes the knock on effect into life is huge. It's affected my career, relationships and as you say - sense of self.

When you realise you are not l"living life for god" and called and special... where do you go from there? And learning to live in the normal world. Occasionally I Skirt the edge of a church group and even the vocabulary and way of seeing the world makes me realise how unaware I was when I was in it what I must have come across as.

No I'm really not now too. And the earnest prayer jobs something in me. We all earnestly prayed all the time in that world - and look where it got us....

I still have quite a few friends who are Christians, but they're mainly people from the first ever church I went to when I was a teen, before I got into the dodgy stuff, and they're all very nice indeed. I now live a long way away from there, but I'm still in fairly regular contact with a lot of them. They know where I stand these days, and they respect me for it. In fact, until fairly recently, I saw most of them at Greenbelt each year - an event which is as Christian or secular as you want it to be, and has plenty to offer anyone.

One year at Greenbelt I told a friend of a friend about how I'd left the church and become an atheist, and she acted like it was the biggest tragedy in the universe. I told her it wasn't a tragedy because I didn't think it was one. Her reaction was to offer to pray for me, which I politely declined, but on subsequent reflection, I found that really obnoxious.

At the height of my evangelical fervour, I can only begin to imagine how much it must have freaked out my parents. I know I'd go spare if one of my kids started behaving the way I did back then.

I used to be a greenbelt regular ... now wondering if we've crossed paths before 🙈. I did love the freedom to be however you wanted to be at GB and I think a fair few were ex churchy people. Yet still had some of the good bits I liked about Christians!

Ha, we may well have done! I missed a few years, but I was there most times from 1994 to 2018. I'm toying with the idea of going this year as it's the 50th anniversary. Now, Greenbelt is a proper festival. Soul Survivor is not.

Yes overlapping years there...

And yes I remember trying to tell people you didn't have to all be in the same venue at the same time and you could have conflicting talks in different venues at the same time and people were trusted to think through things for themselves rather than be taught at set times aka SS/NW/SH. It really did help my exit stage from church.

I wanted to go this year - with no expectation of having to fit in almost the important talks and do 10 things before breakfast - and just reconnect with people but funds/kids/health are ruling it out .

Yeah, there's always been a big group of my friends who have been regular Greenbelters, and various other people we know have come along from time to time. Some of them have hated it because basically you can do what you like, and there's multiple points of view presented. It makes some people very worried, especially after the other events you mentioned, where every speaker has to sign a statement of faith.

For a brief period after my year out, Greenbelt began leading me in a more liberal direction and I think I would have carried on, had it not been for Christian Union at uni. I was 22 when I started my degree, and unfortunately didn't understand the nature of Christian Unions at the time - basically they're controlled and manipulated by UCCF, an organisation I now consider to be extremely dodgy. It promotes a brutally uncompromising form of faith, and unfortunately I got sucked back into hardcore evangelicalism without really noticing. It would take me more than fifteen years to finally get out.

I just wanted to thank everyone who has shared their thoughts and feelings on this thread. I was never part of this world but my husband was and I recognise so many of the issues from things he has said. He doesn't like to talk about it too much but I think it really messed him up for a while and it certainly made the early years of our relationship very hard as he wrestled with the legacy of their influence. I'm not remotely surprised to hear about either the emerging safeguarding concerns or the more general concerns about the cultish nature of these groups.

Oh gosh yes a whole other world. I remember them turning down an incredible theology lecturer as he wouldn't sign the "DB" wasn't it?

And the male centred running of many CUs and CU affiliated groups. And the emphasis on Bible reading partners and accountability....

It's been so healing for me being able to talk about all this to someone who "gets it" and can see it for what it was.

I'm really glad you've found it a helpful read. I hope your husband is doing OK now, and has sorted out the problems he had. It's very hard to talk about it all, as people who haven't been in that world don't get it at all, and people who are still in it can't see the harm it does.

I've not really spoken to anyone about a lot of this, but I want to communicate about it more. In particular, I want to write about my experiences, and have been toying with ideas about how to do that. Sometimes I feel very alone, and that's one of the hardest things to cope with. Just about everyone I did my year out with still seems to be "on fire for the Lord", and it feels pretty horrible to be the only one who seems to have been scarred for life by it.

Thanks for listening, everyone.

Doctrinal Basis. That's the one. Of course, it's designed to exclude loads of people who "aren't quite our class".

CUs were almost invariably led by 19-year-olds who were supposedly given lots of power and responsibility, but were essentially manipulated and used by people in UCCF. I really wish I'd properly understood the nature of them before I ended up going along every week.

Yeah, I seem to remember Redmans father was abusive (which is why he dropped the Jones, from his name)

Charismatic types absolutely love a really damaged person converting. It's seen as far more valuable than a well-adjusted happy person becoming a Christian. The church I did my year out in was full of all sorts of people from iffy backgrounds, from teens who had gone a bit off the rails to people with serious illnesses. They were all paraded around as though they were trophies.

I knew Mike Pilavachi and Matt redman back in Chorleywood where I grew up. They were huge in one of the evangelical churches there. I Was around 13 so 1987/1988 .. and they became mega popular and itje church events were very teen focused, with lots of groups and social events... new wine as well.

I started to pull away from the church not long after, but I never will forget what a creepy man Mike seemed. Even at 13 I could trust my gut instinct. Reading this i was shocked but not surprised sadly

@PrimitivePerson
I just wanted to acknowledge your really personal post and say sorry for the damage that was done to you.

I want to say how much I appreciate all your contributions too. Being and ex-christian who grew up in the church, has parents who are still very much involved and attending New Wine, Soul Survivor and Greenbelt in my teens it has really shaken me up. Definitely something I thought I'd left in my past and am now having to face a lot of the damage it has done to me head on, which is extremely painful and uncomfortable. This thread has been very affirming of what I had been feeling.

@emmeline8228 hasn't it just? So many people don't get it because they've never been basically brainwashed into being total twats. On the other hand, I'm definitely better at questioning thi gd now and have a healthy dose of cynicism that has served me well.

I think the hardest part is there are so many truly lovely Christians. It's such a pity there are so many majors issues and so many people using religion as a stick to batter other people with.

@Username84 You're right there - there's so much about Christians, church and faith that is good, positive, admirable and lovely, and it's been an enormous influence on my life, much of it good - but sadly the hardcore and abusive stuff ruined it for me.

I think the problem is that often teens are encouraged to take their faith far too seriously without properly understanding the potential consequences, and they exclude other healthier and more moderating influences.

I recently re-read a book by a well-known charismatic Christian leader that was aimed at teenagers. It was written in 1989 and was hugely influential on me back in the day. I was quite horrified by what I was being encouraged to do - the book was homophobic, sexist and absolutely brutally uncompromising, encouraging us to do things that were both highly dubious ethically and potentially would get us into big trouble - but hey, suffering for the Lord! It doesn't get much better than that!

We were indeed being "brainwashed into being total twats".