Born and Razed in a Cult: Beth Granger on Surviving Grenville Christian College (Part 1)

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[00:00:27] This podcast is for informational purposes only and should not be considered legal, medical, or mental health advice. The views and opinions expressed do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the podcast and are not intended to malign any religion, group, club, organization, business, individual, anyone, or anything. I'm Sarah Edmondson. And I'm Anthony Nippy Ames.

[00:00:57] And this is A Little Bit Culty. Cults are commonplace now. From fandoms to fads, we're examining them all. We look at what happens when things that seem like a great thing at first go bad. Every week we chat with survivors, experts, and whistleblowers for real culty stories told directly by the people who lived through them. Because we want you to learn a few things that we've had to learn the hard way. For example, if you think you're too smart to get sucked into something culty, you might be prime recruitment material. And who knows? You could already be in a cult.

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[00:02:07] Hello, everybody, and welcome back to A Little Bit Culty. Today's guest is Beth Granger, a writer who spent 30 years trapped at Grenville Christian College. She's written a memoir about her experience called Born and Raised. Surviving the cult was only half the battle. For a little background, Grenville was a religious boarding school in Canada, and it hid severe abuse behind a very prestigious reputation.

[00:02:29] It also hid its connection to the Community of Jesus, a commune in Cape Cod which was led by two women who were called the mothers by their followers. The influence these two women wielded cannot be understated. They taught the leaders at Grenville to torment their students, using shame and humiliation to keep them in line. They called this light sessions, but really it was an excuse to scream at the students and give unsolicited, constant feedback. Grenville also specialized in physical abuse as punishment.

[00:02:59] They beat students with paddles until they bled and made them do demeaning labor around the campus. Secrecy and isolation were a huge part of Grenville's MO, and because of their glossy reputation, victims who did speak out were not believed. Many people have called Grenville a straight-up cult who abused their students. The Canadian courts agree. After a 16-year legal battle, Grenville was ordered to pay damages to their victims. The school closed in 2007, so we'll see how that turns out.

[00:03:25] This truly is an egregious stain on Canadian history. Our guest, Beth, was one of the representatives in that battle. We'll get into what life was like at Grenville and how it was for her to face her abusers in court. And she'll tell us about the bumpy road to healing. Beth's experience and recovery were both traumatic, so we'd like to add a trigger warning to this episode. Her story is inspiring, so let's welcome her to our show.

[00:04:04] Beth, welcome to A Little Bit Culty. Thank you. I'm so delighted and thrilled to be here. I've been dreaming of this day since you started your podcast, to be honest. Really? Yeah. Four years. Four years. Four years. That's when I started writing my book. But I'll be honest, I'm also very nervous. It's giving me flashbacks from being on the stand testifying, which was almost six years ago.

[00:04:31] And I haven't talked in public about my past before or since that event. So please bear with me if I struggle because it's difficult to talk about. And this is, I'm just getting started with podcast interviews. So you're the first. We are honored. We are honored. They are friendlier. Yeah. Yeah, a lot friendlier than the defense. Bright lights and yeah. We will not be cross-examining you. We have a warm audience. That's good.

[00:05:00] And also our audience really understands, I think, trauma and you know, you've been through it. You've lived it. You had to talk about it. You're writing about it. It's not an easy path. It's not an easy path. It is not. No. Thank you very much. There's a lot to tell. So I'm thrilled to be here. There is a lot to tell and we'll be sure to include the articles you sent, including the expose on the fifth estate, which we thought was quite well done and well researched.

[00:05:30] So we'll make sure to include all of that in the show notes. You don't have to cover everything. We'll focus on your story. Awesome. So you didn't choose this group. You were, as you said in the title of your book, born and raised. Born. Yes. My book, I suppose I can mention the name of it. It's Born and Raised. Surviving the Cult was only half the battle, but the word raised is spelled R-A-Z-E-D or R-A-Z-E-D if you're Canadian like me.

[00:05:59] And I know that's a mouthful for a title. But anyhow, yes, I was the first baby born to staff members at Grenville Christian College, which was an elite private boarding school in Canada that advertised itself to be Anglican. But in truth, it was a cult hiding in plain sight. When I was three, our school fell prey to the mothers, two leaders of a commune in Cape Cod, which is still running. It's called the Community of Jesus.

[00:06:28] And under their influence, our school became an institution of paranoia that basically brainwashed, abused and terrorized its residents for decades. So that's the setting the scene, if you will. You said it so well. And obviously your parents didn't sign up for that. No. When they became teachers at the school before the mothers got involved, what were they signing up for? Like just to be teachers at a prestigious boarding school?

[00:06:55] My parents actually wanted to be missionaries and a lot of the staff were kind of headed in that direction. They were young. They had just gotten out of university. They were Christian. And they tried being missionaries overseas and that wasn't easy. So they were more academically inclined. And when the opportunity came up to work at a school, you know, a Christian school, they thought, great, let's put our faith and our academics to good use.

[00:07:23] And the school was floundering within the first three years, financially especially, and also with the leadership wasn't really cohesive. So they were looking for outside help, if you will. And it wasn't long though, before, you know, the mothers came on the scene and I paint a picture of something terrible, but somehow they influenced the staff very quickly to tell them, you know, to get them to believe or lead them to believe that they were specially

[00:07:51] called by God to form one of the most dynamic, dedicated and effective teams of Christian education in the world. And, you know, that was the draw. And we staff kids were expected to follow in their footsteps. So to be clear, before they got involved, it was on a different trajectory and had kind of a different mission. And then they came in and added this structure in air quotes. Yes.

[00:08:19] So they basically told the staff that they were all heading the wrong direction. They were too rebellious. They weren't cohesive. They needed to like get disciplined. And they basically came in and read them the riot act, but it was sort of like tough love and people, and they challenged them. They said, if you follow our leadership, you're going to be the best school there is. You know, God is going to bless you. We see it in a vision.

[00:08:43] They used to prophesy about what they could see for our future, our school's future and people bought it. And it's really scary how quickly you can coercively control a group. Like I even now I asked my dad and he can't explain it. He doesn't know what took over them. But very soon we were feeling like we were the elite, like God's chosen and, you know, the best of the best.

[00:09:10] We took great pride in thinking that no one else prayed as hard as we did. No one sacrificed as much or lived in the light like we did. And we'll get into that. But we took pride in that and we thought we put all other Christians to shame, which was a draw. That's what kept the staff there, plus all the other tactics that they used. And then the school made itself to it appeared to be like I said, it was elite. It was prestigious.

[00:09:40] We had all kinds of support from very high up members of society and even the government. We had senators and lieutenant governors on our school board. We just we duped them all really because from the outside, our school looked like a place you'd want to send your kids and the kids, the students there looked happy and engaged and involved in endless opportunities. So, yeah, the motto was excellence to the glory of God.

[00:10:09] Beth, do we know how the leadership connected with the community and the mothers? Yes. Judy and Kay. Judy and Kay. Thank you. Yeah. How did that relationship come about? Well, so before the mothers came, we had six leaders and that didn't go very well. But the two main ones that started the school were the Hagues. And they had friends in many Christian friends who were leaders of their own, you know, different

[00:10:37] places, communities or churches. And they were introduced to the mothers through a man called David Manuel, who interestingly enough, before he died of cancer, left a scathing affidavit in court about the community of Jesus because he was trying to go through a divorce and leave the community.

[00:11:01] Anyway, all that aside is he, in that affidavit, said that he introduced the mothers to the Hagues and he felt terrible because of what would transpire. Wow. Yeah. And I actually didn't realize until we were prepping for this interview that, and this is a whole other tangent for me for another episode, but the community comes from like charismatic renewal in the United States that started in the 1960s and then like in a backward

[00:11:30] reaction to the, you know, 1960s flower power specifically. But that Kay and Judy stayed at various German sects called the evangelical sisterhood of Mary and really borrowed a lot of that fire brimstone theology, punitive mind control techniques, which led to what we call, and I believe I've never heard this term exactly, although it happens in every cult, light sessions. Yes. Which seems to be the backbone of the abuse. Tell us about that.

[00:11:57] Well, I mean, like I painted this rosy picture, but the real story was that we had another motto that wasn't so public. It was, we will break you down and build you up the Grenville way. And that was accomplished through an all you can eat buffet of coercive tactics. And number one was light sessions. Light sessions were where, where people were publicly attacked for their sins, real or imagined.

[00:12:28] The humiliation sessions, really. Exactly. They could be small groups with, you know, five people, 10 people. It, we had regular assemblies, which were actually light sessions with the entire school. Wow. And people would be, students would be stood up, sometimes brought to the very front and attacked verbally. And you never knew if you were next. And we lived in constant fear.

[00:12:54] As a staff kid, the light sessions happened to me all the time. As students, you wouldn't see them as often, but people lived in fear. Um, so that was one of the ways they, they broke us down and I can go, do you want some more examples of these tactics? Sure. Yeah. Well, we want to know what life was like on the inside. Yeah. So sure. I'll try to paint. Cause I thought about it and I thought, okay. Well, it sounds like there's, there's life for staff kids and then there's life for the other kids. Yes.

[00:13:24] But from what I'm hearing. And this was really important in our lawsuit. I felt a great responsibility to, to share that. Yes. Life was more difficult for staff kids, but the tactics they used on me or all of us were also used on the students and they were, and you know, maybe to not the same degree, but, um, they affected the students in so many ways.

[00:13:49] And I'll try to, you know, well, if you read the book, you get the picture too, but, um, but yeah, but, um, yeah, they dismantled families is another way right off the bat that they controlled us and broke us down. Um, from the word go, they separated staff kids from parents, told the parents that they were blind to their children's sin and that their sin of idolatry had to be eradicated.

[00:14:17] But at age four, what I learned was that it was a sin to love me. And, uh, that's, that's really hard to take when you're growing up. Um, anyway, again, another thing was that they established a spy network and, um, I, I didn't see this clearly until we were looking back through our lawsuit, but it was right from the top, the

[00:14:45] leaders, the staff, staff kids, prefects. Everyone was expected to turn people in for breaking a long list of rules, which were written and unwritten. On top of that, we were required to write written confessions on a regular basis, which were used against us. And then the disciplines, they imposed harsh and unpredictable disciplines.

[00:15:11] Anything from hard labor, which, you know, if you're put on discipline, you were put on hard labor and you were usually not given a debt, like a timeline. So you were basically told you're going to work until we think you've changed, but you could also be paddled harshly with this long wooden paddle, you know, was almost the length of a, like a row, an oar. Or you could have other things, like I said, unpredictable. You could have your long hair cut short so you wouldn't be a temptress.

[00:15:41] People would get paddled or disciplined for not turning a friend in or for having a bad attitude or for what they call a sinning in your mind. So I hope I'm giving the picture that this is the paranoia. I mean, this is like military. It's how military works. Just random disciplinary actions. Yeah. But it's worse than the military, I think. I've never been in the military.

[00:16:10] Yeah, you sign up for the military. It's a choice. Yeah. And you know they're yelling at you because they're telling you you're a piece of shit. But, but it Grenville, you had to believe that you were a piece of shit. Like you had, you had to be drowning in shame or they weren't really satisfied. And so I was disciplined all growing up. You know, I get into detail in my book, but I can share a few, a few of the more unpredictable ones, I suppose.

[00:16:39] Like starting with the age of five, I was put on my first diet by the leader, one of the leaders who wanted to get rid of my sin of gluttony. And that, that affected my whole life. I'm still dealing with it. But at the time I remember hoping that if I lost weight, she'd let me live with my parents. You know, like, she didn't, by the way.

[00:17:10] Then, you know, like another one was when I was a teenager, they wouldn't let me see my grades because they wanted to annihilate my ego or haughtiness as they called it. And you were a star student, I will add. Yeah. And that really, really mattered to me, my grades. Hey, Calti listeners. As you probably know, Nippy and I are working on a manuscript for our first book together. And as you probably also know, maintaining control is important to us.

[00:17:38] That's why we've decided to produce our book with the Self Publishing Agency or TSPA. Unlike traditional publishing, where you're often left waiting for months or even years to get your story out, the Self Publishing Agency lets you take control of your timeline. You'll have complete creative freedom with insights and guidance from pros in the publishing world. So if you're like us and you have a story or a message that's burning to be told, we highly recommend TSPA as your go to partner.

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[00:19:13] Enjoy. A little bit culty. Shall we? This is another thing that's been very hard to explain to people is we were in a school that where performance was everything, but you weren't allowed to take pride in yourself. So it was like a, it was a mind fuck. Well, you can't experience the self esteem that comes from. Yes. And anyone who I never understood it until the trial, but anyone who was doing well was

[00:19:44] knocked down. And I, there are so many other examples like, well, when I was 16, one of the worst disciplines that happened to me was they caught me for having basically a secret crush on a boarding student. And we had never done anything. I, I hadn't even held his hand, but they found proof that I liked him and he liked me. And, uh, I was pulled out of class, put on hard labor indefinitely.

[00:20:11] And that lasted for almost a month. And then I was then sent, uh, expelled, basically sent to the community of Jesus where, uh, they treated me like a slave and I was denied my education indefinitely. And, uh, and then these are just highlights from the time, but you know, at, when I was 23, I was fired for a bulimic episode. It just, it never stopped. You never knew what was going to happen to you next.

[00:20:40] And, uh, yeah. So those were the disciplines. And then there were other things like we were fully indoctrinated. We had to listen to the mothers tapes on, um, their teachings on tape. And that became the soundtrack to our lives. And we had to pray excessively and do Gregorian chant. I don't know if you know what that is. Yeah, I know. Oh my God. We had to do that several times a day. Um, one Lent, we had to do it six times today.

[00:21:10] Uh, go to the church and sing the prayers, you know, all in Latin. And, uh, anyway, and then staff had to take lifetime vows of obedience to the mothers. They couldn't work at Grenville unless they took the vows. And we staff kids were pressured to follow suit. I didn't realize that lifetime vow of obedience. Yep. Was even a thing outside of my thing until. I know.

[00:21:36] Until you're, I'm going to be singing your praises for this book throughout. And it was a total honor to read it months ago and to write the, write a blurb for you, which is of course when we booked this podcast. Yeah. I was like, yes, I'll blurb your book and you must come on a little bit culty. And I, I don't want you to have to go through everything because that's one of the joys of writing a book is it is just there and you don't have to go through all the details. But I think what, what's the, what do you think is the most important thing for people to understand about the theology?

[00:22:05] Well, I'm going to say theology, but just the, the mixing of. Yeah, I guess the philosophy. And I mean, one of the terms I hadn't seen before, although the tactic is everywhere in terms of separating parents from children, but being adulterous, adult, not adulterous. Idolatrous. Idolatrous. Thank you. Different, but similar. But that's just was like to cut the bond between a parent and child is just so cruel.

[00:22:34] And I, how, I mean, I guess it makes sense for, for people who are sending their kids to a boarding school. They know that's going to happen, but to be separated from your parents within the school. Well, was there compliance that like, is that what people signed up for? I mean, yours, your case is different. Mm-hmm. You mean compliance amongst the staff? The staff and the parents too. Like, I mean, you, you're, you're, your scenario is different than people who are like, hey, I'm going to send my kid to this school under the guise that I'm not going to see them.

[00:23:03] Is that kind of what they're agreeing to or? Yeah. Well, yeah, but it was a regular boarding school in that you would expect your kids to be away for a month at a time and, or maybe more. And they'd come home for, for breaks like Thanksgiving and Christmas. And that was for the regular boarding students. But for those of us living there on campus, I, I honestly, I don't know how parents could let their kids go. I don't know.

[00:23:27] I know that the coercive control must have been so expert as to make them buy into it. Do you know what I mean? Um, and like, I never was a parent there, so I can't really imagine it, but I do know that they were, like, I witnessed my parents being publicly humiliated, like so many times

[00:23:52] for their idolatry and for their apparent love of me and my brothers. And they were told that they were ruining us, spoiling us just by being loving in any way. And, uh, so we learned to basically be very distant from one another. And, uh, my dad, I think he even wrote in that letter that's in my book, I'm afraid to hug my kids or to show them any kind of favoritism or, or outward affection.

[00:24:22] And, uh, yeah, I don't know if I'm answering your question, but, but I will say as the mother's core philosophy was, like I mentioned, we had to listen to their tapes. And I have access to a whole bunch of them that were digitally, what's that word when you digitally? Transferred. Yes, transferred. And anyhow, I have a lot of their, their quotes and, you know, some of the quotes just kind of drive it home. Like one is the key is death to self.

[00:24:51] They preach that a lot. They preached, um, all human love is sin before God. I mean, think about that. You had to love God and only God. And if you, if you started loving other people more than God, that was a massive problem. It wasn't just the children that were separated, um, from our, the parents, they actually interfered in friendships with the boarding students amongst the boarding students.

[00:25:17] So I, one of my best friends was a boarding student for one year in grade 12, and she has so many examples of where she was separated from any girls who she was getting to be close with. They would change their classes, change their, um, where they sat in the dining room. They would just orchestrate it so that people weren't getting too close to one another. So they would monitor you guys and, and try to get sensitive to who was enjoying someone else.

[00:25:47] And then based on that, they'd take action. Yeah. It's like prison. Well, yeah. Yeah. Yeah. It, it, it's really hard to, to understand that, isn't it? But, um. No, because we were. Yeah. Yeah. We get it. Yeah. We've seen, we've seen a lot of it and we understand the tactics and your, your story's hitting multiple and some that I didn't even get catch from the book.

[00:26:14] I'm really curious as to how the mothers ran this school so efficiently from a distance. Like, did they kind of. How they got that control. Yeah. Just how they. And it's also very interesting because we rarely see female. Yes. Dare I say cult leaders. Yeah. But just that they're, they were so feared and they weren't barely even there. I know. Well, like I said, um, yeah, it's really fascinating.

[00:26:38] And the fact that they're women too, like I hear so much about the dangers of Christian patriarchy and I get it. I mean, it is a problem, but I think anyone, female or male can weaponize religion and make it a fearsome damaging thing. So, you know, I'm here to tell you that's, that's our experience. I would make a case that women have a little bit more of an advantage because people are so unsuspecting of it. Maybe, yeah. You know, like I don't.

[00:27:06] But like as, as sisters, as nuns, you know. Yeah. I don't have any context. These gentle nuns are coming in. Yeah. I don't have any context of where I would even suspect that or be afraid of it. Yeah. I think maybe that's it because, and they were the typical cult leaders that would love bomb at once, one moment and then the next they're attacking. So, um, you're so off balance.

[00:27:27] And what they did was basically, I haven't mentioned this yet, but to run Grenville, they, they were actually listed as directors, like in, in the courts and everything. They actually were on our paperwork as our directors, but they didn't run the day to day. But they set up two sets of leaders at Grenville, the Hags and the Farnsworths. And so the Hags and the Farnsworths became their kind of spokespeople and did their bidding and then became their own cult leader. Do you know what I mean?

[00:27:56] So we had our own cult leaders at Grenville. And then eventually the Hags, um, moved down to the community and it was just the Farnsworths running the show, specifically Charles Farnsworth, who was the headmaster for about, um, 20 years by himself. So, um, the mothers, like, this is another thing. When we were in light sessions, we, I never once saw the leaders be attacked, right? Like they, they were off limits, right?

[00:28:24] But I suppose they had their own little light sessions with the mothers. Do you know what I mean? Because they were definitely following the mother's lead and doing everything. And I said that they would want them to do. And as I said, there was a spy network. Like I said, um, we not only had to write written confessions, but anytime we were involved in any kind of light sessions, people were reporting those light sessions to up the chain. So it all got back to the mothers. Mm-hmm.

[00:28:52] And Charles Farnsworth, was he equally as authoritarian? Yes, absolutely. I think in some ways worse, but I don't know if you can get worse. I don't know. Like he had his own brand of, you know, his own special flavor of coercive tactics. And yeah, he, he, uh, he was someone we were all afraid of. I know it wasn't your experience, but in researching for this podcast, we did hear about other allegations of sexual abuse from him and his, his son.

[00:29:22] Was he ever charged or did, or is it just allegations at this point? Yeah. Well, Charles Farnsworth died before he could be like actually, but Robert Farnsworth, his son, um, was officially charged and went through a trial and then got off on technicalities because these things are very difficult to prove.

[00:29:43] And, um, and I feel terrible for the people who had to go up and speak their stories in court and then for it not to, um, be successful. But terrible.

[00:29:55] And that apparently after fifth estate, um, they said they were going to reopen the, the issue or the cases, um, investigation, they call it because after the fifth estate, which was 2021, I believe more allegations came forward, more people who had been abused by Robert. So I don't know where that stands at this moment. And the fifth estate for our audience is. For our American audience. Yeah. Yeah.

[00:30:21] It's a Canadian investigative show through the CBC and sidebar, we actually met. Well, Bob McKeown. Came to our home after the NXIVM scandal. Yeah. And I went to boarding school with his son. Oh, wow. Small world. Yeah. So he, he knew me and kind of, and he came out and spoke to us about it and then we ended up not. I think he didn't do, I can't remember because it's so long ago now. I think he didn't, we didn't do it because it was so much based in America and not Canada. I think. I can't remember. I have to go ask the PR team.

[00:30:50] Why they didn't end up doing. Oh, right. Right. Yeah. Cause it's like 60 minutes in Canada. Yeah. 60 minutes. 60 minutes for Canada. I thought he did a great job. Made me want to write him. He was good. Yeah. I, it really, I don't want to, I'm hesitant to use the term chops my ass because of the paddling in this episode. Oh no. But it chops my ass that that there's a lawyer for the community is just such a piece of work. Quick question about the Farnsworth. Do you feel like they were protected in any way?

[00:31:17] Cause it seems like there's a lot of power and not, it just, it just seemed that like there's overwhelming evidence. I mean, there's complications in, in, in these cases in law and legal understanding what they're looking at, but it seemed like these guys seem to dodge a lot of bullets. Yeah. They must have been, I mean. It's my impression. I don't know. I do. I know that.

[00:31:39] I don't know the ins and outs of their protection, but first of all, it seems to me that we have a bigger problem because in society, religious leaders are far more legally protected than their vulnerable followers. And they can hide behind religious freedom.

[00:31:57] And so, or basically when we took the, the, our story to lawyers, they, they said, look, you can't find someone guilty of running a cult, even if we prove it, you know, and we can't find them guilty of being or liable for being abusive in their religious teachings. The only thing we can do is find them liable for, you know, breaking their fiduciary duty.

[00:32:25] In our case, that's, that was the kind of hook we used, but like to go back with the Farnsworths, I think, I know the community of Jesus is very litigious. They're very wealthy. I'm frankly scared to put my book out because I know that they might try to go after me. And the Farnsworths would, I imagine, would have benefited from their legal protection or even advice.

[00:32:54] And also the Farnsworths, we were living very in poverty, but they were driving a Lexus and wearing fur coats and they could hire good lawyers. I'm wondering why they picked a school in Canada and maybe it would be easier for them to get away with things in Canada because there's plenty of boarding schools and there's plenty of schools in the United States that I feel like are more in their backyard than they could, could do this. I don't know that they even, I don't know.

[00:33:24] I, I don't think they picked it per se. I think they were invited by the Hags who are our founders. And I think they were probably open to any opportunity where they could get their, their influence and basically take control, if you will. It was like they just descended and decided and realized maybe, hey, these people could be our followers. For more context on what brought us here, check out my memoir.

[00:33:53] It's called Scarred, the true story of how I escaped NXIVM, the cult that bound my life. I narrate the audio version and it's also available on Amazon, Audible and at most bookstores. And now a brief message from our Little Bit Culty sponsors. And remember, when you support our sponsors, you're supporting this podcast. Break time's over, people. Let's get back to this episode of a little bit culty. It's a good one.

[00:34:20] I mean, the other thing that really chapped my ass is just how they were able to keep up this facade of respectability for decades and how there was an investigation that somebody went to the police and the Anglican church and nobody did anything about it. Yeah. Why do you think that is? Is it back to what Nippy was asking in terms of the connections? I do think that Grenville had such strong and, well, I don't know if that's the word. They had such powerful connections.

[00:34:48] Like, for example, my best friend, she was, she's my best friend now, but when she went to Grenville, she was afraid of me because I was a staff kid. But she was there for one year and she was smart enough to realize it was a cult. And when she left, she became one of a few handful of people who went to the local newspaper and tried to be whistleblowers.

[00:35:12] And she also called InfoCult, I think it's called in Montreal, and gave them, and here she's like a 17 or 18 year old, giving them the stories of what's really going on there. Anyway, the recorder in Times in Brockville got so, they felt compelled to write a story and they were doing an investigation.

[00:35:34] And Grenville was able to get its lawyers from Toronto involved and threaten the newspaper and shut it down before it happened. And I remember clearly I was a brand new staff member and we were called to pray round the clock against the newspaper. But anyway, yeah, like I mentioned, I think we had left, we had three lieutenant governors on our board.

[00:36:00] We had senators, we had very influential business people who had no idea what was going on in Grenville because it looked so prestigious and so successful. So I'm sure that's why Grenville never was outed until they went bankrupt.

[00:36:19] And also, don't forget all of us who were abused there, we were so broken that we could, we didn't have, like my friend is an anomaly. She came forward and spoke up, but most of us didn't have a clue, number one, that we'd been in a cult. We totally normalized it. And number two, we were so afraid to speak up because we knew, well, we were just afraid of the leaders and we were afraid of the spy network and everything else.

[00:36:46] And even to this day, people are still trying to understand what happened to them there. Do you know what I mean? It takes a lot of work and healing to even understand that you were in a cult situation. And then to be able to do anything about it is a whole other story, you know? Yes. And we're going to get to that too. Like your healing journey, I know, is a big part of your message.

[00:37:10] Before that, I do want to acknowledge that when you're born into something like that, that you don't, you actually don't know anything else. And you're not something like you're sitting there watching like Facts of Life and Days of Our Lives or something outside of it and saying like, oh, and that's not even reality anyway. But like, it's not like you're getting- Facts of Life? I don't know, just two random shows that I watched in the 80s. A little different. I don't know, in the 90s. Random. Degrassi Junior High for those Canadians listening, right? Or Saved by the Bell. Like you don't have any- No, we didn't.

[00:37:40] You didn't, like, or did you watch those things? No. No. I mean, I was aware of shows, but you know, I missed everything from, you know, well, I saw a little Sesame Street. I think it's important for your healing bath to go watch the entire catalog of Degrassi Junior High. Oh, God. To really embrace your Canadian pop culture that you missed. And you might be thankful you missed it. Or you did. Maybe. I feel like it shaped me in positive ways.

[00:38:06] My daughter got me to listen to watch Friends, and I realized, oh, my God, I really missed something there. Yes. Yeah. Absolutely. Well, you know, the book, I have to say, is very – I can't believe the things you remember, first of all, like the details you remember. It is very hard to read what you went through. And my heart goes out to you. There's so many times I just wanted to go back in time and kidnap you and bring you to Vancouver.

[00:38:32] Although I was a little bit younger, but I think I could have done it had I known about it. But I don't want – you have to go through all those details. The book is there for a reason. Tell us how you graduated. You graduated, you became a staff member. What were some of your final straws and your eventual reason to leave? Well, it's complicated, and it's all in the book. I won't tell all of it, but I'll give a few things that happened.

[00:39:00] Basically, throughout my 20s, I just kept getting disciplined in more cruel and unusual ways, if you ask. And it got to the point where I started to realize that I might never be happy there, which was a very kind of rebellious thing to think, really, because we were meant to – like I had already – I had taken vows for life when I was 21. So I was expecting to be there forever.

[00:39:26] But then by the time I was 27, I had lost all hope of getting married there because, well, we were not allowed to marry outsiders. And I grew up very worried that I'd be a spinster for life. And so that made it so much worse when my fiancé, an office coworker, broke up with me with no explanation.

[00:39:52] And I became intensely depressed. Like there were no men left. And it didn't help that I was pushing 30 and still a virgin, which is very hard to take, I'm here to tell you. And side note, that fiancé went on to be a monk at the Community of Jesus. He took vows of poverty, chastity, and obedience for life, and he's still there.

[00:40:21] But my brother's still there too and in the same boat, and I don't have any communication with him. So anyway, after the breakup, I had knee surgery, which is important because as part of the recovery, I was allowed – I was given special permission to go off campus to get physio and then aqua fit classes.

[00:40:43] And that opened up a whole new world for me because I started to get strong and fit, and I started to meet people and make friends, and I started to feel like a caged animal. I just had this feeling like I just felt like a rebel, and I wasn't doing anything bad. I just wanted to break out of this cage that I realized I felt that I was in. I hadn't felt it before then. And I started to question things.

[00:41:13] And instead of feeling ashamed when people were yelling at my sins, I started getting mad. And I started thinking, I don't think I can buy into this anymore. And so it took a long time for me to realize – three years, basically – to make the decision that if I was going to hell for leaving, as they taught me, then so be it. And I will say that I left not because I thought they were bad or that they were abusive.

[00:41:42] I thought – I saw myself as the black sheep in the white flock. I felt like I was failing them because I felt rebellious. And I just knew that I couldn't, in good conscience, stay there any longer. And it's interesting looking back. My grandfather died when I was in my early 20s, and I didn't leave until I was 31. But he left me $40,000.

[00:42:08] And I was so brainwashed that I didn't have a clue that he'd given me the keys to my freedom until I left. So, yeah. Thank you, Grandpa. Yeah. Amazing. Yeah. Where was it – I remember I would think you were 27 when you tried on your first pair of jeans. Yeah. Exactly. I love that moment. Oh, my God.

[00:42:34] Well, no, actually, I did sneak a pair of jeans when I was 13 visiting someone in New York City. New York City. Yes. For one day I wore jeans, and then I got in big trouble. Oh, yeah. Because, of course, you had to confess everything. Yeah. So how did you actually escape? So when you made the decision, was it like in the night? No, I wasn't one of those steal out the middle of the night kind of thing. I was very methodical about it. But I actually did it gradually.

[00:43:04] So we weren't allowed to – we had to live on campus if we were working at Grenville. And I asked for special permission to continue working at Grenville, keep my job, because I was so afraid of leaving and not having any income. I didn't even realize the $40,000 could help me. Do you know what I mean? I just needed a job, and I needed security. So I asked if I could live off campus. And they gave me – because they were starting to lose staff at that point, they gave me permission to do that.

[00:43:34] So for two years, a little over two years, I worked on campus in the daytime and lived off campus. And that was very unusual. Like, I – and every day I went in there feeling like I had a scarlet letter on my chest because I just felt like I – that was very difficult to live with one foot in and one foot out.

[00:43:56] But I didn't have the courage to totally leave until I'd met some more people outside who gave me friendship and gave me some kind of a perspective on what was going on and gave me the courage to just break ties completely. And so then when I decided I wanted to pursue my teaching degree and I got into university, then I gave them – I think it was like six months' notice.

[00:44:20] Because I had a special job that had been – you know, I'd been trained for, highly trained for at Grenville in the finance department. So I gave them lots of notice, and then I left, and that was that. So do you know – like, it took – What year was that? 2001. 2001. So the school had six years left. Was it kind of – you said it's losing staff. Yeah. Was it kind of a sinking ship? Yeah, it was.

[00:44:46] Yeah, and they were losing not only staff because staff were burning out, starting to be like me. They just – they were starting to break away. But I was one of the very first who asked to leave and keep my job there. So that was pretty scary. And then they were losing, you know, enrollment too. So – and eventually they just didn't have enough to keep going. So they went bankrupt. Was it because word got out? They had a bad reputation? Or was it just –

[00:45:15] I think it was a little of both the economy. You know, people stopped sending their kids to boarding school as often. And also there was – I think people were starting to – you know, the internet was just beginning. Maybe people were starting to hear more and more about the past. But it was really interesting when they did go bankrupt in 2007.

[00:45:37] We were all – at least I was – blindsided by the abuse that – the allegations of abuse that kind of blew up like a volcano. Because people were finally safe to talk about it now that the school was bankrupt. You know what I mean? Before people really were too afraid to talk about it and – or even understand it. That makes sense.

[00:46:02] And I'm so glad that you got out when you did and that you had some community and a place to land on the other side to help you. Thank you. To give you an option. To give you that option that there was life outside of Granville. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, I was very alone. Like, I – it's not like I had a – it was difficult. It was very difficult. It's so hard to leave a closed community. But I had met a few people who helped me. They really did.

[00:46:32] And I will never forget them. We're going to pause there and wait until our next episode to hear about how you've healed and your book and the lawsuit and everything that's happened since leaving Granville in 2001. Thank you so much, Beth. Thank you. If you like the show, please consider supporting us by giving us a rating, a review, and subscribe on iTunes. Cults are commonplace now, and we're looking at them all, and every little bit helps.

[00:47:01] Hit that subscribe button so you don't miss an episode. Thank you, everybody. We are going to pause right there and come back next week for part two with Beth Granger. Thanks, everybody, and see you next week on ALBC.

[00:47:36] A Little Bit Culti is a Trace 120 production. Executive produced by Sarah Edmondson and Anthony Nippy Ames in collaboration with Amphibian Media. Our co-creator is Jess Temple-Tardy. Audio engineering by Red Cayman Studios. And our writing and research is done by Emma Diehl and Kristen Reeder. Our theme song, Cultivated, is by the artists John Bryant and Nigel Aslan.