Broken Faith: Inside the Word of Faith Fellowship, One of America’s Most Dangerous Cults by Mitch Weiss
My rating: 5 of 5 stars
An absolutely incredible and necessary expose on one of the worst church cults ever, author Mitch Weiss did such thorough research to bring Word of Faith Fellowship’s abuse and illegal activities to light. I wish this was required reading in schools so people could learn from an early age what the warning signs are of a cult.
First of all, Word of Faith Fellowship’s pastor, Jane Whaley, likes to deny all claims, but there is ample proof in the form of video recordings, audio recordings, eye witness accounts, and documentation that all of it is absolutely true. All accounts from loads of witnesses are the same, even when they don’t talk to each other outside of WOFF, which means that of course the allegations are true.
This is an important book to read for everyone. It tells you the signs of cult behavior long before you’re stuck in it, and cults are unfortunately easy to fall for with the best of intentions. But luckily a lot of them have the same signs, so a lot of this information will apply to any kind of cult.
The individual accounts of the abuse people took were shocking and disturbing, and Jane Whaley’s encouragement of it and insistence of worsening it is beyond comprehension. Her need for control over her parishioners and her ability to simply take and take everything from them, all under the guise of religion, really takes your breath away. Let’s face it, this is *one woman* versus hundreds of congregants, and they’re all too afraid of her to talk back or leave. It’s incredible. And she’s got branches in South America, Europe, and Africa. It’s truly frightening.
An eye-opening read and highly recommended.