October Novel Prep Challenge

Officially, I said it was "basically a cult." ;- It was just super controlling--she couldn't be alone with a guy, even to study or whatever (she was a student). She was "encouraged" to move into their housing and room with their people. She didn't get along the best with her initial roommate and didn't want to live with her. They accommodated her by letting her have different church members as roommates, but they didn't want her not living in their facility or not having church members as roommates...or having non-church members as roommates.

Anytime she had questions about their teachings, she was given a good talking to about spreading ideas against God or not being a true believer or whatever. She initially thought she was only expected to attend service twice a week, but there were activities like 4-5 days a week and there was no missing them. She repeatedly called me crying because we had a paper or a test the next day and they were making her attend some function when she needed to be studying. If she wanted to miss something, including the days they went out to spread the word, she was told she wasn't a good person or didn't love God enough or whatever.

I'm sure there's more that I'm forgetting because she was told to cut communication with me (and pretty much everyone else outside the church) and told to change her phone number so no guys or non-members could contact her. I'm not sure if she wrote down my number or what, but she does have a new phone number now, but has finally been able to get out of that situation and reached out to me again. It might not be a full-blown cult because they did let her leave (after a couple of months of her expressing that she wanted to and then a week or so of her insisting), but I've been a member of quite a few denominations in quite a few parts of the world and though some were more fervent than others, none were like that.