A Gloriavale mother of 12 has limited contact with one child because she's trying to "undermine my children and my faith and what I stand for".
Hannah Patience Standtrue was asked about the evidence given by her daughter Rose Standtrue at an Employment Court hearing, which will decide whether six former members were employees or volunteers.
Rose Standtrue left the West Coast commune in 2021 and is one of the plaintiffs. She said she wanted to commit suicide "because I was really depressed and had anxiety and PTSD, and I felt like that was the only way out of Gloriavale".
She sat in court sobbing while her mother spoke.
Hannah said she helped her daughter to leave with the assistance of the police and did visit her about a week after she left.
"Well, her evidence is that you've had no contact with her for almost a year. Are you saying that isn't true? You actually went and visited her?" asked Gloriavale leavers lawyer Brian Henry.
"Yes, it would have been more than a year now, but … she was in Greymouth, and I have met her, and I went and visited her another day at our lake," said Hannah.
The court heard that members can choose to have contact with the family who leave Gloriavale and that the leaders don't have any input. But when asked whether children are taught to avoid "people who are not part of the pure Christian faith as practised inside Gloriavale", Hannah said, "as far as the bible goes, yes".
"We might need to make sure they're okay if they're having trouble or struggling … I think what I've been taught is that I don't want to associate myself with them and listen to a lot about how they think things are, but I want to base what I think and what I believe on the bible," said Hannah.
In August 2022, Rose said that when she tried to visit her family, she was physically forced from the room and stopped from seeing her siblings.
"She actually pushed me; I don't think anyone pushed her. She pushed me into my bedroom and said I'm coming in when I had asked her not to.
"If she was respectful and she respected what I believed, and she wasn't going to undermine what I had believed with my children, I might consider having more to do with her, but because I believe she would want to undermine my children and my faith and what I stand for I have chosen to have limited contact with her," said Hannah.
Rose said she had issues regarding sexual abuse, to which her mother said, "she never told me, particularly that there was".
The hearing is continuing.
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