Virginia Courage said Gloriavale's founder Hopeful Christian "bullied everybody". Photo: Google Maps
A former Gloriavale member has described an ingrained culture of bullying and mocking at the West Coast Christian community, where powerful and controlling leaders punished women.
Mother-of-11 Virginia Courage told the Employment Court Gloriavale's founder Hopeful Christian was a bully who ridiculed the way she looked when she was pregnant.
She and five other women - Serenity Pilgrim, Anna Courage, Rose Standtrue, Crystal Loyal and Pearl Valor - are seeking a ruling they were employees, not volunteers, working in slave-like conditions at the commune.
Gloriavale's leaders strongly contest the women's claims and deny they were ever employees.
Courage said bullying was so prevalent at Gloriavale people became desensitised to it.
"Hopeful was a bully and he bullied everybody," she said.
"Bullying and mocking people in Gloriavale is such a part of the culture.
"Hopeful mocked me about how I looked when I was pregnant. It's ingrained in them, everybody does it, everybody saw it."
Courage told the court Gloriavale's leaders wielded power over women by ordering them to work in places like the baby or sewing rooms as punishment.
One of the women in charge of the kitchen would often growl at mothers who were feeding their babies, Courage said.
"She would say things to them like, 'don't you take too long with feeding that baby, you just do what you need to do and then you get back to that kitchen it needs you'," she said.
Courage said overseeing shepherd Howard Temple put her niece on gruelling daily duties for six months.
"She said to me, 'I think Howard is trying to kill me', because she was having to work so hard," she said.
"She wasn't allowed to work with anyone else, every task she had to do by herself. That is because he had the control and the power."
When her younger sister died in an isolation room, Courage said one of the leaders was still carrying the pin to the door four hours later.
"We were there with the rescue teams, with the ambulance, with the police, and everyone kept getting locked in the room. I would call that complete control and power," she said.
Courage told the court she was reared with a sense of obligation.
"You are told right from little that if Hopeful hadn't set up the community and your parents hadn't joined and if Hopeful hadn't preached the faith to them, that you wouldn't have been born," she said.
"So right from little you've got this strong sense that you're obligated to the community, you owe them something."
Gloriavale ticked every box for a "thought control group", not a Christian community, Courage said.
Last week Courage told the court she and her family left the commune in 2019 because she was extremely concerned for her children's safety.
Today she said she locked the bedroom as best she could her entire married life.
"With my kids' room, even in the heat of summer, the window was either locked or I had my husband cut boards so we could put them in the space where the window had come back... no-one could get their head through it and climb in," she said.
Courage said her nine-week-old son Jonas, who was born on the outside, was the easiest baby she has ever had.
"When you're in Gloriavale, you have to routine your baby to fit in with the community's routine. So you're not trying to manipulate their sleeps, you're not trying to manipulate their feeds," she said.
"I spend so much more time with him. My older kids have said, 'mummy, he's going to be spoilt', and I just said to them 'love and care doesn't spoil anyone'."