Name Zion Pilgrim 
Age when entered care From birth 
Hometown Springbank
Year of birth 1978
Time in care 1978–2020  
Type of care facility Faith-based communities – Springbank, Gloriavale  
Ethnicity NZ European
Whānau background Zion is the son of Faithful Pilgrim, who was a Shepherd and school principal at Gloriavale. Zion has 12 siblings.
Current Zion is married and has 13 children. Zion and his family left Gloriavale in 2020 and he is actively involved with the Gloriavale Leavers’ Support Trust. Five of his siblings have also left Gloriavale. One of Zion’s sons was a plaintiff in an Employment Court case against Gloriavale leaders.

My wife and I married when I was 21 years old. We were taught that any form of birth control is evil and sinful so we immediately started a family. Eventually, we were sharing a two-bedroom space with our 12 children – we were given a third room in early 2020, which helped a lot. 

We were also taught that every man and woman at Gloriavale must have greater loyalty to the leaders than to their spouse. This means if the husband wants to leave Gloriavale, the wife cannot. 

I was a trustee of the Gloriavale Christian Community Trust. The trust owned various businesses, including a passenger plane service from Greymouth to Wellington. I worked as a pilot in this business from 2004 to 2008. Then from 2008 until 2020, I was the head guide at Wilderness Quest New Zealand, a division of Canaan Farming Deer Ltd, also owned by the trust. We catered for predominantly American tourists and turnover was NZD$1.4 million per annum. Once a year, a colleague and I would travel to America to attend trade conferences to promote our business. This role created conflict with my personal life because some of Gloriavale’s core principles relate to being ‘separate’ to the world. 

I became a Servant at Gloriavale, which is like a church deacon. I acted as support management for the Shepherds, who were the senior managers. We dealt with financial, administration, spiritual and disciplinary matters. If someone was not ‘towing the line’ we would interview them, and people were encouraged to report those who may have acted in a way that did not reflect the leaders’ teachings. Discipline from the Servants and Shepherds was seen as an act of mercy and love because if you were held to account and repented, then your soul was saved.  

When I was at Gloriavale the leaders were not really concerned about sexual abuse. Their thinking was that women were the ones that have control, and you can’t blame men for wanting or having sexual desires. Nothing can happen if women do not encourage it. If something of a sexual matter does happen, it is the woman’s fault because she must have caused it by encouraging it to happen. It is never seen as the male perpetrator’s fault.  

If someone made an allegation of sexual abuse against a male member of the community, the leaders did not let the rest of the community know, even if children are involved. For example, a youth leader had a sexual relationship with an underage girl. When she left the community and made a legal complaint against him, he was initially allowed to keep his position and the leaders chose not to make the rest of the community aware of the potential risk to the young girls he interacted with on a daily basis or to take any steps to make sure it didn’t happen again. He was only later stood down following pressure by an external report. I believe that the people at Gloriavale are still unaware of his sexual offending.  

Parents who are unhappy with such situations can choose to stand up to the leaders, but this is extremely difficult. It may also make their children the subject of increased scrutiny and pressure.  

I am aware that a young girl made an allegation against a teacher, Just Standfast, and the leaders blamed the girl for her involvement. Just Standfast was found guilty but the leaders took his side. He was signed off as a fit and proper person to teach. 

The leaders also knew a young man in the community was sexually offending against young boys but they did not report his offending to any outside authority. The leaders told the parents of one victim they needed to better supervise their children so these things do not happen. They also told parents of other young boys to closely monitor their children and ensure they did not go out at night. They gave no reason for this warning and parents did not know the risk they were being warned about. 

Eventually, this led to a police investigation relating to 63 people in the Gloriavale community – multiple perpetrators were identified and charges have been laid but there has been no accountability for the issues that allowed for this intergenerational sexual offending. The leaders knew about the offending, but were more concerned that someone had called the police, therefore betraying the community.  

Because I spent a lot of time outside Gloriavale, I had access to outside scriptures and preaching through the internet. I started to question the belief that the leaders saw themselves as anointed by God, and that when they read the scriptures there was no difference between God and themselves. 

I wrote a letter to Howard Temple, the overseeing Shepherd. I wrote the letter because I felt very strongly that changes needed to be made. When I spoke to him he said, “We are not going to change. We have been living this life for 40 years. People have had concerns but we are not going to change.” 

I was very disappointed with this response and sent a resignation letter to the trustees the following week. I was summoned to a disciplinary meeting and told in the opening statement that I would have to leave Gloriavale because I had talked with others in the community about my thoughts.  

At a final meeting on 19 September, Howard Temple told me that my letter was judged to be completely wrong and it was rejected and unacceptable. My wife and eldest son were also required to be at the meeting and we were told that if we wanted to stay then we would have to reject all outside preaching, submit to the will of the leaders and give up our own thoughts and questions. We were also told we would have to reject our son if he would not reject outside preaching. 

We knew this was wrong and we could not go against our conscience and give them complete and unfettered control of everything in our lives. 

Our family left Gloriavale on 20 September 2020.[289]