Class Acts
My memoir, Misguided: My Jesus Freak Life in a Doomsday Cult, was published by New Star Books in Vancouver:
www.newstarbooks.com/book.php?book_id=1554202065
It tells my story of dropping out of high school in 1972 at the age of 16 to join the Port Alberni commune of the most notorious Christian sect to emerge from the spiritual counterculture of the 1970s. I lived in cult communes in several Canadian cities, the U.S., Japan, Korea, the Philippines, Malaysia, Macau, Hong Kong, and Beijing (undercover).
I take readers on an extraordinary trip through the world of biblical literalism, fundamentalist endtime fantasies, paranormal spirituality, evangelical extremism, ritual abuse, and liberally interpreted biblical teachings that were used to justify licentious sexual doctrines, evangelical prostitution, and child sexual abuse.
After escaping the cult in 1991, I returned to Canada, earning a B.A. with distinction at Vancouver Island University and a law degree at UBC, and was called to the Bar of B.C. in 2003. Through education, I lost my religion and turned from a religious extremist to a secular humanist lawyer, fighting for the rights of sex workers and drug users struggling to survive on the streets of Vancouver. I also became an advocate for thousands of second-generation survivors of the cult’s child abuse and psychological trauma scattered around the world, challenging academic cult apologists who defended the cult and rejected accounts by survivors as biased exaggerations or lies.
Cult expert Janja Lalich, PhD, writes: “Perry Bulwer has given us a real treasure, especially given that so few cult memoirs are written from a male perspective. Readers will gain a vivid picture of life in a cult with worldwide spread, led by a pedophiliac narcissist. Definitely a book you will want to read!”