Obituary: Gloriavale patriarch Hopeful Christian’s troubling legacy

By Michael Wright – Stuff – 19/05/2018

Few leaders meant as much to their cause as Hopeful Christian. So it was that, when the founder and spiritual leader of the reclusive Gloriavale Christian Community died this week, aged 91, the very future of the West Coast settlement was questioned.

This was a man, after all, who had spent two years in prison for sex offences against young members of Gloriavale’s forerunner, the Springbank Christian Community in Cust, north Canterbury, and was still viewed as its vital and undisputed spiritual head.

Read more here: https://www.stuff.co.nz/national/103999960/obituary-gloriavale-patriarch-hopeful-christians-troubling-legacy?rm=a