CultNEWS101 Articles: 12/17/2025
Patrick Ryan
"On 30 January this year, [Claire Harris] appeared on Four Corners. The episode Purity: An Education in Opus Dei revealed the disturbing practices at four independent schools in Sydney affiliated with Opus Dei, an ultra-conservative faction of the Catholic Church with cult-like rules governing its membership.
The episode was the culmination of over a year’s work by a group of concerned alumni who graduated from Tangara School and Redfield College. In 2021, when a national conversation was sparked around consent education, [she] penned an article for The Guardian about the lack of sex education at my Sydney private school. While [she] was not allowed to name either the school or Opus Dei, for legal reasons, the anecdotes were immediately recognisable to others who had shared the same religious upbringing."
"Four Corners takes you inside the suburban schools connected to the secretive Opus Dei.
Reporter Louise Milligan and the team investigate the disturbing practices of the conservative Catholic organisation and its influence in the NSW Liberal Party.
Milligan reveals in some cases the schools are not following state curriculum and are accused of persistent attempts to recruit teenagers to Opus Dei and have taught misinformation about sexual health, including discouraging girls from getting the HPV cervical cancer vaccine.
Through intimate personal testimonies, former students of the elite schools reflect on the practices they say has scarred them for life, going as far as to call the school's "hell on earth"."
"In this episode, host Rachel Bernstein is joined by Francisco González Espejito, a psychologist, lecturer, and researcher at the Autonomous University of Madrid. Francisco discusses his background in studying abuse and violence across various contexts, the influence of coercive control, and the rise of digital environments like the manosphere. They explore how pseudo-therapeutic groups manipulate their followers, the psychological mechanisms behind group influence, and the disturbing trend of self-harm communities on gaming platforms. The conversation underscores the complexities of modern-day coercion and the importance of awareness and protection against such systems."
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