How “One Tree Hill” Star Bethany Joy Lenz Got Lured Into a Cult for a Decade— and How She Got Out of It (Exclusive)

The actress particulars the years she spent dedicated to a high-control spiritual group and the way she hopes to assist others in comparable positions

Within the early 2000s, actress was having fun with life as one of many stars of the favored teen drama that additionally starred and

However all through filming, she tells PEOPLE, she led a double life: On the similar time, she was additionally deeply dedicated to a small, ultra-Christian group led by a shady pastor in Idaho, who managed her profession, life decisions and, ultimately, her checking account.

By the point she obtained out a decade later, she needed to begin over with hardly something to indicate for the almost 9 years she spent on the collection — and a sense of remorse and disgrace for not

In her memoir (out Oct. 22), Lenz tells the entire story for the primary time.

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“I don’t consider it as courageous,” she says, of why she’s lastly opening up. “I consider it as vital. Residing silently within the struggling I skilled, I don’t know if that helps anybody.” She hopes her guide will empower others in comparable conditions: “I consider this extra as the correct factor to do.”

Lenz first met the pastor by way of a bible examine she’d joined when she moved to L.A. at 20 to additional her appearing profession.

“I had at all times been searching for a spot to belong,” she explains. She’d grown up an Evangelical Christian, the one youngster of oldsters who married younger and moved round loads earlier than divorcing when Lenz was 16. Appearing and her church group had been her anchors and an effective way to fulfill like-minded individuals.

At first, she liked her bible examine. They’d sing, worship and have philosophical conversations about God and life’s which means. Discovering that group felt like “water in a desert” to the younger actress, who says she had by no means earlier than had that type of connection.

“We crave that type of intimacy,” she says. “The concept somebody on the market says, ‘It doesn’t matter what you do or how badly you may behave or what dumb decisions you make, I nonetheless love you, and I’m right here for you.’”

When a visiting pastor she calls “Les” started to come back to the examine nights and lead the conversations, she didn’t suppose there was something unusual about it — even when he satisfied others to maneuver to a “Large Home” in Idaho to reside in a small, commune-like setting.

“It nonetheless appeared regular,” Lenz says. “After which it simply morphed. However by the point it began morphing, I used to be too far into the relationships to note.” She provides, “Plus, I used to be so younger.”

She says the truth that she was in a cult wasn’t misplaced on her One Tree Hill costars.

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“I might see it on their faces,” she says of their reactions. “However I’d justify it, like, ‘I couldn’t presumably be in a cult. It’s simply that I’ve obtained entry to a relationship with God and other people in a approach that everyone else desires, however they don’t know learn how to get it,’” she explains.

She even says her costar Craig Sheffer advised her level clean she was in a cult early into filming.

“I used to be like, ‘No, no, no. Cults are bizarre. Cults are individuals in robes chanting loopy issues and ingesting Kool-Assist,” she advised him. “That’s not what we do!’”

Finally, the cracks started to indicate. however Lenz didn’t know that she might get out. She’d married a fellow “household” member and in 2012, a yr after the start of her daughter Rosie, she realized she wished to depart each her marriage and the cult. But it surely wasn’t simple.

“The stakes had been so excessive,” she says. “They had been my solely pals. I used to be married into this group. I had constructed my total life round it. If I admitted that I used to be improper … all the pieces else would come crumbling down.”

To learn extra about Bethany Pleasure Lenz and the way she lastly managed to depart the cult, learn this week’s situation of PEOPLE on stands Friday.

comes out Oct. 22 and is accessible for preorder now, wherever books are offered.

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