Guest Bios Show Transcript https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AWVNVNJg4n0Normally, people think of grooming as the manipulative process a sexual predator uses to lure his unsuspecting prey. But these same grooming tactics are rife in cult-like churches. So says Mike Donahue, a child sexual abuse survivor who spent many adult years serving under popular author and youth leader, Jeanne Mayo. On this edition of The Roys Report, Mike joins host Julie Roys to tell his tragic but riveting story, revealing shocking truths about megachurch culture. During his childhood, Mike was abused and neglected, making him easy prey for sexual predators. These predators exploited his need for love and attention to fulfill their perverse sexual desires. After escaping these predators, Mike found hope in Jesus and became a Christian. Yet, instead of finding safety in the church, Mike says he found another predator: well-known author and youth leader Jeanne Mayo. Mike says Mayo exploited his same need for love and belonging—not to satisfy sexual appetites, but her craving for success and growth. In this eye-opening discussion, Mike reveals the predatory recruitment tactics he observed in Mayo’s ministry and others, and then was coached and trained to imitate. But he also talks about his journey of discovery, and how he changed after being convicted that the way he was ministering was wrong. Guests Mike Donahue Mike Donahue is a highly sought-after speaker and author on the subjects of respect, bullying, and resiliency. Over the past three decades, he has addressed more than a million students and adults in-person including across the U.S., Asia, South America, and Europe. He has written five books including Hidden Scars and his latest book, Groomed. Mike and his wife, Rachel, who are parents of five children, live in Omaha, Nebraska. Learn more at his website.  Show Transcript SPEAKERSJULIE ROYS, MIKE DONAHUE JULIE ROYS  00:04We normally think of grooming as the manipulative process a sexual predator uses to lure his unsuspecting prey. But these same grooming tactics are rife in cult like churches, so says Mike Donahue, a child sex abuse survivor who spent many adult years serving under a cult-like church leader, and today, Mike joins me to tell his story.   JULIE ROYS  00:25 Welcome to The Roys Report, a podcast dedicated to reporting the truth and restoring the church. I’m Julie Roys, and I’m so looking forward to sharing Mike Donahue’s heart wrenching yet critically important message based on his own life experience. In his childhood, Mike was abused and neglected, making him easy prey for sexual predators, and in his new book, Groomed, Mike talks about the tactics these predators used to exploit his need for love and attention to fulfill their perverse sexual desires. But after escaping these predators, Mike found hope in Jesus and became a Christian. Yet instead of finding safety in the church, Mike says he found another predator – well known author, youth pastor and conference speaker Jeanne Mayo. Mike says Mayo exploited his same need for love and belonging, not to satisfy sexual appetites, but her need for success and growth. In this eye-opening discussion, Mike reveals the predatory recruitment tactics he learned in Mayo’s ministry but was coached and trained to imitate. And he talks about how you can safeguard yourself and loved ones against those who would use religion to prey on people to build their own empires.   JULIE ROYS  01:34 I’m so excited to share this really important podcast with you, but first I’d like to thank the sponsors of this podcast, the Restore Conference and Marquardt of Barrington. If you’re someone who’s experienced church hurt or abuse, there are few places you can go to pursue healing. Similarly, if you’re an advocate, counselor or pastor, there are few conferences designed to equip you to minister to people traumatized in the church. But the Restore Conference, this February 7 and 8, in Phoenix, Arizona is designed to do just that. Joining us will be leading abuse survivor advocates like Mary Demuth and Dr David Pooler, an expert in adult clergy sexual abuse. Also joining us will be Scott McKnight, author of A Church Called Tov, Diane Langberg, a psychologist and trauma expert, yours truly and more. For more information, just go to RESTORE2025.COM. Also, if you’re looking for a quality new or used car, I highly recommend my friends at Marquardt of Barrington. Marquardt is a Buick GMC dealership where you can expect honesty, integrity, and transparency. That’s because the owners there, Dan and Kurt Marquart, are men of integrity. To check them out, just go to BUYACAR123.COM.   JULIE ROYS  02:55 Well, again, joining me is Mike Donahue, a survivor of child sexual abuse and then of spiritual abuse in the church. Mike now speaks around the country on bullying, respect, and resiliency, and he’s also written five books, including his latest Groomed, which is a riveting memoir. So Mike, welcome, and I’m just so glad to have you join me. Yeah. Thank   MIKE DONAHUE  03:18  Yeah. Thank you so much. It’s my pleasure to be here today,   JULIE ROYS  03:20 I have to say, Mike, when I first got your book, it’s a self-published book. And when I get self-published books, often the writing isn’t so good, the editing isn’t so good. And so I didn’t have really high expectations as I went to read this, and man was I surprised. This is a page turner from beginning to end. Just a really, really well written book. But your story, your life story,  it’s stunning all that you’ve been through. And so just such a great book, and I think it will be so helpful for so many folks, but it must have been hard. I mean, some of this is incredibly personal, talking about, abuse that you received, and yet, you talk about it quite openly, that must have been tough for you. It was a tough   MIKE DONAHUE  04:08 It was a tough summer last summer when I wrote it, to be honest with you, going through the Boston stuff where I was sexually abused by men in my life. I was involved with the sex trafficking ring from basically a newspaper in Boston. I’m not gonna say which one, but I worked for a newspaper, and we were selling subscriptions to the Globe down on Cape Cod. And the guys that were hired by the Globe, they’re the ones that hired these guys, and they didn’t know, but they were part of a sex trafficking ring, and so they preyed on my vulnerabilities. My dad had left, my mom was really overwhelmed, raising kids by herself, and my dad didn’t pay child support. We were pretty poor, and so I was looking for a job because I needed money, even just to buy clothes. And they knew who they were targeting, and they targeted me. And did all the love bombing, and all the techniques they used to pull you into their web and then did some things that were illegal.   JULIE ROYS  05:10 And we’re going to unpack all of that today, and I’m looking forward to doing that, because I think there’s going to be a lot that’s going to be very eye opening for folks that are listening. I think when I first read the idea of a sex trafficking ring using the same tactics as an Evangelical Church, that’s shocking, absolutely shocking, when you think about it. But as I read your book, I was like, yeah, yeah, it’s the same sort of thing. It’s manipulation, it’s exploitation. I should mention your book, you were able to make that available to us so that we can make it available to donors. So anybody who gives $30 or more to this ministry this month will get a copy of your book. So I’m pretty glad about being able to offer that. So if you’re interested in that, you just go to JULIEROYS.COM/DONATE. For a gift of $30 or more, you’ll be supporting what we do here, and you’ll get this incredible resource. So really glad to make that available to folks. So you already referenced this, but your family growing up, had some major dysfunctions, some major deficits, and that set you up for predators to come into your life. Would you unpack that a little bit about what it was about your family that left you with a void that then other people sought to exploit?   06:43 When I speak in high schools, that’s what I do for a living, I always tell the kids that we’re all part of a genetic lottery, right? You get what you get. And I was born in South Boston, Massachusetts, and my dad was an alcoholic, and his history, I’m not going to get into all that, and my mom’s history, you could really get into that. And I did in the book, it’s pretty devastating. So when I landed on the planet in 1962, I was already walking into, or being born into, a really dysfunctional situation. My mom was an alcoholic, but her dad was, and he was a sexual predator. What I always say in schools, is that, you know, my mom came from a long line of abuse. So my great grandmother abused my grandfather, my grandfather abused my mom, and so when my mom had children, she  just wasn’t functional, she wasn’t emotionally functional. So she was triggered a lot by things, and I triggered her because I really miss my dad and wanted my dad around. I wanted a male figure, and she was pretty bitter at him for doing what he did to her and all that stuff.   07:48 So it just was a the perfect storm for a conflict between the two of us. And so I really didn’t have a connection with her emotionally. My mom connection was not really there, very strong. And then I was a pretty wild guy. I did a lot of crazy stuff growing up and found friends that were like me. And we did a lot of things. We self-medicating with alcohol and drugs and that kind of stuff. So when I was in eighth grade, our house burnt down. So I was accidentally caught on fire, and so we had to live in a hotel, and we were really strapped for money at that point. So I got this job with this newspaper and ended up working with these guys. And that’s when they came into my life, and they were slick, they were funny, they were everything. I was enamored by them because  they were just great guys, and they knew how to talk to junior high boys. They knew what to do to get us to laugh;  they were crude and farted,  and all this stupid stuff that boys laugh at. I just thought those guys were larger than life. And then, as they will lure me in and hooking me with that kind of friendship and relationship, I would do anything for them. And that was their plan was to get me emotionally hooked to them so they could ask of me, to do some things. And I eventually ended up being sodomized by one of them. And that wasn’t on my radar at all. I knew I wasn’t attracted to the same sex. So I was really confused by that. I was really confused by that, because I wasn’t attracted at all physically, but I was willing to do these things because of the emotional benefits that they were giving me, and I didn’t realize at the time. I’ve unpacked this now, but when I was there in the middle of it, I was really confused. Consequently, what happened was I was missing school, so they called my mom, and then she threw a fit about that. She had no idea about the sexual relationship that was happening, but she went after them, and they ended up leaving town. And so I was left without them, and with this knowledge that I had done this.   MIKE DONAHUE  08:57 And so they brought in a person that they thought was a safe person, and he was a guy in the neighborhood that was willing to be my  big brother type. And then he ended up taking his time, but he did the same thing. He lured me in emotionally; common ground stuff – like he worked on cars. He was a mechanic. He had a 57 Chevy that was really hot. We all thought we were driving around in that thing. It was all that kind of same thing. And then maybe a year into it, he asked for sexual favors. And it was the same thing. I was sodomized by him as well, and it was just a really bad deal.   JULIE ROYS  10:52 You used the term love bombing, and I know a lot of people listening probably know what that is, but there’s probably a lot that don’t as well. Would you describe what love bombing is and how that works in the whole grooming process?   MIKE DONAHUE  11:05 Well, it’s just a saturation of love at the very beginning. You know, you’re just real attentive. You’re paying attention to everything they do, say, you’re looking for vulnerabilities so you can fill that hole. I mean, it was actually coined by the Moonies, by the Unification Church back in the 70s. It’s in their literal playbook. They use the term love bombing to saturate someone with a lot of attention at the very beginning,  so you have them hooked. It’s almost like a drug dealer, right? They’re giving you the drug free in order to charge you later, exponentially. So that’s really what it felt like, was that love bombing that I received from these guys, from the newspaper, and then the other guy, Clint, I mean it just was overwhelming. And so, yeah, love bomb, it’s a saturation of love and emotion right from the very beginning of the relationship.   JULIE ROYS  12:04 And you use the word playbook as well, and I’ve heard that so much in church abuse stories that it seems like all of these church abusers, whether it’s spiritual abuse, whether it’s sexual abuse, whether it’s just bullying and, just manipulation, that they all seem to use the same playbook. And when they get caught in a crisis, they all use the same playbook. And with these guys, they use, if you love me, blank, blank, blank, you’ll do this and, and that’s something again, as we kind of fast forward, we’ll see more in your story, kind of this, using the emotional ties, the love, and then using that to extract things from people. Just really tragic and so predatory in the way that that was done.   JULIE ROYS  12:55 You made a decision, though, I thought this was really interesting in your book, where you referenced that you were hanging out with the wrong crowd, you were abusing alcohol and drugs and yet you made a decision one day that you wanted to walk away from that. What prompted you to be able to do that, to make that kind of courageous decision?   MIKE DONAHUE  13:17 Well, there was a girl involved, and she, it’s always a girl, right? Actually, it was a godsend, I mean, she was a blessing in my life. She was only in my life for like, six years, but she was my sister’s  best friend, and so she was around a lot, and I had a reputation in that town and in that area of being kind of a troublemaker. And I was hanging out with a really tough crowd. I mean, we were, we really were. We were selling pounds of marijuana out of the fort behind my house when I was in junior high. Like we were moving stuff. We worked for the some of my friends older brothers. And so when Pam came along in my life, she just brought out a side of me that was,  we would talk, and I would it started out while I was walking her home, because my neighborhood was tough, and she lives in a nice neighborhood, so I wanted her to get her out, because nobody would mess with her if she was with me. So I would just walk her out, get her out of there, and I ended up liking her. I just thought she was, she was really nice, and she treated me with respect, and she saw inside of me something bigger than what I was accepting in my life.   MIKE DONAHUE  14:25 I had an identity that I was protecting and that I found power in. I found power in that identity. And I had friends there, and I was a leader there. I was  respected in that identity. So that’s why, like, I don’t like going to schools and tell kids just don’t do drugs. It’s like, that’s the stupidest thing in the world, because it’s not about the drug, it’s about the identity that the drug is associated with, right? So I was associated with friends that love me, respect me. They were my family. They would do anything. They would take a baseball bat to your head if I asked them to.   MIKE DONAHUE  14:59 So that kind of loyalty was what I was addicted to. Wasn’t the drug so much. I mean, I didn’t mind smoking weed or drinking whatever,  but that wasn’t the issue. The issue was my friendships that was surrounding that. So Pam comes along, and we start having conversations, and these are conversations that are different than anything I’ve had with anybody. She was very intelligent, and I realized I wasn’t dumb, I was intelligent, and that part of me was dormant. So she was pulling that out of me, and I really enjoyed that, and liked the conversation. So that’s what started it. And then, we kept dating when we started dating, and we kept dating. And then there was an incident where I got in trouble in school, and I got arrested, and we all got released, and then I knew she was going to find out, because her brother went to my school. So I just was basically telling her, Listen, I’ve been faking this. I like you, but I’m a bad guy, right? And then, you know, simply, honestly, it sounds like a line that a motivational speaker is supposed to say, and it does play well, I’ll tell you, you know, when you are speaking, but it really is true. She said, “You know, I don’t care what you’re like when you are with your friends. I like the Mike Donahue you are when you with me. Why can’t you be that guy? And that really did, like, resonate with me, because it was like, Why am I accepting this identity? Why? Because I’m smart, I’m a good guy. I’ve got a good heart. I was taking care of an old lady, no one knew this.   JULIE ROYS  16:40 But for three years at the book where you talked about that, was she like 80 years old or something?   MIKE DONAHUE  16:45 Yeah .she was in her 80s. She was feisty, and to be honest with you, she knew my dad, so that was a big draw for me. I went and just listened to the same stories every week about my dad growing up because I missed him. I wanted to hear stuff about him, but I liked her too. I took care of her, and nobody knew that. And I told Pam, but she was the only one that that knew, And it was weird, because it was a side of me that was that pothead kid that I really identified with, and I had power there and then there was the guy that I knew I could be, but I didn’t have the backup there, you know, so I did. I had to make a decision, and I did. I made that decision, I walked away from my friends.   MIKE DONAHUE  17:29 I don’t say this in the book, but this is a true story. A few months later, after I made that decision, my best friend got arrested and got a 40-year sentence for a fight he got into, and something he did fight because he almost killed a kid. And I would have been right there. And everybody that was there got 10 years. This kid got 40, and they reduced it later,, but that was the original sentencing. And so I would have been right there with him. I would have had a felony on my record. So it was a godsend that Pam came into my life and helped me decide to get away from that lifestyle.   JULIE ROYS  18:08 So important sometimes. You don’t realize the impact you can have just by believing in somebody and seeing the best in them. And what a beautiful story. And you know, the outcome there. You ended up then going into the Air Force, going to the Midwest, and that’s where you were invited to this church, Assemblies of God church, and someone named Jeanne Mayo. That may be a familiar name for a lot of people, maybe not for others. She was, I mean, still is a national figure, and is out there coaching pastors and youth pastors. And she’s written a number of books, but you had never seen anyone like her before or a youth ministry like that. Talk about your impressions when you encountered this.   MIKE DONAHUE  18:55 Well, I went because of a girl again, some girl invited me. She was like, Do you want to go to church? I was like, I will join a cult with you. So let’s go. And little did I know that it was kind of a cult. I get there and there’s 300 teenagers and young adults, and it’s energetic. never went to a church that had energy in it. First of all, there was drums, and it was a rock band up there playing before the speaker came up. Then when Jeannie came up and she started talking about God, it was riveting. I mean, it just captured me, because she was so alive in talking about God and relationship with him. And I don’t remember what the sermon that night was on, but I couldn’t take my eyes off the people around just watching them. During worship, they had their hands up, and they were really into it. They were passionate about God. And it was very intoxicating to me, and I kept asking questions. I was like, Well, is she a nun? Because she wants to be called Sister Jay and they laughed at me, and they’re like, No, her husband’s a senior pastor. I didn’t know what that was. I had no idea. I wasn’t involved in any of that, like, I didn’t know any of the lingo and how the rules worked or anything.   MIKE DONAHUE  20:15 But I kept going, and I struggled for a little while. I went, but then I wasn’t really into it again, because I was looking for a girlfriend, and so I did. I found somebody that I dated for a while. She was from Boston, actually, and she was in the military too, and it was decent. Then she got stationed somewhere, and I was left again alone. So I was there, and I went one night, and I was drinking. I had been drinking, and I went towards the end of the night to talk to sister Jay, to talk to Jeanne, and I was drinking, and they were right to do this. There was no way they would let me near her. And that was good. I mean, in retrospect, that was a smart move. But this guy named Mike Beckham, he was six-six, walked me to the to my car, and, I mean, my feet hardly touched the ground. I mean, he was walking me out, and it was great. But what he did with next was he was like, Listen, you don’t ever come here drunk again. What are you doing tomorrow for lunch? And so he took me out to lunch, and that was the beginning of getting deeper involved in it. And then I decided that I would, and it was a good move, because I got close to God. I didn’t know Jeanne, or any of the mechanics, or any of the leadership structure or anything like that at that time, I just felt like I needed to change. I needed to deal with the self-medication issues with drinking and the girl stuff. And I didn’t know why, I didn’t know what, but I, I knew this was probably the answer for me. And it was, actually, it was, but as we found out later, I got involved in leadership. Then I got to see the how the sausage is made, and got to see some of the ugly side.   JULIE ROYS  22:02 Yeah. And you use this word, intoxicating for Jeanne, and you wrote in your book, Jeanne’s approval was intoxicating. Because pleasing Jeanne was the same thing as pleasing God in my mind. How did she take that place, which I mean, sounds like almost idolatry, right? Like she becomes God to someone. How did she assume that position? And do you think it was intentional on her part? Or where would you kind of put the onus for that?   MIKE DONAHUE  22:37 It’s hard to explain her if you’ve never met her, it’s really hard to explain her, because she is one of the most loving people that you’ve ever been around. It’s not just charisma, like she’s funny, she’s witty, she’s all those things, but when you’re talking to her personally, you feel like you’re the only person in the room. She listens to you on a level that I don’t think anybody in your life listens to you. Oh, you feel that way, at least. And so when you get any kind of time with her personally, it really does make you feel good. My dad met her in New Hampshire years later. And he’s a tough truck driver type guy. And he goes, Mike, he goes, she’s exudes love, and she does. But I think where it gets twisted  is that she’s really good at, you’ll do anything for her, and then she ends up asking you to do anything and the motive is gets twisted. I do think that at times, she’s had good motives. But I also think that because of the magnetic personality and the ability to reach into your soul, people want to follow her. They want to please her, and there’s nobody like her. Her cohorts, and even myself, when I worked for her; I’m charismatic, and I’m funny and I’m whatever. I don’t hold a candle to her, as far as that kind of connection with human beings is that fast. She’s the fastest I’ve ever seen. So it sounds it’s weird. If you haven’t met her, those of you that are listening that have met her, you know exactly what I’m talking about, but you know it’s hard to explain that to anybody else.   JULIE ROYS  24:30 Well I’ve met people like that. I have definitely seen that. And there’s some people that have that power and that ability and used appropriately, it can be a beautiful thing. But that’s a lot of power for a person to have because and especially when they’re working with young people who have deep, gaping holes left from their families of origin or whatever. Yeah, it can really be something. I used to be in youth ministry, and I remember how the kids would put you on a pedestal, and I didn’t have that kind of charisma either. I just remember it, but I also remember that the higher they put you on a pedestal, the farther you could fall in their eyes. So it can be a very, very dangerous thing, and something that you learn in ministry that you really have to work against if you’re in any kind of leadership position. Because  it’s deadly for people, absolutely. But it also seems like , she fed it a little bit by, she asked you to call her mom, right? Which I’m guessing she knew your background and that you had a big hole. I mean, is that right?   MIKE DONAHUE  25:49 Absolutely. And it wasn’t just me, but so publicly, like, she would ask people to call her mom, like, generally, just because,  she wants she basically she would say, I’m your mom in the Lord. But when we were talking privately, it was like she really, she would say, Mike, you’re my son,  you’re my son, you’re mine, you’re one of mine. It made you feel really special. And I did. I felt like I was when I when I got involved in leadership. She didn’t like me right away because I wasn’t very productive. But as I started figuring things out, I really liked that ministry, and I liked working with inner city kids and tough kids, and we were getting them. I mean, this was in Bellevue. We were getting a lot of tougher kids. I was in Council Bluff Iowa, and we bussed kids over. And it was getting a lot of attention. And the church like, oh, where are all these kids coming from? And so she, all of a sudden, she started to, like me, and that’s when the mom stuff started. That’s when her, personally, she began to put her hooks in. Before that, it was just, it was Rick Lorimer. He was her assistant, and he was a good friend. And he would I’m your dad in the Lord, they use those terms. It wasn’t just her, it was in that culture, they used those terms of mom and dad and brothers and sisters and that kind of stuff, because it was one of the hooks that they used to, hook in.   JULIE ROYS  27:16 I’ve been in Christian environments where you refer to brother and sister, because, you know, we are, we’re brothers and sisters in the Lord, I would be very reluctant now. And I was in a church most recently where the pastors were called Father, the priests and even their wife, they wanted us to refer to her as mama. And I look back and that kind of like, grosses me out now. I’m just like, you’re not my mama at all. You’re my sister. That’s what you are. And so I think those sorts of things are, they can sound so good, but they’re really kind of gross, and they should be red flags for us, I think, although coming from a Catholic background, you call the priest father, right? So that is somewhat something that you’re used to, and could be a positive thing, but again, can also be a very predatory thing.   MIKE DONAHUE  28:15 Well, I grew up in South Boston in the 70s, so we all knew that it came out later that a lot of priests were molesting children, and we knew. Like, the street level kids us, we all knew we had euphemistic terms, which I’m not going to say on the air here, but for them, because we all knew, we had no respect at all for priests. Yeah, I’m sure there were good ones. I’m sure there were but we all knew that there were bad ones, and so we stayed away from them.   JULIE ROYS  28:42 When you talked about being productive for Jeanne Mayo, you’re talking about recruiting people for this youth ministry. There’s a big emphasis on numbers, on image, on all of these things. And you used, and I thought this was an interesting term, this term of frog kissing, which is something that you were, I mean, it was actually had a name, and you were trained to use it. Describe what that is and how you were supposed to use this tactic.   MIKE DONAHUE  29:13 Well she taught lessons on it. I mean, it was frog kissing 101. I don’t know what the name of the course was, but basically, in our leadership development, and she does, she speaks when she’s doing her cadre, her training, youth pastors, I’m sure that’s still part of the curriculum, or you know what she talks about. And essentially, it’s kissing, kissing, love-bombing people in general, almost like a shotgun approach right till you land on somebody who has who’s sharp. And they use the term sharp, and people who weren’t sharp, they termed precious. So if you’re somebody who, like, you kiss the frog, and they end up being not productive, they’re not sharp, whatever. Then they go into the precious category, and it’s almost like a separation. You’re filtering people out and categorizing them to see who’s going to be productive, who could be productive in the ministry, and who’s just kind of a normal person that’s going and we were trained to look for people at the altar that was sharp, and not to spend time with precious people, but to spend time with, so what you would do is, if I was recruiting a leader, let’s say that I thought was sharp, I would let him minister or, you know, reach out to the precious people, but I was going to, you know, key on him, and eventually I’m going to coach him to find the sharp people. And you know, that’s how that worked. And it was really obvious. They didn’t hide that was not something they hid, that was everybody that worked there knows those terms and knows what was expected.   JULIE ROYS  30:57 I’m just trying to figure how to put that together with a biblical ethic, because Jesus went to, not the sharp people. Jesus went to, I mean, really the bottom of the barrel. I mean the fishermen; they were like the lowest of the low in society. The Jews were the lowest the low in Roman society, for sure. I mean, did anybody ever question this? I mean, it seems so utilitarian and crass to me to treat people for basically their use to you, right, and to the ministry.   MIKE DONAHUE  31:32 Anybody who questioned that eventually got the door. They were shown the door. So yes, to answer your question, yes. There were people that definitely questioned it, saw it didn’t like it, would say stuff like, hey, you know, we’re supposed to minister to  everybody. You know, all the things like that, things like, what you just said. And she would have you basically she would answer back to the group, but then that person would find their way out the door, so they would ostracize them. As I look back, there are plenty of people that were asking questions like that, and then they were quieted down. You got quieted down.   JULIE ROYS  32:14 One thing I’ve noticed in reporting on these churches that seem to have cult-like qualities is that almost all of them involve crossing boundaries. And for you, I mean, when I read about your marriage and picking a wife, and it seemed like there was way more involvement from leadership in that whole process, which to me, is pretty personal, and that’s up to the individual, provided you’re within certain qualifications of the person you married, the church really shouldn’t be involved in picking someone for you. Talk about that and kind of the personal boundaries that got crossed as you were in this group.   MIKE DONAHUE  33:00 Well, to be personal about it, there was a girl I really liked, actually, that was in college. She wasn’t part of the youth ministry because she was going to a college that was about an hour away, and so she couldn’t really be involved as much. And I was discouraged from dating her. And I liked her. She’s still a friend. We’re friends on Facebook and I know her brother really well. I’m not saying that would have worked out, but they definitely discouraged me from even dating her. So when I went, I did actually go a couple years without dating anybody, which I needed to personally, because I just had to get detox from the mindsets I had about dating. It was just really dysfunctional and that kind of thing.   MIKE DONAHUE  33:45 So I did, it was really a good time for me. I was developing friendships with guys and stuff, and just really finding myself and finding who I was as a guy, and that was great. But then  when I started to date my ex-wife, now ex-wife, it was the Cinderella syndrome. It was really, we were betrothed, kind of. It was like if you looked at on paper, you’re like, that’s a no brainer. Here you are, the up and coming, fun intern guy, I was an intern at the church because they interned me. They saw my talent, my ability, and went, Oh, let’s you know, I’m sharp. I was one of the sharp ones, so I got put on this top shelf. And she was too, because she was involved in a court case that went all the way to the Supreme Court. And they basically got the ability to that schools to this day, are able to kids in schools are able to have small groups like FCA because of that law, for the law that they protected, they went after, and that’s a whole different thing. But  she was sharp too. So you look at both of us and went, that’s a no brainer. But we didn’t know each other. We hardly knew each other. You know, we were friends. We were in the ministry together. And then when we started dating, I was interning, and I was gone a lot. I was gone speaking and stuff and they had me doing all kinds of things. She was in nursing school. So we just thought, Oh, it’s okay, we weren’t physical at all. We kissed or whatever, but we weren’t physical at all. We were waiting for marriage and that’s good and all that. But the bottom line is, we didn’t have any conflict. We didn’t really know each other, really.   MIKE DONAHUE  35:27 So when we got married and we got moved up to Rockford, I took the job up in Rockford, and I guess we can talk about that in a bit. But you know, it was our first year of marriage, and we were in a pressure cooker, I mean, went right into a pressure cooker. And so then all of a sudden, yeah, there was issues; there’s anger in me, and there was some, you know, I’m not going to get into her stuff, but, I had issues in my life that relationships brought out. I think if we had dated long enough, probably those things would have come to the surface and we would have seen some of those things and work through them or parted ways, you know.   JULIE ROYS  36:07 And some of what you’re talking about the work environment too, is another one of those boundary issues that you see a lot in these kind of environments, where they take people who are very motivated, very zealous and kind of exploit that too. You were working super long hours, right? Super long hours for very little money. And that almost, you know, is a badge of honor, right? Because that means you’re really committed, and commitment was really valued. So you went up to Rockford. You followed Jeanne up there. She took a position, and you’re kind of her right-hand man up there in Rockford. And I know Rockford really well. I’ve got family members that live there, so very familiar with the assembly’s church up there that you were working at. But this begins, I mean, in some ways, everything’s going right, because you’re getting lots of opportunities, ministry wise. She’s getting a national stage, which she’s taking you along with her. You’re able to speak. But at the same time, you’re kind of, you’re burning out. I mean, you really are burning at both ends. And in the midst of this, your marriage is suffering too, right?   MIKE DONAHUE  37:18 Yeah, we didn’t really know each other, and she started displaying some real stressful things. And again, I’m not going to expose her stuff, but  we had obvious problems in our marriage, intimacy wise, and other things. And so I would go to Jeanne about it, try to talk to her about it. And slowly she really began to put a wedge between Andrea and I and telling me things about her that really weren’t true. And at the time, I really didn’t know how to take that, because I was, I thought she was really telling the truth, and she was really concerned about me and concerned about our marriage, and so she was just giving me her assessment. But what I found out later is she was really just trying to drive a wedge, because Andrea was the one that was saying, My ex-wife was the one saying, Hey, Red Flag, there’s something weird here, you know. And she didn’t do that right away. It wasn’t that obvious. But there was things like, Hey, are you sure? You know, and to be clear, Bellevue, even though I was an intern, I really wasn’t in the inner circle with Jeanne. I was working for the church and the youth group, but I really wasn’t connected with her. I was connected with Rick Warmer. So I didn’t know, now Rick was a pretty good guy and did things pretty upstanding  most of it. But when I got with her, I saw some bad stuff. I mean, she was lying all the time. I mean, right from the get-go, I mean, there was, I was like, what? I was really shocked, because I didn’t know that this was going on, but she was really insecure and gossiping and slandering people, and if anybody came against her, she was just brutal. And I never saw that. And as I was trying to explain that to my ex-wife and justify it, because that’s the only thing I could do, is justify it. If I came against it, I’d have to get into another job. So I was trying really hard to, like, understand this must be the way ministry is, and it just wasn’t, it wasn’t flying, you know, just it, it wasn’t   JULIE ROYS  39:28 And that’s a kind of cognitive dissonance that just drives you crazy, right? I mean, you hear somebody saying one thing and doing another, and that hypocrisy, it just eats away at you. It’s terrible. So you eventually decided you’re going to leave. And again, another hallmark of these systems, I kind of liken them to the Hotel California. It’s like, you can check out anytime you like, but you can never leave. (You can never leave.) So, right, what happens to you when you try to leave?   MIKE DONAHUE  40:02 Well, I tried to leave twice. So the first time in 93 I went to her and said, you know, we’re gonna go, and I would like you to help me find the next place. You know, she’s connected all over the globe. So I was like,  she could put me in a great spot. So that was part of it, was I needed her endorsement, and I thought this would be a  good time to go, because we  had just had a child and we want to start a family, and I wanted to really be a good dad and all that. So she freaked out and took us out to dinner, both of us, and just bombed the crap out of us, like, just, I love you, I love you, love you know. I mean, just answered every question that we had, and in a really, just goopy, overly, just saturated with love and goop and stuff. So, we decided to stay, and it just got worse. I just saw more stuff. And there was a girl that had a little crush. This is kind of the tipping point for me. There was a kid that had a crush on me and to be honest with you,  the boundaries up there, as far as guy/girl goes, were really gray. I mean, there was no boundaries. It was like, it was just too much. Like today, I would never do the stuff I did up there. I would never meet with a girl, like out for dinner or for lunch. But that was accepted up there because Jeanne did it all the time. She was meeting with guys all the time. You’d walk by her car at 11:30 at night after the youth group, and she’d have a 22-year-old boy, and they were like face to face, not kissing, but they were just an emotional connection going on. And that was just accepted up there, was accepted, and I fell into that. I’d cross some boundaries with nothing physical. Never kissed a girl up there, anything like that. But there was emotional connection that happened  that was my fault. I’m not going to blame that on Jeanne. I knew that I shouldn’t have done that. And one of the girls got really caught up in it, and it got a little weird. And so I went to Jeanne, and I said, I think this person, blah blah, and she said to me, I don’t care if you sleep with her, I will cover you. And I remember going, I got to get out of here, because that’s a setup from if I have that kind of permission in a place like this, with all these pretty people running around, that’s not good for me. I can’t do that. I started actively looking for a job, because I was like, I can’t be around this lady.   JULIE ROYS  42:51 Well, and they do that, don’t they? Because if you do cross that line, now you can’t go anywhere else. Yeah, she’s got you, yeah. And I have seen that at numerous churches where there was the worship leader at Harvest Bible Chapel, James McDonald, did that with he had a fall. He sent him out to, I think, England or something, for a year, and then the guy came back, and then he just did James McDonald’s bidding, which, interestingly, after James McDonald was fired and the whole implosion happened at Harvest, this guy went to a church. I forget where exactly might have been, Colorado. If you look it up on our on our website, you’ll see it because he did it again at the next church, you know. I mean,  it’s horrible how these manipulative people, it allows for this moral laxity, and they actually exploit that as well. They exploit everything. Because, again, it’s about power and it’s about control. It’s very sad.   MIKE DONAHUE  43:56 It’s the hook, and I’ve seen her do that with other people too. Is she having a secret? It’s like they have false intimacy going on. They share a secret, and so she can control them with that secret. I knew to get out of there, you know. So the second time we resigned, I resigned, and we got out of there. When she knew it was for real, she launched an absolute assault on us. I mean, it was just ugly. It was theatrical. She feigned a heart attack. It was just stupid. It was so ridiculous.   MIKE DONAHUE  44:36  And then she turned people against us, and I, was so dumbfounded by that, because, again, I’m a smart street kid, and I took the street kid stuff and put it on a shelf, which was stupid, because I think God didn’t want me to do that, because I was really trusting of her. I was like, Oh no, she would never do that. But the street kid in me never would have let that happen. I would have been like, Nah, that’s bullshit. Sorry, can I say bullshit? It was bullshit. And  the street kid knew it was, but I didn’t let myself go there. I was trying to be a nice Christian guy, and I really felt like Jeanne was going to be true to what she said, that she was my mom, that she would protect me, and the ministry didn’t matter. It was  she loved me, she cared about me, and that wasn’t true. And it was really hard. It  was devastating, actually.   JULIE ROYS  45:37 It is devastating very much so. I’ve seen it play out in person after person in the stories that I’ve reported, and they all report the same thing. I mean, it’s just a horrible betrayal and confusion in all that, because you do love this person at the same time they’ve hurt you very much. So you go out to Denver at a new church, and you write, I realized that I had been groomed in my past ministry experience, but I was trained to be a groomer. (Yes)  I’ve seen this as well, where someone leaves, where they were hurt, but the truth is, they don’t know any other way of doing life or of doing ministry. (So this was the only thing I knew) Talk about what kind of patterns you perpetrated when you went to a new church.   MIKE DONAHUE  46:27 Well, I knew how to set up a structure. She’s really good at putting a structure together that was good, you know? That was useful. And so that part was fine, and I was able to hire people to help me administrate that and do that. So we immediately started, the youth group started to grow, and  again, it’s some of the same principles, the love bombing stuff. It was I knew how to get in someone’s life and get them to talk to me about their stuff.   MIKE DONAHUE  47:00 Now I didn’t take it to the gossip and the slander to the point she did, but there was a situation where there was a kid in the high school. We had a Christian High School attached to the church, much like Rockford, and this kid got he started seeing through it. He saw through it. He was a smart kid, and he had power. He had emotional power, social equity in that school, in our youth group. And so he began to say some things, and  I attacked him. I did from the microphone. I said some things, not to him specifically, but it was to him. I took some things he said, and I twisted it, and everybody knew I was talking about. They knew exactly what I was talking about, who I was talking about, and I remember feeling really gross, like I hated it, that I did that. And , there was other things going on. My marriage was really struggling a lot. There was some other stuff that I’m not going to get into, that it happened with us, but infidelity, and not on my part. There was some really, it was a very tremendous it was a bad place for us to be because basically what happened was everything that we were stuffing down in Rockford came out in Denver and there was this no holds barred. It just went and I got really devastated by that whole thing. And then we ended up having to leave that church after three years, even though the youth ministry was growing. But because of our personal situation, we had to leave. And so we didn’t get fired, but we knew we had to go, so we quit and then moved back to Nebraska. And actually, that was a great thing for me, because I have a friend of mine that said, Mike, when you were in Denver, you were a hole, and he was and I’m best friends with this guy today. I mean, I love him.   JULIE ROYS  48:58 That’s pastor a hole to you. I remember that part of the book, pretty hilarious.   MIKE DONAHUE  49:05 That was a great story. But he said, you just didn’t have the right motives. Because I was doing I was threatened by this kid, and I was threatened by anybody that was coming against our way. We were trying to build this ministry because, again, the numbers were everything. If you had a big youth group, you got to do whatever you wanted to do. I saw it with Jeanne. She had a big youth group. So there was a lot of good people in Rockford that looked the other way because  the youth group was big, that’s it. They knew the stuff was bad. They heard things. They experienced her doing negative things, but they look the other way, because, oh, wait a minute, there’s 1000 kids coming,   JULIE ROYS  49:45 Yeah, because that’s the fruit. And unfortunately, they haven’t looked at what fruit really means in Scripture, which is the fruit of the Spirit, love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, gentleness. Those things should be the fruit we look at. But instead, you’re exactly right. We look at numbers, we look at money, we look at success. It’s the American way, right? And so we have a really, I mean, it’s like we just imported all of the world’s system into the church. We’re so surprised at what we get.   JULIE ROYS  50:14 You began, though, and  it’s kind of like when you were a kid, and you were hanging out with this crowd and doing drugs and everything. And you walked away from that. You began to change as you began to, it sounded like you began to get disgusted with the way things were working, and realizing this isn’t the gospel, this isn’t the way of Christ.   MIKE DONAHUE  50:35 Yeah, so I went to Grand Island, and nobody knew that we were there. There’s a small little town in the middle of Nebraska, and it was great for me that I didn’t go into a mega church. It was the church was a couple 100 people, and there was some really cool things that happened there. As far as me, fall in love with kids again, I got to, in fact, it’s really interesting that one of the guys that I ended up really just keying in on, his name is Marty Levinson. He’s now in his 40s, I think, and he’s, he is the UNK basketball coach. It’s a D2 college here in Nebraska, and I live in Kearney. so him and I are reunited again  and it’s really cool. But I remember, like just reaching out to him and fall in love with just doing what I’m supposed to do without the motive of trying to build a big youth group and be famous and write books and be cool, because  that was the goal – is to be Jeanne. Is to respect you respect you in that space. I don’t care about that anymore.   MIKE DONAHUE  51:46  So I remember  after I left, we had to leave that Grand  Island church because it was the charismatic stuff was a little too much for us, but they were a little on the side, but they were good, they’re good people, but it was just a little crazy. So we ended up going back to the church that Jeanne originally, I met Jeannie at in Bellevue, and we became the youth pastors there for six years. And it wasn’t a mega church, but it was a bigger church. And I felt the pressure again. This was Jeanne’s old youth group, so I did feel it, but I didn’t let it hit me. I really tried to not let it bother me, and I think I put this in the book, but this was a defining moment for me. When I was reading Ezekiel chapter 34, and I was really getting into what a shepherd is supposed to be doing with people. I really wanted that heart, and I went to this, you know, we had to go to these denominational meetings with the Assemblies of God that were ridiculous. And this pastor came up to me, and he’s like, Well, hey brother, because they’d heard our youth group was big and we were growing and stuff, but we were growing for the right reasons. And I really was proud of that youth group, and it wasn’t perfect, but we were doing some good stuff. And He came out to me, and he’s like, Hey brother, you know how big your youth group or something like that. I know  why I was asking, so I just looked at him and I said, there’s a kid in Bellevue right now sitting on his bed. He’s got a gun in his hand. He wants to kill himself, and if he does, then our youth group wasn’t big enough. So I don’t really care how big. I want a good youth group for him. We gotta get him, you know. And so that’s what our youth group’s about. It’s not about numbers, it’s about him. And that kid became my like, that’s what I want to do. I want to reach him. I want to get him because he might not make it tonight. So let’s get him, you know. And  then I got cocky, because I was, like, these church people are so gross, like, I’m just going to do my thing. And because we had numbers, they left me alone, right? I mean, even though my motive was different, and I felt good about, I enjoyed that youth ministry because I had people like Shawna Swanager and Ryan Swanager. I had guys, Dan Torres and Kevin Barker and guys out there lifelong friends now that we’re still buddies, we’re not ministry buddies. We weren’t ministry buddies. You know, we were buddies. We were friends. And enjoyed that part of it.   JULIE ROYS  54:23 So that was a really redemptive experience for you, but at the same time, your family, your marriage, was falling apart, you ended up getting a divorce, and sadly, it sounds like a lot of the church just kind of abandoned you at that point. Is that fair?   MIKE DONAHUE  54:41 That’s more than fair, yeah. I was shocked about that. Some didn’t. I’m not going to say everybody baled, but the hierarchy in the church, did. There’s a lot there, because I knew things about their family because  their kids were teenagers when I was working for them, and so there was some bad things that happened within their family that I was involved in helping them get through. And so it’s weird, I put this in the book, but you know, one of the weird tensions of being a youth pastor is that you know information about the pastor’s kids, if they’re teenagers, you know. And so you know, the family. And there’s that weird tension. They need you. They called on me. I mean, I can’t tell you how many times my phone rang, and they said, come over here, and I’d have to go in and deal with some junk that was going on.   MIKE DONAHUE  55:34 But now I know, so that was part of it. They resented the fact that I knew some pretty heavy stuff, and then I saw them covering it up too. They should have probably handled some of that stuff differently, and they didn’t, and I didn’t like that, and they knew I didn’t like that. And then also the weird dynamic in our church was that our senior pastor had gotten into a car accident, and he was paralyzed from the chest down. So we were without him for a couple of years, pretty much. I mean, he was in rehab, so I really kind of developed my own ministry philosophy, that stuff, that I was kind of Ezekiel chapter 34 stuff, I was really trying to shepherd kids. And when he came back, it took a while, but there was a contrast between our ministry philosophies. And again, he was trained by Jeanne and Sam Mayo. So he was going with that precious people stuff. And I felt like he was looking for a product.   MIKE DONAHUE  56:42 They wanted a Christian product. They wanted to look a certain way. And I’ve just realized that if you’re going to shepherd people, it’s probably going to look bad for a while. It’s not going to look great at times. It’s going to look bad. So you have got to be willing to make it, you can’t be worried about it being clean or looking clean. Because it’s like raising children; sometimes they’re going to make you look brilliant, sometimes they’re going to make you look like an idiot. So it’s the same thing, right? You have to be willing to accept that. And they weren’t. They were really about the polish. And I couldn’t stand it. And my guys were like my guys, because I had two years without I had good quality guys that were good people that loved God and were productive or whatever. But we were good, you know, we were doing the right stuff, and they were coming to me and going, Ew, I don’t like church. And then I had to manage that tension. So I tried to influence the church in a way, that in the right way. I’m not gonna say I had the corner, because they did some things right too,  but it really was about the polish. And my guys were real. We were street kids, you know? We were like, you know?   JULIE ROYS  58:05 I know I loved we were in a Vineyard church for a decent amount of time. And one of the things I loved about it is that we used to have a motto that we’re committed to having a Messy Church. Because if you’re really doing ministry and you’re really getting in people’s lives, you’re going to have mess, and that’s just the way it’s going to be. I mean, I think Jesus’ ministry was kind of messy. And so the way that we want to put on this beautiful image for everyone, again, it’s the world’s values. It’s not God’s values, right? But that is, yeah, that is definitely there.   JULIE ROYS  58:42 You know, I want to end with,  you talk about this deconstruction process that you went through. And I know a lot of folks when they see this, hopefully some folks listening, just by hearing your story and the grooming and can identify some of those things that maybe folks are involved in right now, but I know there’s probably a lot of people listening that have been, there, done that, and have seen that, and now they’re trying to put together, okay, what was real? what was good? what was not good? and the deconstruction process, which I think has gotten really maligned by certain folks who just make it out to be some evil process. I’ve seen a lot of people go through deconstruction and come out with a really more beautiful faith than where they started. But what was that process like for you? And kind of, where are you landing right now as a result?   MIKE DONAHUE  59:37 Well, I go back to sacred moments, right? I really disappointed myself  when I went the divorce really messed me up, and mainly because of my kids,  not having access to them, and I was immoral. I’ll just say it. I was like, Well, you know what? Yeah, none of this really matters. And I did. I went off the deep end for a while, and I drank a lot. I went back to drinking alcohol, and started carousing around, meeting people. I played hockey, so I was meeting people at the bars afterwards and stuff. And so it was just bad, and it was so maddening, because I knew what I was doing wrong. I taught leadership seminars on the very lifestyles leading. I knew it was wrong, but I couldn’t stop. And I because I had no anchor. There was no anchor. Every anchor was gone. I didn’t have a family. I wasn’t talking my dad or  my mom, Jeanne; all that was a mess. I had no anchors, and my marriage was over, and my kids were young, and so it just was crazy.   MIKE DONAHUE  1:00:49 But what began to happen in me is little by little is I really felt like God never took his eyes off me,  he just didn’t give up. And there was just little things that would happen that I knew was him. I knew it was him, but I just couldn’t stand the church. I didn’t want it to happen through a human because I couldn’t stand them, and because it was so mean and so little things would happen. And d then I met my wife, who is one of the best human beings I’ve ever been around. I mean, she’s just as solid and as genuine as you can find, and that doesn’t translate to nice sometimes. Sometimes she’s a brat, but you can trust her. I trust her a lot, because I know whatever comes out of her mouth is what she thinks. And I love that! I’ll never not like that anymore, like I’ll never be involved in people’s lives that lie, that sell me something, y and she was a big part of my reconstruction. She didn’t grow up in the evangelical world. She grew up Lutheran but had a faith in Jesus and we talked about a lot, and that really helped me. , I would tell her stuff that happened in the church world, and I was involved, like I was a big name, you know, for a little while. I was speaking at big conferences and youth things, and people knew my name, and I was being groomed to be the next youth leader in Nebraska and blah, blah, blah. And I would tell her stuff that  we did. And she’d look at me, she’d be like, That’s weird, like, and she’s right, you know? And it was good to be able to bounce that off her, and then just settle into the fact that there is a God,  and he is the source of love, and he’s going to use everything, he’s going to use Jeanne Mayo even, he’s going to use everything. He’s going to use me and I’m a sinner. I mean,  that’s what it comes down to, and I need a Savior, and I have one.   MIKE DONAHUE  1:03:15 So that’s it. Anything after that is just a bunch of crap, like, it’s all smoke and mirrors, right? The bottom line is, I need the gospel every day. I need it every day because I’m a sinner and that’s how I came to faith was that, was the original thing that happened to me, was I realized I’m dark and I need light, and then got involved in the church world. I got swept up into its machine. And then so when it all crashed down, I went back to the original God’s my Savior, and Jesus is my friend. And I love the song in church. We sing in our church. I do go to church now, and I love the song that says, ,  my heart needs a surgeon. My soul needed a friend. That’s what it is. That’s what it comes down to. That’s what I always needed, and that’s what I always had, and that’s what I still have. All the rest of it is just a bunch of noise.   JULIE ROYS  1:04:20 Well, Mike, thank you. Thank you for just being so real and honest with your story and beautiful how you really came back to, as I used to say in Vineyard, the main and the plane, right? All the other stuff, it doesn’t really matter. And I love that the main in the plane. I mean, this is the gospel, and I feel like a lot of us are doing that, like, what is what is church really? And we’re rediscovering that. And there’s a beauty in that. I feel like about my church experience now is richer than it’s ever been and that’s because it’s back to what it’s all about. And it’s not the numbers. It’s not about growing the big ministry. It’s not about having the smoke machine. Oh my God, I know, right, but it is about Jesus I hope, that corporately, as a church, we come back to that. And I think more stories like yours continuing to shine the light on what’s true and what’s not true and what’s just absolutely not only not true, it’s of the devil. I mean, this is the really worldly, awful stuff, and we’ve let it come into the church. So, Mike, thank you for this book. I really appreciate it. I appreciate your testimony and your willingness to just be so vulnerable. So again. Thank you.   MIKE DONAHUE  1:05:41 Thank you so much. I appreciate what you’re doing. I really do. I think God’s using you in so many ways to it’s not about exposing people. It happens you have to, to get to the light, to get to the truth. And I think you’re doing a great job.   JULIE ROYS  1:05:56 Thank you so much. Blessings to you. And thanks for listening to The Roys Report, a podcast dedicated to reporting the truth and restoring the church. I’m Julie Roys, and if you’ve appreciated this podcast and want to support our work and get a copy of Mike’s book, Groomed, just go to JULIEROYS.COM/DONATE. If you give $30 or more, we’ll send you a copy of Groomed, and you’ll be ensuring that podcasts like these continue again. We don’t have a lot of big donors or organizations supporting us. We simply have you, the people who care about reporting the truth and restoring the church. Also just a quick reminder to subscribe to The Roys Report on Apple podcast Spotify or YouTube, that way you won’t miss any of these episodes. And while you’re at it, I’d really appreciate it if you’d help us spread the word about the podcast by leaving a review, and then please share the podcast on social media so more people can hear about this great content again. Thanks so much for joining me today. Hope you were blessed and encouraged you. Read more