S4E67 | Cindy Metcalf - Relentless Hope: Combatting Ritual Abuse & Sex Trafficking in the LDS Church

Today I’m honored to have on the show: Entrepreneur, Founder and Executive Director of Relentless Hope, certified victim’s advocate, survivor ally, Utah whistleblower, and passionate pursuer of truth: Cindy Metcalf

Cindy is the founder and Executive Director of Relentless Hope, an anti-trafficking organization in Salt Lake City. She’s been working with ritual abuse survivors since 2018, and in that time, Cindy has heard some of the most horrific stories of abuse. Relentless Hope are a team of advocates who provide support and resources for survivors. They also work on criminal and civil cases for clients. Ninety percent of the clients seen by Relentless Hope were abused within the LDS Church, but they know this is happening in many church denominations across America. Cindy and Relentless Hope serve to educate the public and legislators in order to change laws, fight for justice, raise awareness and get the resources for their clients need to heal. Cindy is a certified victim's advocate who works with lawyers, law enforcement, media and healthcare professionals for the benefit of ritual abuse survivors. She volunteers 100% of my time to this cause because she believes that ritual abuse is the most sadistic form of torture on the earth. In Cindy’s own words, “Children need to be protected. Justice must be served.”

I was interested in having Cindy on for a variety of reasons and one of those reasons is because I have such a deep admiration for Cindy who stepped into a role that she didn’t have to step into. So many of you reach out to me feeling helpless wondering what you should do now that you know the hard truths of the world and although I can’t answer that question for all of you, what I CAN do is bring you people who found an answer to that question in hopes that it can inspire you. Cindy is a hero for stepping into an advocacy role and I’m just as excited as all of you to learn from her. The second reason I’m excited to have Cindy on is because I get a lot of requests about having more discussions around the LDS church and Cindy has been right in the thick of it in the heart of Utah where she’s been risking her life at times to discover the network of corruption that is committing crimes against children. Her work and research are incredibly thorough and non-biased - as Cindy is NOT Mormon - and you can feel and see her deep passion for helping survivors in her testimony. I am honored to have Cindy on and ask that all of you please give her your full attention as we dive deep into some new topics!

Before I finish introducing today’s guest - I wanted to give a couple reminders and updates: If you’d like to be on the podcast as a guest or share any information privately with me, please email me at [email protected]. You can also use this email if you’d like to be a part of my new book series featuring written survivor testimonies. You can find the video with all the details on how to submit YOUR testimony on any of my podcast channels. And lastly - I’d love your support on Substack where I’m taking up investigative journalism as an outlet for me personally to share about my podcast, guests, and advocacy work and you can Subscribe to me there at www.emmakatherine.substack.com. All my links are in the show notes and I’d love your support across all platforms! Thank you all for caring so deeply about survivors and for helping to make this the safest space on the internet for survivor disclosures!

CONNECT WITH CINDY:
Website: https://relentlesshopeforyou.org/

CONNECT WITH THE IMAGINATION:
EMAIL: [email protected]
My Substack: https://emmakatherine.substack.com/
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Website: https://standbysurvivors.com/