She says she still has 'repetitive nightmares about it to this day', years later. 'There's a big group of women out there that are still healing from their stay.' 'It was a kind of cross between the army, a psych ward and a convent,' Erenie says. Suicide Call Back Service on 1300 659 467īad publicity and an investigation by the ACCC forced the closure of a controversial counselling program linked to the evangelical Hillsong church.Some former clients of Mercy Ministries claim they were denied professional help and were instead exorcised and told simply to repent their sins. On its website, Mercy Ministries said it treated women aged 16 to 28 years old by 'providing homes and care for young women suffering the effects of eating disorders, self-harm, abuse, depression, unplanned pregnancies and other life-controlling issues'. My treatment was to get God in and gay out,' she says. 'For nine months, I was isolated in a place where same-sex attraction was treated as though it was a mental illness.