Mary Cosby directly addressed the TLC documentary about herself and her church, and she’s apparently not that bothered. On the second reunion episode of The Real Housewives of Salt Lake City season six, Cosby said she was hurt by family members participating in TLC’s The Cult of a Real Housewife. “It hurt me, of course,” Cosby told Andy Cohen. “Definitely hurt me. But I’ve been through a lot, Andy. I’m pretty tough. So it hurt, and it just got put in the pile of all the rest of the things that hurt me.”
The Cult of a Real Housewife premiered on TLC on New Year’s Day. The doc asserts that Cosby, alongside her step-grandfather turned husband, financially and spiritually exploit the members of their Faith Temple Pentecostal church. One person claimed they had lived with the Cosbys for years, working for no pay as a housekeeper. The doc also goes through the church’s history, including its founding by Mary’s grandmother Rosemary “Mama” Cosby. Mary’s sister Denise Jefferson Odinaka and Mary’s cousin Dan Cosby both participated in the filming.
In Bravo circles, the doc was a blip, perhaps because these issues had already been brought up in RHOSLC season two. Former Faith Temple attendee Cameron Williams spoke to Lisa Barlow about Cosby. “Is it a cult? Yes. Does she call herself ‘God’? Yes,” he said at the time. Williams died in 2021, and Cosby skipped that year’s reunion, in part because she didn’t want to “talk about this guy who has passed.”
At this year’s reunion, Cosby said she thinks people in Utah throw aspersions on her church due to cultural misunderstanding. “I think it’s because of the policy and the rules and the different things that our church does,” she said. “They’re not used to a Pentecostal church in Utah. They’re not used to a Black church.”
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