Of course, no sooner had I handed them out than I began worrying about how they would be viewed. Idols were forbidden, and therefore making dolls might be sinful. I had trusted that Jennifer had known what she was doing, but I’d become so paranoid that everyone seemed to have an evil eye. I was almost too paralyzed to do anything that hadn’t been approved. Luckily, no one said anything about making an idol, but I was still nervous until each of my friends had hers on display in her bedroom. Even then, I still had lingering expectations that down the line I was going to hear from someone that the dolls weren’t allowed. It was probably all in my head.
I trusted Shirley, though, and when she liked the dolls, I relaxed. I was usually completely comfortable with her. She didn’t make me feel dumb, like other people did. We talked a lot about the Bible. We had been reading Revelation, and there were a few chapters that were bothering me. We were always talking about the “end of the world,” which Revelation described in great detail, but some of the timing didn’t make sense. In Revelation, the end of the world came soon after the seventh of seven seals was broken. After it was broken, there was one half hour of silence; then seven angels appeared, each receiving a trumpet. At that point, the world came to an end, with God pouring down his wrath on all the sinners and escorting the chosen ones into His kingdom. Our church embraced the belief that the end was nigh. Our whole existence was waiting for the end, being prepared, and knowing what to expect.
The point I wanted to make to Shirley was that there was an urgency to study the events in the Bible in order to be ready. I believed that the end of the world could be determined with more certainty if we knew more specifically where we were in time. For example, the Bible said Satan was locked up in a bottomless pit, where he would remain for a thousand years. Knowing exactly when God had cast him there would give us a huge advantage in predicting when he would return.
We were always focusing on verses about the “end of the world.” We read them over and over to make us feel we were more knowledgeable about those verses than any of our detractors. We would be the most equipped to describe it and preach about it at pickets. This was the reason my questions were so pressing: I needed to know for sure what I was talking about. If I was telling someone else his soul was going to hell, I couldn’t just be spewing it without scriptural basis.
We read Matthew 24 often. The chapter wasn’t as elaborate as the Book of Revelation, but it had stunning imagery about the end of the world. One image in particular was causing me some confusion, but nobody could ever tell me exactly what it meant: “And knew not until the flood came, and took them all away; so shall also the coming of the Son of man be. Then shall two be in the field; the one shall be taken, and the other left. Two women shall be grinding at the mill; the one shall be taken, and the other left. Watch therefore: for ye know not what hour your Lord doth come.”
My confusion was about which was better: to be taken or to be left. The verses always seemed to be interpreted differently. Sometimes, they were referred to as the “fly away” or “rapture” doctrine: that at the end of the world, God’s people would “fly away,” or be swept up into the skies before the destruction on the earth, and therefore they would meet God in the skies before they died. However, the pastor said the only ones “getting raised up into the skies” were already dead, dead in the grave, dead in Christ, dead. They would then rise to heaven instantaneously to meet God. According to our interpretation of scripture, people were either in heaven or hell upon the moment of death, and if that was the case, they couldn’t possibly rise for the rapture. He wasn’t 100 percent sure about meeting God in the skies.
It was so confusing, yet the pastor insisted we be correct and fully informed on all things biblical. I would get very frustrated when I met with what I thought was a refusal to investigate possible contradictions in the text, even the contradictions that might be a little sensitive because they conflicted with what the church said or taught. We scrutinized every other religion, after all. The pastor was obsessed with reading what other people of other faiths said they believed. He would read books, watch the news, or see something on a website related to faith, and then the whole congregation would analyze and dissect his discovery. He’d even send out a press release disputing the claims of other believers, especially when it came to God’s return.
We studied all the apocalyptic visions in the Gospels, including those of Mark, John, and Luke. The book of Jude was so important for its vision, the pastor had us memorize the whole thing over one summer. All the kids who could read had to memorize it and know how to recite it. We would all read it aloud to one another and recite it at the pickets. At the end of the summer, we had to recite it in front of Shirley and all the other kids to prove that we had learned it. Kids as young as seven and eight years old could do it.
I didn’t want to bother the pastor with my problem of Matthew’s vision because I didn’t want him to attribute my question to a weakness of faith. The older he was getting, the less approachable he became. I had been on only a handful of pickets with him in three years. He was starting to get paranoid that someone might want to assassinate him, so except to preach on Sundays, he mostly stayed in his own living quarters. For his daily exercise, he either used his indoor stationary bike or walked the church’s track. I felt honored when Shirley told me to stand by while she went to discuss my conflict about the end of the world with him. She was very enthusiastic about my question and wanted to know the answer herself. Shirley had a way of saying things that sounded better anyway. She located the pastor walking laps around the track and joined him for about fifteen minutes, while I waited at the picnic tables. I couldn’t hear what they were saying, but they seemed to be caught up in an earnest discussion.
When she came back, she told me the pastor didn’t have a light on that right now. I accepted that, but her demeanor was now angry and frustrated. To my surprise, she started scolding me. “Gramps told me that you are not supposed to question things that you don’t know, and you are not supposed to tell God when to tell you stuff. Beg for understanding when you don’t get it,” she warned me. “I don’t have the answer. Don’t ask me anymore, and I will tell you when I know. We are not investigating this or doing a study on this right now.”
I was taken aback that she was running out of patience with me. I thought I was being sincere by coming to my elders and talking to them about this. I was very disheartened and never heard anything more about my scripture question again, although it still bothered me. I couldn’t figure out why I didn’t understand something the church said proved our point, nor why I didn’t have the right to get answers to my questions. Even though I was discouraged, I had to accept it without a challenge.
Shirley’s scary side came into evidence whenever she wasn’t supporting you. She had so much power and authority, she could reduce you to “worthless” with one slight or “how dare you” answer. I knew I shouldn’t take her shutting me down about the specifics of the end of the world too personally, because she chastised everyone, constantly keeping us in check with Bible quotes of her own and letting us know she had power over our membership in the church. She was the mother of the church. If she got mad at you, she won. If you thought there were two sides to a story, everybody believed her, not you. Her word was sacrosanct, and nobody dared to refute her.
I never got into the minutiae of scripture with the pastor. After Shirley told me that she and he were done with my silly questions, the pastor and I stayed pleasant and superficial with each other. He was no more and no less standoffish than he had been before, so I was still left wondering what was going on in his head.
He definitely had a propensity for manic habits. He had periods when he abided by an extreme diet that he had started in his fifties, which featured bowls of yogurt, blueberries, and full cloves of garlic. The girls and I would joke that Gramps had garlic breath because of the cloves he ate every day. He drank eye droppers full of oregano oil, exceeding the daily recommended maxim
um of four drops, but enough to just fill the back of his mouth. He had a fig tree in his backyard, because figs were in the Bible. He didn’t drink anything stronger than his daily “vitamin C cocktail,” which was vitamin C powder diluted in a combination of Diet Pepsi and water. His only “junk food” was veggie wraps from Subway. He didn’t have a single health issue, even into his seventies, and he wasn’t on any medications.
I would often get groceries for his wife, Marge, and clean their house. The whole house was really dated. They had a ’70s-style kitchen with linoleum countertops and well-used appliances. The blue carpet in most of the rooms was worn in the heavily trafficked parts and looked practically new at the edges. Framed Bible passages and famous quotes from Alexis de Tocqueville and some of the pastor’s other heroes decorated the walls. The couches in the living area had floral designs, and the pastor’s La-Z-Boy swiveled instead of rocked.
I loved doing errands for Marge. I wasn’t as intimidated by her as I was by the pastor. She might have been the warmest person in the whole church. Just as we called the pastor “Gramps,” we called her “Gran.” All the girls had a role in keeping house for the two of them. Since I was planning to be a nurse, I’d do small medical things for the pastor and her, like check their blood pressure or heart rate. I could even use the hours I spent helping them toward my community service requirement in school.
No matter how kind and generous the Phelpses were to me, things in my head caused me enormous tension. I didn’t know if they were doubts about the church or just my own insecurities. I needed clarification on scripture and church rules so often, but after the conversation on the track between Shirley and the pastor, I wasn’t sure if looking for answers would be taken as a strength or a weakness. I was completely on edge. If I caught somebody at a bad time, I’d get a snippy answer to my inquiry, but if I caught that same person at the right time, I would get a thoughtful explanation. It always seemed to be a gamble.
As a spokesperson for God, I was often conflicted about what was expected of me. It was a strange feeling. I’d ask myself what I was supposed to be doing. I didn’t want to be judged, so I didn’t ask too many questions. I just wanted to get it right. I didn’t want anyone else to know that I was doubting myself. I would bring a Bible to the pickets and start reading it, but then I would get self-conscious. Was I reading it to show off, or was I really reading it? I would get anxious and start second-guessing myself.
I would question my own motives. Am I doing this because I want to, or am I doing it because I feel like I want the other church members to see me and be impressed? I’d seen the consequences of substandard behavior on the pickets. I just felt really unsure, and I didn’t want to get kicked out like other people who had done things wrong. But sometimes I was overwhelmed with fear. I thought I was living my life for God and I was going to heaven, but the church let me know that I could fall from grace at any moment. I was consumed by the desire to get it right.
CHAPTER TWELVE
Ask, and it shall be given you; seek, and ye shall find; knock, and it shall be opened unto you.
—Matthew 7:7
During the weekly Bible study that was open to anyone, I was still willing to ask questions, and I was convinced my questions were impressively deep. I thought everybody knew my intentions were coming from my heart, and I wasn’t trying to waste anybody’s time. There was just so much to learn. Dad was often in attendance, and sometimes he led the group. He would happily answer my questions until people like Shirley and Margie started calling me divisive. They thought I was causing trouble and going against authority. I was just trying to straighten out the contradictions. I used to point out some of them during the sessions, such as why people needed to repent if they weren’t going to heaven anyway.
In my understanding, nothing the church preached could change anybody’s destiny, since everyone but us was still going to hell. I wanted to know why we were telling outsiders to obey if salvation was only for the elect. Dad might say, “Good question,” but then the other members would criticize him for indulging me, accusing him of showing me favoritism. It upset him when they started blaming my behavior on him, so he just shut me down. The oldest child was considered the reflection of how well a man was running his household, and he needed me to conform and submit. After this happened, I made sure not to ask him anything in front of other people, because I knew he would try to make me feel inferior or tell me I was screwing something up.
The problems and inconsistencies went beyond the ones I’d found in scripture. I noticed a lot of hypocrisy—some people seemed to get away with a lot more than others. Taylor might agree with me, but she would never bring it up or acknowledge that it was an inconsistency. She might say to me that something wasn’t fair, but fair or not, she’d accept it rather than get in trouble. She didn’t like being accusatory. People admired that about her. She was easy to get along with, a go-with-the-flow kind of person who stayed away from pricklier issues.
I handled the criticism the best I could, taking the suggestions I thought would make me a better person. The church elders expected us all to figure out what career we wanted before we went to college. The policy was a good one: nobody should waste time and money in college after he or she got there. The idea of squandering money was extremely distasteful, especially on something as expensive as an education. We didn’t have many career choices, though. My parents told me the best options for me were to be either a dental hygienist or a nurse. Between the two, I decided on nursing, and Jael did, too. We had a shared purpose—to get a really good nursing job, to give our parents money as soon as we could, and to still be productive members of the church.
By the second semester of my senior year, I was splitting my day between Topeka West and a technical high school, where I was earning credits for my nurse’s aide certificate. I’d spend the first half of the day at Topeka West, then drive to the tech school for the rest of the school day. I wanted to get the certificate so I could earn money as an aide to put myself through college and nursing school. Nurse’s aides could make almost twice the minimum wage that most after-school jobs paid.
At the tech school, I noticed that there was always a sporty red Camaro parked next to my car in the afternoons. I also couldn’t help but notice its owner, Brian, a really cute boy who was about my age. He had brown hair, green eyes, and a nice white smile. We started chatting briefly before classes every afternoon, and he told me he was taking photography classes there. Some days, I’d be eating lunch in my car while he was outside having a brief smoke. Our conversations were superficial, but it was my chance to flirt. One day, he walked over to me and told me I was beautiful. He said that he had a crush on me and leaned into my car to kiss me, my first real kiss.
After class a few days later, when Brian asked me to come over to the house where he lived with his parents, I hesitated. I was so scared, knowing how completely forbidden it was, but I had really liked the kiss, and so I followed him there in my car. When I parked at Brian’s, I noticed that one of my tires was a little flat and needed air. I didn’t worry about it, figuring I’d fill it on my way back.
Neither of Brian’s parents was home, so we skipped lunch and went straight to his bedroom. We sat on his bed talking for a few minutes, and then he put his lips to mine. His kiss felt so good, I didn’t want him to stop. He was really hot, and I was turned on—but after an hour, I knew I had to go.
By the time I got to my car, my tire had gone completely flat, and Brian had left a few moments before. I tried to drive as far as I could with the flat, but I got only a street away. I was starting to freak out when my cell phone rang. It was my mother, wanting me to pick up my brother from day care. I told her I couldn’t. When she asked why, I was forced to explain where I was so she could come pick me up. Her interrogation began the moment I opened her car door. She asked me if I had been visiting a boyfriend. She demanded to know how I met him, did I have sex with him, was there a chance I had gotten pregnant, why did I
do it, did I want to go to hell, did I hate God, was I a whore, and would I rather be a whore or a Christian? She upset me so much I cried, but even worse, she told my father. He was furious. “I feel like I should hit you,” he growled. “But it won’t do any good. I will humiliate you enough to be memorable.” He proceeded to tell everyone in the church about my transgression.
Nothing could be kept hidden once it was in the church’s pipeline. About fifty church members had to come and talk to me and ask me if I still wanted to be here and question why I did what I had done. Megan said my obsession with boys would ruin my life. Jael reminded me that the devil was always lurking to offer us temptations. The body language of members after they were through talking to me distressed me more than the lecturing. It was almost unbearable. They avoided me at pickets. If I was standing on one corner, they would walk right by me and stand somewhere else. They’d laugh in my general direction and sneer at me. They wouldn’t joke with me, or even say hi. Pickets used to be an opportunity to socialize. Instead, I’d have to endure thirty to forty minutes of being shunned, even by my best friends.
Shirley, however, was surprisingly gentle. She sat me down to talk to me. “When I was young, I made mistakes and ended up getting pregnant,” she said. She didn’t want the young people in the church to make the same mistakes she had made. She said the best way to avoid danger was to stay busy. She gave me as many chores as she possibly could to make sure every moment of my day was filled. I weeded the yards, mowed the lawns, emptied the wastebaskets, cleaned the floors, and did anything else she could think of.
Banished : Surviving My Years in the Westboro Baptist Church (9781455518470) Page 16
