October 19, 2004


  • I started reading this book mike lent me today. It came highly praised, and mike chose it as something I would love out of his wide selection of books. He made a good choice. I’m only about one fourth of the way through, but already the book has me. Leaving the rather dramatic and heart wrenching event that has befallen aside, it is the protagonist in this part of the book’s character that I’m finding intensely interesting. I think this is because, if I knew her superficially, if I was just to know about her without getting to know her: I wouldn’t like her much at all. Her lifestyle embodies everything I dislike about the Christian culture. She has a reputation for being to good for the rest of her school, along with her Youth Alive! friends, she uses phrases like ‘skin is sin,’ and she even gets married for the express purpose of having sex with her boyfriend. On the surface, she is like a character from the movie Saved and represents the church like a foul odour.


    But when she starts talking, when you start to get to know her: you find that she is really quite tragic. She is unfulfilled by these things, and does them anyway. It seems like the only thing she is passionate about is her husband. She lies to her small group because they demand she confess sins, and yet she meets with them still. It’s sad. It’s the fist time I’ve found myself having pity for misguided Christianity rather then anger and frustration.


    As an aside, I think I’ll tell you about one of the most satisfying things I’ve read in a while. The boyfriend of this girl is confronted in the halls of their high school by a member of their youth group. He says that they have had people following him and his girlfriend (this person doesn‘t know they are married), and that they know they’ve been having sex. The boy replies by picking him up by the neck, smashing him against a locker, dropping him to the floor, and punching him once in the face as he says if he ever finds this happening again he will break into his house and smash his face with a tire iron. Hmm, maybe I’m a little sadistic for finding that enjoyable.

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