An Old Friend's Mother Died.

[Shyone]

It's good you had your girlfriend with you. Two people are very strong together, even when entering a den of vipers.

 

But, it's over. And life goes on.

[HRDWarrior]

 

I know for sure the former youth pastor is going to call me at least once, for sure. He'll question me for the better part of an hour and in particular he'll ask who the fuck the "foreign woman" was.

 

 

 

Glad you're back with little else to worry about

 

And there's a VERY easy solution to this one - just don't answer. The excuse that you're busy with your life and forgot to call back works wonders. then you don't need to worry about your brother hearing back or anything else. You don't live there, what are they going to do - drive to Vegas to see why you didn't answer your phone?

 

Seriously, don't bother facing this guy. You avoided it at the funeral, and there's no reason to be making excuses and lieing about who you and are and who you're dating to someone you never talk to anymore when the only way for them to reach you is the telephone. I'm not trying to be mean, but why are you so scared of this guy that you couldn't ignore his call? Ignoring it gets nothing back to your brother than you didn't answer...

[belladonna]

I'm back!

 

Well, I survived, and it wasn't nearly as bad as it could have been, but neither am I in the clear just yet.

 

My girlfriend is from Italy and was born-and-raised an atheist. No godparents, no baptism, no first communion, none of that. But unlike here, in Italy a clear majority of folks don't give a shit. Even most of those who go to church at least somewhat regularly (30% of the population at the most) are pretty laid back. Maybe only 1/6 of those are anything like what we would consider a "fundamentalist." As my Italian boss (from Italy) once said, "here in America the priests feel all guilty about it and they get all weird, but back in Italy they just fuck the girl, they don't give a shit!"

 

So we pulled up to the church. I took a deep breath. "Here we go." "That's the church?" she asked. It was a utilitarian rectangular 70s building that had been built out of cinder blocks. "Yep." She had to go to the bathroom. "Inside the church." She was shocked. "Inside the church!?" "Yeah!"

 

Apparently in Italy, Catholic churches don't have bathrooms in the back of the sanctuary. "What if a guy had to take a shit real bad? Because sometimes it just hits you." She said you'd have to run to a store across the street or something. She thought it was really weird.

 

They were all there. Ex-girlfriend and her sister, her dad and mom (the senior pastor and pastor's wife of the church), my best friend and his older brother and his mean n' nasty wife, and 50 other fundies I used to know.

 

My girlfriend said that everybody kept staring at her wondering who she was. They all knew who I was.

 

It was a typical fundie funeral. They talked about her childhood and about the years when she was active in the church. Everything else was left out. There was a lot of missing backstory that I filled my girlfriend in about later and she remarked "there was so much hypocrisy in there!" Yep.

 

She found the service touching. She wasn't used to the informal nature or to all the emoting and teariness. And she thought of the senior pastor "he's not such a bad guy." He was officiating. She was thinking "this isn't so bad. This is kind of nice." But then...

 

...at the end the senior pastor preached a sermon. He stated that if you're an atheist your life has no meaning, that it can't possibly have any meaning. Then he went through the other major world religions and told why they were wrong (and stupid) and why Christianity was right. And that Christianity is the only one backed up by proof (the Bible, of course). Then he talked about how if you weren't fully on board by Assembly of God standards you were going to roast in hell. He said "hell is far worse than the flames. The flames you think about don't even begin to describe how terrible it is, and it's for all eternity." And then the capper: "the most important thing that [friend's mom] ever did in her entire life happened exactly one week ago, when she went before the throne of God and [blah blah blah]."

 

This shocked and offended the shit out of my girlfriend. She told me so after we left and I said "I bet you get it now, don't you?" She indeed did.

 

When the funeral was over, I had to make the rounds and start schmoozing. During the eulogy certain people's names were called and they were told to stand up. My name was called. When I stood up, a loud murmur swept through the crowd. Apparently people had been wondering where the fuck I'd been. I was like "well, so much for being a shadow." Now that Sunday morning has come and gone the news has probably made the rounds for miles around, and they're probably wondering who the fuck the "foreigner girl" was.

 

I don't mean to sound so self-absorbed. I'm just giving the play-by-play as to how this went down, per the concerns expressed upthread.

 

So I had to start schmoozing. First I talked to my former youth pastor's wife. Apparently, he had to be at work. Which was a relief, because out of everyone I was expecting to see, he would have been the one to most aggressively question me and get to the bottom of things. As in, taken me aside so he could talk to me privately for twenty minutes, that's what we're talking. She said "what's your phone number?" I said "he has it." She said "okay, I'll have him call you." Fuck!!!

 

Worse yet, I found out that he calls my brother at least once a month to check up on him. So whatever slip-up I make would immediately get relayed to my brother. (I know how the guy operates.) So I have to finesse my way through it when he calls. (Oh, and he will.)

 

Here's the part that really made me feel like shit. His wife said "I still share your testimony with people, to this day. You have the most awesome testimony." I felt like the biggest fucking asshole that ever walked the earth. I just nodded my head and looked thankful.

 

My ex-girlfriend was looking pretty hot. She lost a lot of weight, got an up-to-date hairstyle, was wearing this incredible black suit with knee-high black boots, and... wow! So I told my girlfriend later "well, I know who I'll be thinking about the next time I jack off." *heh heh heh* Good thing she didn't have anything sharp.

 

A few people were like "where've you been? You need to visit us more!" I said "eh, I can't leave Vegas so much these days. I hardly ever set foot in L.A. anymore. [True.] And then I'm overseas and everything." [Also true.] Kept it nice and vague.

 

The senior pastor didn't hassle me any. Although my friend's brother's wife (the mean one) was giving me the evil eye. She insistently invited me to church tomorrow. I begged off, but I could tell she was testing me. She was giving my girlfriend this ultra-suspicious, borderline-homicidal look the whole time.

 

So we got out of there.

 

Well, on our way back to Las Vegas we stopped where my friend was staying (it was on the way). His brother was there but thankfully his mean n' nasty wife was somewhere else. We didn't get much chance to talk. Then we left. He started talking about church and I was like "uh oh, here it comes." Then he said "what church are you going to now in Las Vegas?" Without skipping a beat I said "eh, I'm in between churches right now. Thinking about checking out this mega-church. You know, something for everybody." He was satisfied with the answer. Then we left.

 

Well, I only had to lie once. And it was a small lie. I knew the "in between churches" would throw him off the scent. Hopefully he won't keep sniffing. However, he regards this as a "reconnection" so I think he's going to start calling me now. Shit.

 

I know for sure the former youth pastor is going to call me at least once, for sure. He'll question me for the better part of an hour and in particular he'll ask who the fuck the "foreign woman" was.

 

I know my appearance must have made the gossip rounds in record time. Los Angeles may be a big fucking city but when it's fundie-ville we're talking about, it feels like a small town. Especially since fundies are so few and far between in the City of Angels. Hopefully I can fade back into obscurity, and hopefully the ones doing the chattering keep it at just that and they don't try to pick up my trail.

 

As for my brother, I explained the whole thing to my girlfriend. She said I should look into getting him help. I said "there's nothing I can do. I can't make him get help. My family has tried." I tried to explain to her the laws about that (she seemed to think we could easily force him to be helped, and that a lawyer would know about some loophole that we could exploit) here in America but she couldn't understand. She said I should at least look up some information. She insists that there are specialists who know how to handle mentally ill religious delusions (demons and shit) and religious cult type stuff. I said I would be willing to talk to such a person if I can find one. Anybody got any ideas?

 

Her brother back in Italy is a psychologist and she said she would talk to him. So I explained the whole Assemblies of God thing and the whole "spiritual warfare/demonology/bat-shit Pentecostal" thing to her in as much detail as I could. She said it was like "a horrible science fiction movie." I said "yup, welcome to my former life." So I ran the whole story by her and she's going to talk to her brother about it. But I have no idea what could be done. God dammit, I don't want to live to see my brother jump out of a fifth floor window because the demons drove him to it. God fucking dammit!!!

 

So there it is in a nutshell. I'd go into much more detail but I'm short on time.

 

Glad you survived, and I'm glad you're back.

[Vomit Comet]

All's quiet so far. Hopefully I can just fade back into obscurity.