Mike Hill

[Guest Shiva H. Vishnu]

I belonged to an aggressively evangelistic christian cult, the ICC. It was a regular part of my day to invite people to my church. Shit, it was expected of me.

 

One day I was in the line at the DMV with a friend of mine, a fellow disciple. We were discussing some church bullshit and imagine my absolute glee when the guy behind me in line asked me about my church. Usually I had to initiate the salespitch, but this guy was supremely interested from the get go. I invited him to church, and from there he readily agreed to @study the bible@ with me - cult speak for a gruelling break down session where scriptures are used like lawn darts on the turf of a gullible mind.

 

We quickly moved through the stages where I convince him hes a sinner, going to hell, previous conversion efforts are null, all other churches are lost, yada yada - then we land with a THUD on the "Sin and Repentance" bible study.

 

The way this usually works is you read through relevant scriptures on what sin is, and how confessing it is "powerful and effective", then you butter them up a bit by recounting, briefly yet dramatically, the bullet points of your own sinful past. If you have worked the salespitch just right, you will have before you someone who will tell you things they would never tell their own mother, father - even best friend. I heard so many many stories in this context, so many different life experiences that this alone completely changed my mindset - but I digress.

 

Mike Hill stood before me, ready to spill his guts. Now, I already knew he was gay. This had been obvious from the start. But, even as a fundy I didn't hate nor was I revulsed by homosexuals, Confounded, maybe. But, it didn't bother me that I was converting someone who was gay, and I knew it would come up eventually. Not that I knew exactly how I was going to handle it, but I was going to try. I wasn't prepared for what I was about to hear, and I haven't really even thoroughly processed it until more than a decade later.

 

Mike, who by now I would call my friend, told me something that might be, in retrospect, the most appalling thing I have ever heard slide between the lips on a human's face. MIke was HIV positive. Mike had known for 7 years. Mike had continued to have daily, unprotected sex with multiple partners. Mike was a human mind so distorted by guilt and need and a billion other things that I couldn't even begin to understand in that moment.

 

What could I do? I couldn't change his past, and in my worldview I was offering him a chance to become a new creation. There was nothing in my skillset that allowed me to view him as anything less than a sinner in need of salvation - so I offered him whatever support I could. I eventually baptised him and was made his "discipler", which meant I was responsible for his spiritual "mentoring".

 

When Mike joined the church, obviously unbeknownst to me, he only had 4 more months to live. I counseled him for the first couple of months, every day, about being faithful through his visits to the doctor about his T-cells. He was mostly stoic about dying. But, nearly every other day he would confess to me that he had sought out some anonymous encounter in a movie theatre or something, and how he hadn't used protection. It was frustrating and so truly profoundly befuddling that I didn't really absorb the magnitude of this guy's behavior at the time. I only considered how I could best help him stay faithful to Jesus. As the weeks went on, and I heard his reports from his doctors, it became obvious to me that the moment of truth for this guy was close at hand, and I was determined to keep him faithful. After all, if there ever was someone who truly needed a graceful pardon, it was this guy. Justice would be a lion's den for him.

 

A couple of months into "discipling " Mike stopped coming to church, citing his health. In my cult, if you didn't come to service when it was physically possible, then you were in sin. Period. I tried to argue with my leaders that he was in poor health, and they shouldn't consider him so harshly. They would not sway from the position that unless he could be made to attend meetings, he would soon be considered a "fall away", and would burn when he died.

 

I can't begin to describe the inner turmoil this entire thing produced in me, so I won't try. I really don't even want to.

 

I visited him at his parents house as often as I could. He was black, and his parents were poor, religious, and willfully oblivious of their son's lifestyle. They loved me though because they saw me as trying to bring him to Jesus, even if they didn't know that I wouldn't have accepted them as chritian brothers and sisters, at the time. Not because of race, obviously, but because of church affiliation.

 

As I visited him in the last 2 months of his life, each visit was more disturbing and heartbreaking. He became demented and eventually did not recognise me. I don't want to go into the details.

 

When he died my church leaders barely blinked, when I asked, before pronouncing him apostate, and damned. The congitive dissonance produced by this experience and the trains of thought it produced in me for months afterward might have been the catalyst that led to my deconversion. It's hard to say because so many things happened to me around that time. But one thing is for sure, I don't think I allowed myself to consider the scope of this person's offense and affront to life. My dogma forbade it. I am as bad as a murderer - so I am as bad as this man.

 

It's not that I think Mike was evil, even now. I still love Mike. He was a human and faced a life I will never understand and made a prodigious mess of it. Who knows how many are dead now, as I type this, because of the particular sequence of events that described one person's life. I think about it, and I am alternately furiously angry and helplessly compassionate, because I KNEW HIM. He wasn't a killer. He was.....victim is inadequate.....pawn maybe.....but human for sure.

 

He was a tender soul who truly seemed locked into a pattern of behavior that he was powerless to overcome. Maybe I give him too much credit. If I hadn't have known him personally I'd probably have nothing but curses for him.

 

I can't help but wonder how Mike's life would have been different if he hadn't grown up with the spectre of fundamentalism. Perhaps he wouldn't have felt, as he did, cursed by God. Perhaps then he might have cared a bit more for his own life and those of his fellow man to be responsible, and face reality. I dunno. But it hurts to think about it 11 years later. I almost couldn't remember his name.

[Guest Shiva H. Vishnu]

Bump.

[Ouroboros]

Wow. I'm just so amazed that the leaders would so easily condemn him because he couldn't come to church. That's very harsh.

 

Did he ever give you any reason why he had continued to have sex after he was diagnosed?

[Guest Shiva H. Vishnu]

The leadership was getting fed up with his continued sexual indiscretions and saw his non attendance as "falling away". They demanded he make an effort to attend to prove to them that he was still faithful. This is just one area where the leadership of my cult callously threw around their authority. There were many.

 

He said he had continued his lifestyle because he simply would not accept that he was infected. His sexual life was the only joy he had, and he couldn't give it up.

[Ouroboros]

Did he expect or hope for a miracle?

[Guest Shiva H. Vishnu]

He was scared to death of going to hell. He was hoping for a pardon as he saw the end of his life rapidly approaching. I dont know, I can't say I understand him.

[Japedo]

 

 

When he died my church leaders barely blinked, when I asked, before pronouncing him apostate, and damned. The congitive dissonance produced by this experience and the trains of thought it produced in me for months afterward might have been the catalyst that led to my deconversion. It's hard to say because so many things happened to me around that time. But one thing is for sure, I don't think I allowed myself to consider the scope of this person's offense and affront to life. My dogma forbade it. I am as bad as a murderer - so I am as bad as this man.

 

 

 

 

Shiva,

 

What an absolutely heartbreaking story, I'm truly at a loss for words. I have known 2 people in my life that died of that hellish diseases and details as you say are much to harsh and painful to rehash.

 

As for your guilt issue, I can not even begin to comprehend how you must feel, this definitely doesn't have an easy answer. I will say that You aren't a murderer and not even close to one. I don't want this to come across as I'm excuse making, but perhaps giving you a different angle to look at it.

 

If you were a Catholic Priest for example and were told the same thing you would be held by that same gag order and binding contract not to divulge any info given, saving the soul is considered more important when people are in that state of mind. The level of Morality of this depends on what you weigh more important.

 

Now that being said, Say at the time you disregarded the religions instructions. Who would you have told? Would you have been able to stop him? Would anyone have been able to short of holding him hostage? Realistically the answer is probably not. I'm going to link a NY Times Article that talks about Prosecuting aids victims (even in the case of a rapist) with willfully spreading aids. Granted it was originally written in 1989, but laws take a long time to usually to catch up with the times.

 

Prosecutors Grapple With Questions of AIDS

 

 

 

Now depends on the state one lives in as of 2000 (which is approximately 4 or 5 years after Mike passed. ) It could mean a Misdemeanor,nothing, or felony if you do it. It say's nothing about being told about it and reporting it (from a legal aspect of it) You can check out the chart here:

 

State Criminal Statutes on HIV Transmission (June, 2000)

[white_raven23]

Fear is a hard thing.

 

And having a terminal and communicable disease like AIDS, I think, there is the same kind of strong expectation of responsibility there that our culture holds for parents of children.

 

And a lot like unplanned parents, not everyone is prepared to bear the responsibility that has been put upon them when they discover they have HIV.

 

Does that make irresponsible behavior okay? No. But it does make it understandable. It can be hard to understand....and it seems like there should be a 'greater' or 'higher' degree of responsibility being a terminal disease carrier.....but human emotions are simplistic compared to our complex rationalizing of morality. And because human emotions are primative compared to the reason of our minds......guilt over actions as a result is ultimately inevitable.

 

Your friend travelled a hard road. And you were generous enough with your compassion to travel it with him. When it comes down to it, that is really what mattered in the end. Not what your church authority dictated...but what you as a fellow flawed human being exhibited to him. That someone could see his worst, and still care.....that is what is truly meaningful.

 

I think the more organized (strict) the religion....the more they try to simplify everthing in life as 'black or 'white', and unless their members are brave enough to have a real encounter with what they consider 'black'......they will continue their happy sheepdom, blithely judging folks like your friend with nary a concern. Because people like your friend aren't 'real' to them....and they prefer to keep it that way.

 

You done good Shiva.

[Gnosis of Disbelief]

How sad.

 

I'm not sure that there was much you could do for your friend.

He was already too far gone. He couldn't restrain himself from

his activities, and it sounds as if he couldn't handle the thought

of his imminent death very well. Hopefully, he was too far gone

to know that your church leadership had condemned him to burn

in hell. (Funny, I thought that was something reserved for gawd

in the xtian mythos, but then again, it seems to be mutating and

taking on all sorts of new and hideous forms these days).

 

There's not much you can do about it 11 years after the fact,

either. Time to learn what you can from it and let it go.

[pandora]

What is ICC? The Independent Christian Church? If so, I was a member of of that congregation, too... as was my husband.

[Guest Shiva H. Vishnu]

The ICC is the International Church of Christ. Check out www.reveal.org - they'll tell you all about it.

[Thurisaz]

Ouch. Just ouch.

[Vigile]

The leadership was getting fed up with his continued sexual indiscretions and saw his non attendance as "falling away". They demanded he make an effort to attend to prove to them that he was still faithful. This is just one area where the leadership of my cult callously threw around their authority. There were many.

 

 

It's interesting how your church leadership felt that they had the authority to decifer a man's fate. This sounds more like the Catholic church than your run of the mill protestant. Guilt, fear, and a distorted sense of morality seems to be the thread that ties most xtian-based cults together though.

[hatepirate]

Wait a second...even as an ex-c, I still don't see any reason for compassion for Mike.

1) He got AIDS by acting irresponsibly. Probably from some jackass just like himself. He ignored the statistics, let passion override reason, and suffered the consequences.

2) For knowingly spreading AIDS, I consider the guy not only a murderer, but a sadist. He didn't have enough respect for humanity to control himself. All that his guilt proved was that he wasn't a complete sociopath. Still doesn't make up for the pain and suffering he surely caused others.

3) You can file lawsuits for damages when you've been knowingly infected with an STD (and for a disease like AIDS, the damages are going to be pretty fucking big).

 

So a man was inadvertantly acted like a sadist murderer because he let his passion guide his actions and lacked the will to stop himself...the only tragedy I see in his death is that it didn't happen sooner. :angry:

[white_raven23]

Wait a second...even as an ex-c, I still don't see any reason for compassion for Mike.

1) He got AIDS by acting irresponsibly. Probably from some jackass just like himself. He ignored the statistics, let passion override reason, and suffered the consequences.

2) For knowingly spreading AIDS, I consider the guy not only a murderer, but a sadist. He didn't have enough respect for humanity to control himself. All that his guilt proved was that he wasn't a complete sociopath. Still doesn't make up for the pain and suffering he surely caused others.

3) You can file lawsuits for damages when you've been knowingly infected with an STD (and for a disease like AIDS, the damages are going to be pretty fucking big).

 

So a man was inadvertantly acted like a sadist murderer because he let his passion guide his actions and lacked the will to stop himself...the only tragedy I see in his death is that it didn't happen sooner. :angry:

 

Hatepirate......do me a favor. Set your socially PC righteous indignation on the curb for a second....go back and read my last post....and TRY to see actually having such a disease from the point of view of someone less perfect than yourself.

 

Your opinion of the actions of someone deceased and therefore not able to be censured, while understandable, is NOT appropriate to say or express to Shiva!

 

My best friend killed himself when we were still in high school. The next day an inconsiderate oaf mistakenly assumed that no one in the 911 Response class he was sitting in knew the guy....and asked the class openly if they'd heard about the Satanist that offed himself. Naturally I was sitting there. Now....I knew my friend was not a Satanist. But to hear someone putting down my best friend in such a way, and so indelicately....... I wanted to kill him. And no, I'm not being dramatic, or exaggerative. I....WANTED....TO....KILL.....HIM. Fortunately I had good friends in the class with me, who knew it was time for me to leave the room and explain to the instructor on my behalf.

 

 

Now...I can tell you quite sincerely that regardless of how long ago Shiva's experience with his friend was......the kind of rage that can boil up regarding the kind of ignorant ass shit you just spewed....can still be pretty volitile and painful.

 

And YES I called it ignorant shit. We aren't talking about some vague unknown person behaving irresponsibly with their disease. We are talking about someone that was known to one of us. Known to one of our fellow Ex-C friends. In such a context, you bashing a specific person who is now gone, within the thread of a surviving friend is not only rude....it is inappropriate, inconsiderate, and boorish.

 

Save your PC righteousness for other threads on the same topic, but not referencing specific people. This thread sure as hell isn't the proper place. Now piss off. :angry:

[Guest Emerson]

Wait a second...even as an ex-c, I still don't see any reason for compassion for Mike.

1) He got AIDS by acting irresponsibly. Probably from some jackass just like himself. He ignored the statistics, let passion override reason, and suffered the consequences.

2) For knowingly spreading AIDS, I consider the guy not only a murderer, but a sadist. He didn't have enough respect for humanity to control himself. All that his guilt proved was that he wasn't a complete sociopath. Still doesn't make up for the pain and suffering he surely caused others.

3) You can file lawsuits for damages when you've been knowingly infected with an STD (and for a disease like AIDS, the damages are going to be pretty fucking big).

 

So a man was inadvertantly acted like a sadist murderer because he let his passion guide his actions and lacked the will to stop himself...the only tragedy I see in his death is that it didn't happen sooner. :angry:

 

oh my god, who are you to fucking judge someone of AIDS? How do you know he didn't have enough "contro and respect for humanity to control himself." Were you there? Then don't fucking judge.

 

Shiva, I'm sorry you and your friend went through that. I just can't imagine. What a terrible thing to go through. I just can't imagine. Religion really has a way of fucking with people's hearts and heads, its a wonder anyone ever escapes.

[hatepirate]

Oh, jeez...I'm so sorry for criticizing someone for knowingly infecting dozens, perhaps over 100 people with a disease that slowly kills them, citing his raging libido as his excuse.

Mike willingly harmed others; alive he was an active threat to society. To delude yourself that Mike is somehow a victim in this story is asinine.

I'm unable to empathize in this situation.

 

Second, I don't are if you wish to accuse me of being "righteous". I'd rather be deemed "self-righteousness" than pity a murderer or a murderer's friend.

 

Furthermore, regarding your friend who committed suicide, that sucks. Your friend (unlike Mike) didn't harm anyone else. That's the damn difference in the analogy. Say your friend had been a killer, say he murdered 10 people and openly admitted it to you. You would then expect people to be unsymathetic in hearing that a murderer killed himself. They would be able to realize the guy had been a threat to society and more happy that he is dead that sad that he died. The situation you presented is entirely different than the OP's.

 

And finally, a little example of my own. My best friend (I've known him over half my life, we're like brothers) is gay. The way I read this story, I imagined a guy like Mike willingly infecting my friend. And my friend would suffer from AIDS and die because of Mike's uncontrollable sex drive and lack of integrity to warn my friend.

Would you not expect me to "want...to...kill...him" for doing such a thing to my friend???

 

The reality: There are people out there like me, who have a gay friend (or brother, or son) who Mike infected. He ruined peoples' lives.

To sympathize with those people, and sympathize with Mike, it's contradictory. You either feel for the victim or you feel for the perpetrator.

Get it?

[white_raven23]

I GET it you asshole. Our condolences however....are directed towards Shiva. Who is NOT accountable for his friends bad behavior. We don't condone people with AIDS fucking around unprotected, you idiot!!!

 

You attitude and exclaimations however are not appropriate!! Shiva's friend did not ask to get AIDS himself.....and people do stupid irresponsible things when they are in denial.

 

Condoning a behavior, and undertanding a behavior is not the same thing.

 

And again and I repeat!!!! This thread is more to do with SHIVA......NOT his friend. Your attitude towards people who do these things is quite understandable.....but your taking your ire out on the WRONG target!

 

Like it or not....the offender is deceased......and like it or not, Shiva had the courage to be his friend.

 

Don't be an ass towards Shiva for sticking by a friend that you would have apparantly shit on.

[hatepirate]

Condoning a behavior, and undertanding a behavior is not the same thing.

That's the thing: I don't understand it. It doesn't make sense, both what Mike did, why he did it, or why anyone would feel sorry for him after doing it.

 

Even Shiva said: "If I hadn't have known him personally I'd probably have nothing but curses for him."

 

I'm sorry if it was a tough ordeal for you Shiva, but I do think you gave Mike too much credit.

[pitchu]

Imo, the understandably emotional outpourings here demonstrate what a complex and horrific situation this was/is.

 

Shiva, my guess is that you remembered his name now because it was finally time to put it all together for yourself, in some clarifying way, under the title, "Mike Hill." I wish you success in integrating the meaning of this devastating time in your life.

[white_raven23]

I gave Mike not more or less credit that I would any human being. That includes humans who murder and maim.

 

When I speak of humanity....I include it's ills along with it's more nobly meant nature.

 

When I went to school, I wanted to understand that which other's shied away from....and labelled "aberrant behavior", because I myself did not understand either. The only difference between us my friend, is just that I chose to understand the human condition, not as we idealistically wish it to be, but often how it really is.

 

Human beings can be noble, virtuous, kind, and represent the best of sentience......they can also do the opposite. And most often, they teeter between both extremes. Like it or not, people are not wholly good, or wholly bad.

 

Caligula was a fearsome excuse for a civilized being. Yet he had friends and family who loved him. And it didn't matter how many dinner guests he decided to poison just for his own amusement. There were still people who loved him.

 

And it's not your understanding in this matter I wish to engender. You are not required to understand Mike. There is no point. He's gone. You keep focusing on Mike. And yet I repeat again.....this thread is not about MIKE. It is about Shiva. I don't even expect you to understand Shiva (though in his case you could try). I do however expect and insist that you have some respect and empathy for how Shiva feels. He lost a friend. A friend who was seeking acceptance and solace for his spirit. A friend who was afraid.

 

And ultimately a friend that was denied by people Shiva respected at the time. That's not hard for the friend....again he's gone. It was hard for SHIVA.

 

The thread is about SHIVA....not MIKE.

[hatepirate]

In that respect, you are correct, raven.

I apologize for my callous response, Shiva.

[Guest Shiva H. Vishnu]

hatepirate, I understand your opinion. Like I said, if I hadn't known him personally, or anyone else who died of a debilitating disease, my anger might outweigh my compassion. It's been known to happen. I too imagine the possibility that he could have infected a loved one, but when I imagine those scenerios myself, it's not just the faces of the victims which are clear to me. I also see Mike's face very clearly, and in many ways he very much was a victim. His sexual behavior wasn't the result of a normal healthy upbringing. He was sexually abused my a member of his family for many years from a very young age. A family member who was, by the way, quite religious. His behavior was pretty much programmed into him. Imagine being molested by someone in your family and actually liking it, but hating yourself. It's pretty hard for me to imagine. It's damned near impossible.

 

All the things I know about Mike make it possible for me to look past his monolithic irresponsibility. I still see it. It won't be ignored, but it begs to be understood.

 

Thanks, everyone, for all the kind words. It helps.

[Guest Shiva H. Vishnu]

 

 

When he died my church leaders barely blinked, when I asked, before pronouncing him apostate, and damned. The congitive dissonance produced by this experience and the trains of thought it produced in me for months afterward might have been the catalyst that led to my deconversion. It's hard to say because so many things happened to me around that time. But one thing is for sure, I don't think I allowed myself to consider the scope of this person's offense and affront to life. My dogma forbade it. I am as bad as a murderer - so I am as bad as this man.

 

 

 

 

Shiva,

 

What an absolutely heartbreaking story, I'm truly at a loss for words. I have known 2 people in my life that died of that hellish diseases and details as you say are much to harsh and painful to rehash.

 

As for your guilt issue, I can not even begin to comprehend how you must feel, this definitely doesn't have an easy answer. I will say that You aren't a murderer and not even close to one. I don't want this to come across as I'm excuse making, but perhaps giving you a different angle to look at it.

 

If you were a Catholic Priest for example and were told the same thing you would be held by that same gag order and binding contract not to divulge any info given, saving the soul is considered more important when people are in that state of mind. The level of Morality of this depends on what you weigh more important.

 

Now that being said, Say at the time you disregarded the religions instructions. Who would you have told? Would you have been able to stop him? Would anyone have been able to short of holding him hostage? Realistically the answer is probably not. I'm going to link a NY Times Article that talks about Prosecuting aids victims (even in the case of a rapist) with willfully spreading aids. Granted it was originally written in 1989, but laws take a long time to usually to catch up with the times.

 

Prosecutors Grapple With Questions of AIDS

 

 

 

Now depends on the state one lives in as of 2000 (which is approximately 4 or 5 years after Mike passed. ) It could mean a Misdemeanor,nothing, or felony if you do it. It say's nothing about being told about it and reporting it (from a legal aspect of it) You can check out the chart here:

 

State Criminal Statutes on HIV Transmission (June, 2000)

 

 

Thanks, Japedo. I wanted to clear up that when I said "I am as bad as a murderer - so I am as bad as this man", I was simply reiterating (admittedly not very clearly) the idea that my ideology wouldn't allow me to see Mike as a worse sinner than I was. I bought the idea that any sin earned you death, so Mike and I were in the same boat as far as God's ethics were concerned. At the time, I didn't feel any responsibility to society, really. Only to God.

 

It's only now that I am considering that I may have behaved unethically in my christian ignorance. I wouldn't consider myself a murderer at all, far from it. But I may have been negligent. I really don't know what I could have done that would have been perfectly appropriate. There's no fucking WWJD in the real world. I don't regret anything.

[Japedo]

 

 

 

Thanks, Japedo. I wanted to clear up that when I said "I am as bad as a murderer - so I am as bad as this man", I was simply reiterating (admittedly not very clearly) the idea that my ideology wouldn't allow me to see Mike as a worse sinner than I was. I bought the idea that any sin earned you death, so Mike and I were in the same boat as far as God's ethics were concerned. At the time, I didn't feel any responsibility to society, really. Only to God.

 

It's only now that I am considering that I may have behaved unethically in my christian ignorance. I wouldn't consider myself a murderer at all, far from it. But I may have been negligent. I really don't know what I could have done that would have been perfectly appropriate. There's no fucking WWJD in the real world. I don't regret anything.

 

 

Okay, Thanks for the clarification and sorry for misinterpreting the post.