by Hannah Luce
There was also a playful side to our friendship. Garrett loved playing the macho guy. He wanted everyone to know he was all man. He loved talking about football and all kinds of sports stuff, and he bragged about spear fishing in Oklahoma, and hunting caribou in the Arctic Circle and monkeys in the jungles of Peru.
I suspected there was a feminine side hiding in his manly body. So one day when we were together in the park I brought along a copy of the BEM test, a test that measures androgyny, or just how male or female you are in your thoughts and feelings. The way the test works is it asks a series of questions resulting in a score from “ultra masculine” to “ultra feminine.” A score that falls in the middle means you have the well-developed psyche of an androgynous mind. I never thought he’d take the bait, but he did; he didn’t even hesitate. Sitting on a bench in the park, we each took the test. I was certain his would show he was softer than he liked to admit, and that it would get him to see the benefit of embracing his feminine side. I really wanted to say, “I told you so!”
When we both finished, I scored them. My score fell near the middle, but closer to the masculine side. His? I couldn’t believe it. It was on the high end of ultra masculine. When he saw it, he shot up from the bench, flexed his muscles, and grunted, “Huh!” I laughed so hard I fell off the bench and onto the grass. We held each other and laughed until our stomachs hurt.
15
Judgment Day
Religions are different roads converging to the same point. What does it matter that we take a different road, so long as we reach the same goal. Wherein is the cause for quarreling?
—MAHATMA GANDHI, HIND SWARAJ
I graduated from ORU in May 2011 and soon after joined Papa on a trip to visit an old acquaintance in Chicago. The man had been a protégé of Oral Roberts himself, and like Papa, he’d made quite a name for himself in the conservative Christian world. Like Papa, our pastor friend founded his own ministry that drew thousands of followers to his church in Tulsa on Sundays, and thousands more to the annual conference of music and ministry he held at the university every year. He was at the pinnacle of the evangelical hierarchy. Then, one night, as he watched a documentary on the genocide in Rwanda, he had an epiphany. Hell wasn’t some biblical place of eternal torment. It was created right here on earth by depraved human behavior. He began to reject his strict fundamentalist beliefs in favor of more Universalist views. He sermonized about inclusion. Jesus, he said, was everyone’s savior, not just the savior of Christians who claimed they were saved. In the end, all sins would be forgiven and all people would be reconciled with God. Because of his new beliefs, the evangelical order turned their backs on him. Some called him a heretic. His parishioners left his church in droves. But I adored him.
The visit with our friend went really well. I was surprised that Papa seemed to be developing a stronger relationship with the man. It was the only friendship I’d ever seen him develop with a person who, in his eyes, wasn’t a true Christian, not anymore. “I really like that you’re becoming good friends with him,” I told Papa when we left the man. Papa nodded affirmatively and smiled.
Our conversation started again when we boarded the plane for home. I was going on and on about how much I liked our friend, how inspiring, how brilliant he was, and those kinds of things. I supposed Papa had been holding his tongue all along, and just couldn’t do it any longer, because he made a remark about the man’s not being saved. I was enraged.
“It’s always like that with you, isn’t it?” I said through clenched teeth. “Is there any point at which you will just judge people based on the fact that they’re good human beings? It seems as though you can’t be friends with anyone who isn’t a Christian, and when you are nice to anyone who isn’t a Christian you always have an end game.”
I couldn’t stop. The words spilled out as if I was puking them up. It was as if I was regurgitating every hurt, every fear, everything I had been holding back my entire life. The truth was that my faith, what was left of it, much more resembled our pastor friend’s faith than my father’s. If Papa couldn’t accept our friend, how could he accept me? The answer was, he couldn’t, which was precisely why I had been living a lie for most of my life. Why I had never let on about my crisis of faith. Why I had split into two people, the real Hannah and the Hannah my parents insisted I be. It didn’t matter that they were true to their faith. That they believed in the literal word of the Bible. That they believed that only a relatively chosen few would be allowed into Heaven and everyone else would be banished to Hell. I didn’t believe what they believed. I didn’t know what I believed anymore, or even if I believed.
“You’re always playing the game, Papa,” I said, choking back tears. Mine were tears of rage. “This game of trying to save souls so they won’t burn, and that’s all you can experience of people, and that’s all they can experience of you.”
My father had been quiet to that point. But I had struck a nerve.
“You’re exactly right!” he shot back. “That is my goal! With him! With everyone! Would you want your friends to burn in Hell?”
“Who do you think you are?” I cried. “Are you God?”
“If they’re not saved they’re not going to Heaven,” Papa said.
There it was again. What I’d been hearing my whole life. It was always us against them. Those of us who have been saved and everyone else. I had never thought of my father as a “turn or burn” guy before, and I didn’t like thinking it now.
“There’s us then there’s the rest of the world, isn’t there, Papa?” I said. “Can’t you accept that just because people don’t believe in God in the way you do, that God still loves them? Can’t you accept that it’s possible that God loves everyone? Not just us? That maybe all sin is forgivable and, in the end, we will all be saved?”
“That’s not what the Bible says,” Papa said.
I felt sick. “While we’re at it, are gay people and Muslims on the ‘they’ side?” I asked. It was a rhetorical question, of course. I knew what Papa’s answer would be. “You can’t see the beauty in people, can you, Papa?” I cried. “You can’t even see the beauty of God that is within your wonderful friend. He has been so good to you. He has been such a kind and loyal friend. Why can’t you just see that?”
Papa wouldn’t budge. “Yes, he is,” he said. “But he isn’t saved.”
Fed up, I took a leap of faith and confessed my struggle. “Papa,” I said. “I have felt my entire life that I have been bouncing back and forth from us to them, us to them, because I’ve never been accepted in the ‘us’ category. I tried my hardest to be accepted into your Christianity, and it just hasn’t worked. Now I’ve studied theology, and I see these things on a broader perspective. Can’t you see that you’ve built a wall between people who are like you and people who are not like you? That it doesn’t have to be them and us?”
I don’t know what I was expecting. Did I think Papa would suddenly see things differently? Did I think he would question his core beliefs, to which he had devoted his entire adult life, because of one conversation with me? If I had been expecting to hear some kind of compromise, some acknowledgment that even though his friend didn’t believe exactly as he did, he was still a good man and God could still love him, I would have been sorely disappointed. If I had such expectations. But I didn’t. I knew exactly how Papa would respond.
“It is us and them,” he said, “If you’re not for us, you’re against us!” He sounded like George W. Bush talking about the war on terrorists, and I guess in his good and evil way of thinking, it was the same thing.
I pushed back harder. “If it’s a them-versus-us culture, I’d prefer to be one of them, thank you very much,” I said bitterly.
Papa opened his book and pretended to read.
I turned to the window and pretended to doze off.
We were at an impasse. We were never going to agree. I thought he probably didn’t even like me very much anymore. I was sure he was praying for my lost soul.
That’s why I was so shocked when, the following month, he asked me to join his staff.
16
Back to the Future
A week is more than enough time for us to decide whether or not to accept our destiny.
—PAULO COELHO, THE DEVIL AND MISS PRYM
I was working in Designer Women’s Apparel at Saks Fifth Avenue in Tulsa that summer when Papa called to say he had something important to discuss with me. “I’ll call you on my break,” I promised. I couldn’t imagine what couldn’t wait until I clocked out of work at six, but Papa had insisted time was of the essence.
An hour later, during my break, I dialed Papa on my cell phone. “What’s going on?” I asked. “Is everything okay?” Papa sounded excited, but he often sounded like that. Sometimes I thought he was an enthusiasm addict. “Remember when you told me there was nothing you wouldn’t do to get to your goals?” he asked, a little bit mysteriously, for effect.
I thought that’s what I had been doing. The job at Saks was one of three part-time jobs I was working since graduating from ORU that spring. I was also waitressing nights at two different Italian restaurants downtown to be able to support myself and pay for my first semester of graduate school at Oklahoma State for psychology. On Sundays, I worked as a sort of youth counselor at a local church (where yet another pastor was under fire for having an affair, this one with his nanny). That put a few extra dollars in my pocket each week, too, but I still was barely getting by. What was Papa getting at? Did I remember saying that about getting to my goals? “Yeeeaaah, I remember,” I answered, tentatively.
A few months earlier, before our clash on the plane, which, by the way, was never spoken of again (evangelicals are often passive-aggressive and come at you through a side door, and that’s what Papa was doing now), I had expressed my frustration to Papa over the phone that I was working my tail off but was barely able to buy groceries after bills. The job at Saks paid a small base salary, plus commission, which was where you made the real money, but it took time to build up a clientele, and I had only been on the job for five months. Papa taught us that money didn’t bring happiness (yes, only God could do that), but I wanted at least to be able to support myself and not depend on a man to take care of me—the way everyone was telling me I should. I didn’t just want to make a difference. I wanted to be able to make enough money to do the things I loved to do while I was changing the world. So Papa sent me a book about the psychology of selling. After I read it I immediately noticed a spike in my sales, but it wasn’t enough to carry me through grad school for another semester.
I breathed into the phone, waiting for Papa’s next move. “Well,” he said, drawing his sentence out for suspense. “I have a proposal for you.” Oh, boy, I said to myself, not to Papa.
Papa always had trouble keeping his assistants. Most of them were from Teen Mania, and although their intentions were good, they weren’t equipped to do the complicated work it took to run his life. We were always hearing that this one wasn’t smart enough, and that one was overqualified and left for a better-paying job, and someone else screwed up and was fired. It was always something. Papa is a kind man, but I knew he was a perfectionist and a tough taskmaster. It takes a lot of grit and dedication to push a ministry of that size forward. His schedule was rigorous, and sometimes even I couldn’t keep up with him. Not only that, but Teen Mania’s business office was operating in a time warp. The database was so outdated that the mission recruiting staff was calling people who had died years earlier, and they were still using file cabinets instead of computers to keep records. “I’d like to offer you a job as my executive assistant,” Papa said.
Papa had the best of intentions, and he was a loving parent to me growing up. But he had a hard time letting go, and I knew that, after the conversation on the plane coming back from visiting his friend in Chicago, he feared not just that he and mom were losing me, but that I had lost my belief in their God. Offering me the job back in Texas was a smart move on his part, because I was competent and hard-working, and I certainly knew my scriptures. But I suspected that part of his motive (that passive-aggressive thing) was getting me back home so he could try to influence me back to his version of faith.
As I held the phone to my ear, a million thoughts swirled around in my head. I was in trouble financially. I wanted to finish grad school. I wanted to stay in Tulsa. As much as I loved my family, the last thing I wanted was to go back home to Garden Valley. “Well, Papa,” I said. “Thank you for offering me the job. I will consider it.”
Papa wasn’t going to let me off the hook that easily. He said he needed an answer soon. His calendar was jam-packed with tours and missions and speaking gigs, and he needed someone now. He needed me now. “Okay,” I said. “I promise I’ll let you know soon.”
I hung up and scolded myself. Hannah, are you crazy? Have you lost your mind? Why didn’t you just say no? I did what I always did when I was in a panic. I called Austin and Garrett. What am I going to do? I cried. “C’mon over,” Garrett said.
After work that night, we all met at Garrett’s house, and over beers at his kitchen table, my friends laid out the pros and cons of my moving back to Texas. They, better than anyone who knew me, understood my struggles with Papa and my bewilderment over religion. I had gotten to the point that I didn’t know where, or even if, it had a place in my life. I was sure Austin and Garrett would confirm what my instincts were screaming at me and give me all kinds of reasons to stay in Tulsa, then help me find a way to turn down the job gracefully. But they didn’t do that.
Austin and Garrett avoided the cons and ticked off the pros. It didn’t have to be a forever job, they said. I could go for six months, help Papa get things organized, learn a lot from him, save up some money, and move on. I would be able to travel with Papa, and who wouldn’t want to do that? And I’d be living at home with no bills to pay. Make a list of demands, they said. First and foremost, insist on adequate pay, followed by a commitment that I’d get to travel with him, and I’d have weekends off to come back to Tulsa for classes and to spend time with my friends. I thought it over for five minutes, took a last sip of my beer, and headed for the door.
When I got home, I called Papa with my list of demands. He shot down my asking price. I accepted anyway.
17
Back to Teen Mania
Extending from Biblical analogies and characters used as role models, the campaign has used narratives, metaphor and scripted staged presentations including images of weapons, pervasive use of a red pennant, and terms from a war lexicon such as “God’s Army,” “enemy” and “battle.” It has used current and former members of the U.S. armed forces prominently in the Battle Cry stadium events, encouraging young people to become “the warriors in this battle.” In “Battle Cry for a Generation,” a book released at the start of the campaign, Ron Luce wrote, “This is war. And Jesus invites us to get into the action, telling us that the violent—the ‘forceful’ ones—will lay hold of the kingdom.”
—CHRIS HEDGES, AMERICAN FASCISTS: THE CHRISTIAN RIGHT AND THE WAR ON AMERICA
I had nine tan metal file cabinets in my office at Teen Mania. The kind people used in the eighties, before computers ran businesses. They’d been there as long as Papa, and so had some of the contents. Drawers were packed with random sheets of paper and manila folders that had obviously been recycled as many times as they had subjects crossed off them. Nothing was in order. I quickly learned what it would have been like to run a nonprofit as a young executive in the early ’80s.
It wasn’t anyone’s fault. Papa had some great people on his staff, but the focus wasn’t and had never been business, it was saving souls. In fact, the qualifications he looked for in job applicants didn’t necessarily include college or even any business experience. Even on the ministry’s website, it says employees are chosen first and foremost for their strong character and leadership. “They are individuals who have a passion for teenagers and missions and are committed to invest
ing their lives into moving forward the Great Commission through ministering to this young generation,” it says. Those traits didn’t always translate into good business practices, and Teen Mania was proof of it.
Papa had ministered to millions of teens and their families during his twenty-five years in the business, and I swear he had at least some information on every one of them that was all stuffed into those metal file drawers. And that was just the file cabinets in my office. Every office looked the same way. The database was in worse shape than the files. A lot of our program enrollments depended on phone solicitations by staffers using call lists that weren’t updated regularly. The lists were supposed to be separated by category, but oftentimes the same person would get four or five calls from us, each pushing a different program. There were lots of times when someone would call a name on the list, only to be told that the person they were trying to reach had died years before. Phones were disconnected. People had moved away. But what could we do? People had to be called. Lives had to be changed.
Everywhere I looked I saw the effects of cutbacks and limited resources. Part of the problem was that the teenage interns did so much of the yeoman’s work, and there were always turnovers and new people to train. Not just that, like most every major business, we were feeling the effects of a strained economy and had to make cuts in staffing, but at the same time the workload was increasing.
It was no secret that evangelical kids were abandoning their faith in droves (I was one of them) because they felt it was irrelevant to their lives. I had read the studies, and they all had similar results; something like three out of five felt disconnected from the church after they turned fifteen. Most of the kids who were surveyed said the faith they’d been raised with was suffocating and judgmental and out of step with their world. Many said they felt isolated in their struggles to live by outdated conservative Christian values when most of their peers were engaging in casual sex and enjoying forbidden music and videos and other “cultural garbage,” as Papa called it. I knew Papa was worried about what he was seeing. He was even quoted in the New York Times about his fears, saying, “I’m looking at the data, and we’ve become post-Christian American, like post-Christian Europe. We’ve been working as hard as we know how to work—everyone in youth ministry is working hard—but we’re losing.”