Fearing and Trembling

Clowns. Global Warming. AIDS. The falling value of the dollar. MRSA. Confined spaces. Open spaces. AARP. President Huckabee. MCAT. Not scared yet? Here’s another thought: You’re going to Hell.

Not that dance in the Quad. I mean the place of damnation variously described as “a city much like London” (Shelley), “full of musical amateurs” (Shaw), and “murky” (Shakespeare). It is hot and filled with suffering people, all of whom have done something fatally wrong, and many of whom smell funny. Okay, I do mean that dance in the Quad.

But before we laugh it off, we must admit that there is something fundamentally unsettling about the idea of Hell. Even in Salem, the horror capital of Massachusetts, the most terrifying sight was not the man in the lab coat covered in body parts or any of the copious witches. It was a group of four Christians from Repent America, equipped with signs, megaphone, and fliers, out to warn us that, according to the words of Saint Paul emblazoned on one of their signs, “neither fornicators, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor homosexuals, nor sodomites, nor thieves, nor covetous, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor extortioners will inherit the kingdom of God.” Nathan Tyler, a diminutive man in a plaid shirt, stood on a stepladder with a Bible in one hand and a megaphone in the other gamely fielding questions from an angry crowd on topics from evolution—“It’s against the Bible, and it doesn’t conform to science as we know it”—to the crowd’s favorite, homosexuality—“the vile affection of a reprobate mind.” The young woman handing out fliers admitted to me that she didn’t particularly enjoy all the negativity and rejection, but that “when you love someone, you will do anything to keep them from burning in Hell forever.”

The flier she handed me was the biggest scare I received all night. Entitled “This Was Your Life,” it depicts, in cartoon form, a man going to his final judgment. All his actions replay on a giant screen. One image shows a woman walking by. The man is lurking behind a wall. “Ummm nice!” he says. “But I say unto you, that whosoever looketh on a woman to lust after her hath committed adultery with her already in his heart,” states the Biblical caption beneath the picture. (So that’s what that was.) The next page presents various pictures of the man committing a variety of labeled sins—“theft” “lies” “disobedient to parents” “unmerciful” “hater of god” “whoremonger” “whisperer” “backbiter,” (I wonder what the mechanics of that are) and “envy.” “Why didn’t someone WARN me about all this?” he asks.

That’s what Repent America has set out to do. They spend a lot of time focusing on homosexuality, which earned a great deal of ire from the crowd. “That’s not Christianity, that’s Paulianity,” said Eric, a short man in a blue sweatshirt who repeatedly challenged the validity of the Paul quotation. “Paul’s scripture is given by inspiration of God,” Tyler kept replying.

When I asked Eric afterwards about the religious background that enabled him to engage in a fairly articulate debate about the merits of Repent America’s assertions, he explained that he grew up wanting to be a Catholic priest but began studying other religions, from paganism and masonry to the “sex mysteries of Isis and alchemies of Horus.” “What is your religion now?” I asked, tentatively. “I’m a Thelemite,” Eric said. Of course he was. Apparently, there are quite a few in Salem.

What was most striking about the whole interaction was neither the doggedness of Repent America nor the humorous antagonism of the crowd. (At one point, Borat showed up and agreed that “The homosexuals, they wear blue hats, they must be execute.”) It was how concerned everyone seemed. Eric and his cohorts stayed for the full two hours debating with the man on the stepladder. I asked the man holding the less-offensive sign (John 14:6) what they hoped to accomplish by talking to a crowd of inebriated people in costume. “We’re shining the light of the Lord into this dark place,” he explained. When I asked Eric why he stayed and debated, he shrugged: “They caught me having a bad day.”

For both sides, there was an undercurrent of terror beneath the indignation. Repenting and accepting Jesus as my lord and savior is on my To-Do list somewhere between “Pick up your dry cleaning” and “Win a Nobel Peace Prize.” But when I run into groups like Repent America, I start rethinking my life. “Things do not exist simply because you do or do not believe in them,” Nathan said. “If you don’t believe in trucks, that won’t stop a truck from destroying you.” Fortunately, this argument cuts both ways—just because Repent America believes we are going to Hell does not make this the case. But what if they are right? I don’t know what “backbiting” entails, but I’m probably a “whisperer” and definitely “disobedient to parents.” Am I going to Hell? Are you? It’s unclear, but I definitely know what I’m going to be for Halloween: Nathan Tyler.



Alexandra A. Petri ’10 lives in Eliot House. Her column appears on alternate Tuesdays.