JESUS FREAKS AND DONALD TRUMP
When I was young, immature,
and impressionable; searching for my place in the universe and wondering about
the meaning of life, I joined a religious cult.
I became a “Jesus freak”. This
was in the early 1970’s when the word “freak” was a compliment – it referred to
young hippie-types who not only dressed in bell bottoms and beads, but drifted
happily through days of unreality, irresponsibility, and rebellion to their
upbringing. Usually funded by dad’s good
job, because most of the freaks were middle and upper class kids who had been
raised in comfort by a stay-at-home-mom and in their late teens realized the
luxury of choosing to be hippies, to turn their backs on their backgrounds and goof
off in college, or join communes in the country, raise their own vegetables and
listen to a new kind of music. Drugs
were usually part of the picture, but not always. Sometimes experimentation leaned toward
non-drug experiences, such as religion, incense, meditation and other consciousness-altering
pursuits. The belief that turning on one’s background was necessary for a
larger purpose spread like a virus. The
anti-war movement had Vietnam and the draft to coalesce around and firm up this
anti-establishment movement.
In college I drank too much,
smoked cigarettes and pot, wore the same pair of hip-hugger jeans for days at a
time and no makeup. I never carried an
anti-war sign – coming from a military family my dad had warned me on pain of
death if I dared. But I kinda liked calling
myself a hippie. Then at some point I became a “Jesus freak,” but luckily for only
a short time.
Now to my point. The important word here is “short”. Why does that matter? Because in retrospect I can expertly speak to
how easily and quickly a person can become a firm believer in something, even
when it is in opposition to everything one was taught or believed
previously. Using the words “Trump” and
“brainwashing” is offensive; many will stop reading right here, but there is no
other appropriate word. I could use the
lesser known term “Stockholm Syndrome” which applies to what happens when a
person is kidnapped, isolated from his own world, comes to rely on captors for
sustenance and safety, and eventually accepts the positions, beliefs and actions
of one’s captors. At any rate, this is
what happened to me when I joined them, and I see parallels with Donald Trump
today.
This is how they got me: First, I was vulnerable; having just been
dumped by a boyfriend. Then, I was
“friended” by a charismatic girl who carried a worn paperback King James Bible
around all the time, and made notes and underlined passages and shared advice
from it constantly. Her joy was
infectious. I wanted to feel that joy,
and my Catholic upbringing had never supplied such happiness. I wanted to belong somewhere, be accepted
somewhere, be loved somewhere, as she seemed to be. She invited me to a meeting. The meeting took place at a ministry group
home and was so full of people who were loving, understanding, and accepting I
was immediately seduced, as all the young people in that place had been before me. They all had stories like mine – depression,
too much unhealthy pursuits, not loved enough by anyone. I learned that there was a national leader in
another state who had started this church, and God had seen to it that this
holy refuge had grown exponentially in only a few years on college campuses all
across the country.
It was quick, insidious, this
seduction. It wasn’t until I had
attended four or five meetings in a row that they told me I must begin to
“spread the Word”, cut off all “nonbeliever” friendships and family and devote
myself to God and The Word. Any doubts I expressed were smoothly explained
away: “Don’t listen. Satan knows you have found the Way, and he
will do whatever it takes to get you away from us. Don’t listen.” I saw signs in my daily life that seemed to
prove this; everything began to appear in a God vs. Satan battle, from
difficulty getting to a meeting (“Satan doesn’t want you here!”) , to “God help
me get a parking spot close to the store.
Hey thanks!” As I sank deeper and
deeper, with their constant influence over each and ever day, I took my
newfound religion home and attempted to convert my family. Of course they didn’t take me seriously, and
that drove me further toward the ministry group. I chose them over my family, and broke
financial ties. I took out a loan to
finish my education. I had found my new
path.
So here is where Trump is
becoming leader of a cult. His appeal
originated with charm, charisma and celebrity, his tell-it-like-it-is rudeness. He made us chuckle and say “attaboy!”. It snowballed into something no one could
stop. He made it okay to be outspokenly
vulgar and mean, and that permission spread like a virus. Now he is in the most powerful position in
the world, and he is attempting to squash the free press, to say “don’t listen
to them, that isn’t true. The only truth
is what I say” – and half of what he says is provably, obviously, false. This is dangerous. His disturbed view of the world is permeating
and solidifying his supporters, to the point where they will only get their
information and beliefs from his mouth and his tweets. The rest of us are like
my parents were when I tried to convince them they were Satan trying to keep me
from God: they must have been horrified,
asking themselves, how do we stop this?
In my story, it was stopped
by what I believe was an act of God. I
was living in off-campus housing after divorcing from my parents and suddenly,
one morning, my house burned down. My
roommates and my cat survived, but now I had no place to live, no clothes, no
school supplies, no coat for the winter.
The ministry insisted that this was clearly the work of Satan, and that
I must immediately move into their group house, to be with them and be safe. What a dilemma! My parents said, “Come home.” I chose home.
That decision took me away from the constant
brainwashing of the Bible group, and within weeks, I was myself again, back in
the real world. They called me
repeatedly, begging me to return, telling me Satan had me in his grip. It scared me.
I wasn’t at all sure they were wrong.
Of course my parents welcomed me back, showed me love, replaced all my
things, and eventually paid off my school loan.
I graduated, got a job, and settled into a normal kind of life,
returning to Catholocism, which is still my church today.
Years later, the ministry
went belly-up, the leader revealed to be a sexual abuser, and it all faded
away. I’ve often wondered about the
thousands of kids who had been pulled into its influence. Five years ago I reconnected with that friend
who had brought me into the ministry.
She had left decades before as well, and returned to the church of her
childhood. We talked for hours about how
stupid we were. How mistaken. We laughed about it, and thanked God we had
escaped.
Will Americans feel the same
way when the Trump era ends?
