Greenhouse - Fathermothergod: my journey out of christian science

Praise for
fathermothergod

fathermothergod is a heart-wrenching coming-of-age memoir about the implosion of a family when Christian Science dogma encounters a mothers grave illness. Its impossible to read this and not put yourself in the authors shoesthis will take your breath away.

L EE W OODRUFF, AUTHOR OF
P ERFECTLY I MPERFECT AND I N AN I NSTANT

A riveting and heartrending memoir, fathermothergod: My Journey Out of Christian Science exposes the monstrous feats of neglect fostered by this strange American manifestation of religious fanaticism. Tracing her mothers decline and its lacerating consequences, Lucia Greenhouse knows the truth about Christian Science, and she tells it with passionate, righteous indignation.

C AROLINE F RASER, AUTHOR OF G ODS P ERFECT C HILD :
L IVING AND D YING IN THE C HRISTIAN S CIENCE C HURCH

Lucia Greenhouses book is a heartbreaking reminder of how nefarious religious zealotry can be. Her story drew me in and blew me away. This is an important addition to the genre of memoirs by children who escaped religious hucksterism and are now bravely exposing it.

J ULIA S CHEERES, AUTHOR OF J ESUS L AND

Courageous and finely crafted.

S TAR T RIBUNE (M INNEAPOLIS )

[A] powerfully affecting memoir Greenhouses skill in rendering family relationships under the intersecting stresses of illness and conflicting beliefs makes the book worthwhile reading. Wrenchingly courageous.

K IRKUS R EVIEWS

Through this memoir, readers will see how even those closest to us can remain a mystery.

L IBRARY J OURNAL

A touching book that puts a human face on Christian Science.

B OOKLIST

Rather than a journey out of a faith, this is the story of one womans questioning and anguish over her parents choices. Teens wondering about their own faith, their parents expectations, and how to marry the two will find that this book resonates with them. It will also appeal to anyone wanting to know what its like to grow up in Christian Science. Suggest that readers have tissues close at hand.

S CHOOL L IBRARY J OURNAL

[fathermothergod] resonates with anyone wanting to understand anothers beliefs, or trying to understand his or her own.

L AS V EGAS R EVIEW -J OURNAL

fathermothergod tells a uniquely complex tale of a family torn apart, disastrously so, by a startlingly dangerous faith. A captivating, heartbreaking work that will leave readers wondering what else they dont know about the hidden pockets of the faithful world.

T WIN C ITIES D AILY P LANET

Copyright 2011 by Lucia P. Ewing

All rights reserved.
Published in the United States by Broadway Paperbacks, an imprint of the Crown Publishing Group, a division of Random House, Inc., New York.
www.crownpublishing.com

BROADWAY PAPERBACKS and its logo, a letter B bisected on the diagonal, are trademarks of Random House, Inc.

Originally published in hardcover in the United States by Crown Publishers, an imprint of the Crown Publishing Group, a division of Random House, Inc., New York, in 2011.

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Greenhouse, Lucia.
Fathermothergod: my journey out of Christian Science/by Lucia Greenhouse.
p. cm.
1. Greenhouse, Lucia. 2. Christian ScientistsUnited StatesBiography. 3. Christian ScienceControversial literature.
I. Title. II. Title: Father, mother, God.
BX6996.G74A3 2011
289.5092dc22

[B] 2011001059

eISBN: 978-0-307-72094-8

Jacket photography courtesy of the author

v3.1

For Olivia and Sherman

This book is about my experiences, told to the best of my recollection. To create a readable story of manageable length it was necessary to condense and combine some events and characters, and some things have been omitted to protect the privacy of those involved. Dialogue is re-created to the best of my memory; others may remember or interpret certain events and conversations differently, but Ive tried to remain true to the way I remember them.

To succeed in healing, you must conquer your own fears as well as those of your patients, and rise into higher and holier consciousness.

M ARY B AKER E DDY ,
Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures

O ne afternoon a couple of weeks before my eighth birthday, my five-year-old brother, Sherman, and I scramble out of the school bus and race each other home up the steep hill, which we only doand always doon Wednesdays. Wednesday is Caramel Apple Day, because on Wednesday mornings, Mom volunteers at the Christian Science Reading Room, and on the way home she stops at the Excelsior bakery for their caramel apple special. We drop our books in the front hall and dart into the kitchen to find not only the white square cardboard bakery box sitting, as usual, on the lazy Susan in the middle of the table but also our older sister, Olivia, asleep on the tattered red and white love seat, with a blanket up to her chin. Her long brown hair is pulled back in a ponytail. Her chin, cheeks, nose, forehead, and both hands are covered in little red spots.

Hi! Sherman says.

Olivia opens her eyes.

Chicken pox, she says miserably.

Do they hurt? I ask.

They really itch, she says, wincing.

Satisfied with her answer, our eyes turn to the caramel apples.

You want one? Sherman asks.

Olivia shakes her head no.

Mom appears as we help ourselves to the bakery box.

Olivia has chicken pox? I ask.

Mom doesnt answer.

Mom? Chicken po

In Christian Science, she reminds us gently, we know that there is no illness. No disease. No contagion. Olivia is not sick. She is Gods perfect child. We are all going to work very hard to keep our thoughts elevated.

Does that mean she doesnt have to go to school? I ask Mom.

It means I cant, Olivia says.

No fair! Sherman protests. How come?

Well, even though we know Olivia isnt sickcant be sick, our mother says, we need to follow the schools policy on certain matters.

I cant go back to school until the chickenI mean, until they crust over, Olivia says.

We know from Sunday school that were not supposed to name illness, because by naming something, we are giving in to the lie about it. Mary Baker Eddy tells us to stand porter at the door of thought.

For the next several days, life at our house is unbearably dull. My brother and I go to school; our sister doesnt, until her spots crust over. After school, our friends dont come to play kickball or ride bikes in our driveway. We are told its because of contagion, a scary thing other people worry about but we Christian Scientists dont believe in. We know that contagion is about germs spreading; we also know that prevailing thought (something we can tell is bad just from the way our parents and other Christian Scientists say it) claims that chicken pox is contagious. But we have learned in Sunday school that theres no such thing as germs.

Before we go to bed, Olivia, Sherman, and I pile into our parents bed and listen as they read aloud various passages from the Bible and