This was ages ago. I transferred to a brand-new Baptist high school in Memphis. For those of you that have seen the movie, it’s the same school that the young black football player went to, who was adopted by a rich white family. Anyway, the school opened, and there were a bunch of kids who decided to be self-appointed missionaries to those of us who were not Baptist, and therefore, going straight to hell.

Here in America, the different flavours of Christianity hinge upon tiny differences in doctrine and belief that appear bewilderingly small to someone outside the system, but are GIANT AND IMPORTANT to believers. Not only was I not Baptist, but I was Episcopalian (one tiny step away from Rome).

The evangelizers were bullies. Not just annoying, they were HUGE bullies. They would not stop, even when you asked nicely. And, they didn’t think twice about lying to the kids they were talking to. This made me more than a bit angry. So, being a thinking child (I was 15), I went to the library.

For about a week, I carried around, and ostentatiously read, a couple of books on witchcraft. That’s all. Didn’t speak of witchcraft, didn’t espouse any weirdness, just carried books around. It worked. It was as if I had a force field around me. They never bothered me again in the 3 years I was there.