Rosemary Scott-Fishburn
My high school Bible teacher would come into class flinging a USA Today onto his desk and shouting How Shall We Then Live? Then we’d watch a video about the dangers of backward masking and moral relativism.
The newspaper proved that the world was a hellscape desperate for salvation from rock and roll. We wore skirts and the boys wore ties so everyone would know we were better than them and could save them from everything fun.
After high school I went to Europe to rescue the Catholics from Mary and convert them to Jesus because Catholics don’t necessarily go to Heaven. I was a mime and my boyfriend was in the praise band. We performed in public squares like a flash mob with an agenda.
We taught four Spiritual Laws. I don’t remember what they were but we could save strangers in nine languages. Whenever I sold God to people I felt like I was saying something bad to them and then I felt bad that I felt bad it never made me happy.
There was a song we sang as kids: The Happy Way is To Obey. We spelled the word O-B-E-D-I-E-N-C-E at the top of our voices.
My daughter told me last week that she thinks she must be a Christian since she believes people come back as someone else when they die and I laughed and laughed. She asked me what was funny, and I said Honey I think you found the happy way.
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Rosemary Scott-Fishburn is a writer and visual artist living in Gloucester, Massachusetts. Her website is rosemaryscottfishburn.com.
