For the sake of clarity I will give a little background information.
Meg had attended a Christian college in the midwest. Much attention was paid to furnishing the world with zealous do-gooders eager to change the world for Christ.
Sadly, very little attention was paid to the development of the individual.
What I found in dealing with many of those students was that they were so caught up in their Christian personas that they were woefully out of touch with who they really were.
They were trying to compose a life based on the expectations and unquestioned culture of the faith community.
They built lovely edifices, using all the right ideas and lingo, but in practice, they were still filled with all the unlovely characteristics they were trying to escape.
I watched from the sidelines as they started various small ministries, went on mission trips, and practiced leading congregations. But they were so unfinished themselves.
It was partly ludicrous, but as time went on and I saw more of their struggles,
I was increasingly concerned...at times, alarmed.
I was drawn into their world....
Underneath the near perfect facades, I encountered eating disorders, extreme stress,
acting out in many forms, much hiding and keeping of toxic secrets.
At such young ages many of them were painfully crumbling on the inside.
So many of these lovely young people were struggling with a kind of now sick religion.
They typically vacillated between fervent and misguided religiosity and the extremes of piercings, dreadlocks, drug use, paganism and the problems that come with repressed and/or twisted sexuality.
They were, many of them, living double lives already and no one was helping.
The very people who should have been helping were struggling themselves in many instances.
In any case, it seemed better to them to keep the machinery going at any cost, cover up, patch together, maintain the facades.
Keep the coffers filled. Practice damage control....ruthlessly when necessary.
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