By A. Speegle
They were several young women I shall never forget that summer of ’97. Call them “conservative liberals” if you will, maybe even “religious subversives,” especially compared to the other students at Liberty University.
I stare at the picture I have on my desk, all of them wearing black burqas, symbolic of an imposition of yet another repressive ideology in the name of religion.
We’d meet every Tuesday night after vespers at my house where the discussion started about classes, dorm inspections, skirt length and makeup restrictions, and once in a while, men, but eventually and always the hot subject came up—forbidden books. Our reading group called themselves the Dear Jerry Club.
Oh sure, we did the annual missions routine to Mexico, seeing firsthand what the people needed. Yes, food was scarce, the water unhealthy, but what really converted them to Christ was cigarettes.
Our Dear Jerry Club girls, like their counterparts, the Islamic women of the Middle East and their wearing of the required but hated chador, had a secret lust for the forbidden life. Simple girly things.
Lipstick, eye shadow, and mascara were unheard of on campus, but as soon as they came in my house, the tubes came out. Closet lipstick jihadists. Their girlish squeals could be heard in the hallway, the bathroom, the bedroom, wherever a mirror could be found.
I’ll fondly remember so many precious times...
Ayatollah Falwell wouldn’t approve, of course. Maybe that’s why we did it. To shatter the imperial imagery of Liberty’s “Bible Boot Camp,” as he was so proud to call it.
Today, of course, questions frequently come up about how the new Chancellor and President, Inman Jerry Falwell, Jr, is going to rule the Liberty regime. Students still can’t have facial / tongue piercings, but they can wear jeans as long as they don’t have patches, holes or tears. It’s the “Liberty Way.”
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They never did tell me, but I suspect the girls were behind the crossing out of the banner in the Dobson Student Lounge, For the Christian woman, Housework IS Ministry.
By day they were WMD, Women of Makeup’s Destruction, by night, Women of Makeup Determination.
I hear from them now and then, my girls.
None became pastors, no surprise there, but all became, as expected, wives and eventually mothers, one way or another.
Amy became a pastor’s wife first. She’s the second from the left, the one with the cool blue eyes staring out through the netting of the burqa. Her two boys favor her.
Angela, the one with most reprimands for violating curfew, wearing shorts, distributing of unauthorized petitions, and hanging a “Do Not Enter” sign on her dorm door, became the first mother. Triplets, all girls.
Christina mastered wearing six-inch heels and is on her third marriage, finally settling with a pastor in California. She is doing well and, more importantly, is happy after the adoption came through. A cute five-year-old girl from Singapore. I spoke with her yesterday, she’s already teaching “Kimmy” makeup techniques.
Amy, when she isn’t working as a caseworker at Liberty’s Godparent Maternity Home, is a hotline counselor for Family Services Adoption Agency. She has a two-year old girl, and is eight weeks pregnant. She’s given up watching R-rated movies until after she delivers.
Within two months of giving birth to another boy, Rebecca came out of the coma after the motorcycle accident on a run with Liberty’s Iron Horse Motorcycle Club. Her husband, a former pro wrestler, became a Christian after his near fatal third wreck.
Carrie didn’t graduate, but she manages a Christian procreations vacation resort in the Virgin Islands, along with her husband and their five children.
Nicole was the editor of our campus paper, The Liberty Champion, for one issue, and always believed readers were really secret voyeurs. After her husband was laid off, they moved to Ohio. She won the state lottery, bought a publishing house and renamed it Song of Solomon Publishers. Together, they stay busy promoting a new genre of romance novels featuring the first-ever Christian Porn. It should be a success; their “practice sessions” have produced nine children.
All of us meet on the annual missions trip to Mexico. And we’re always sure to bring plenty of cigarettes.