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How To Speak in Tongues
A powerful religious experience was the beginning of the end of my faith.
Trigger warning: this essay contains details about suicide, self-harm, sexual assault, and religious abuse.
On the final night of service, the message was on healing. I was at the altar before I even knew it.
Sobbing, heaving, crying out, hands raised over my head. I started to sway back and forth as I felt hands laid on me- my head, my shoulders, my back, my arms.
My eyes shut tight, I focused on the voices around me: the feverish prayers of those touching me, willing me to be overtaken by the Holy Ghost; the same melody sung over and over again accompanied by a keyboard; my own voice as I plead with God to heal me of my affliction, to deliver me, to anoint me with His Spirit.
In the next moment my lips parted and my tongue began to tremble and from my mouth came a language I’d never spoken. I was only vaguely aware of my body. My physical being was just a placeholder for the ethereal being into which I transformed as I hollered in tongues, praising the Lord and rebuking the devil.
I carried on that way for a time, then I fell silent. As my shouts quieted to whispers, my knees gave way and I fell to the ground, gently guided by the same hands that had…
