Let Us Drink Tea and Read Voraciously

Photo by Sarah Jane.  It was a lovely visit!

EX-SDA BLASTS PRECIOUS JEWELS, A SEVENTH-DAY ADVENTIST FAMILY SAGA

I suppose it was inevitable that my book about an Adventist family would come to the attention of the anti-Adventist community sooner or later.  There are several websites devoted to debunking Ellen G. White and Adventism in general, and these guys are vigilant, staying up to date on the latest news within Adventism.

I met one of them on a forum where I had posted a synopsis of Precious Jewels, A Seventh-Day Adventist Family Saga.  He (I'll call him "Ex-SDA") posted his own commentary, calling my book a "proselytizing effort" and advising all who purchased it to view some videos produced by exAdventist Outreach in order to get a "brief history and evolution of the church."

Ex-SDA went on to say that he was ashamed that he had ever been an Adventist, but since his family had been Adventists from the time of the Millerite movement in the 1840s, he didn't have "a sporting chance to figure out what's what" until he was well into his teens… 

The folks who crusade against Adventism argue that they are more informed because they read things that Adventists don't. 

Yet this fellow was carrying on about what he thought my book was about without having read it. 

This weakened his arguments considerably.  Nevertheless, some interesting issues were raised.

First, is my book a proselytizing effort?  Ex-SDA said he was proud of his family's other accomplishments, but if he ever wrote a book about them, he'd weed out the "cultic doctrine of Seventh Day Adventism."

While I wish Ex-SDA the best of luck in writing his own family saga with the religion censored out of it, my family's story would be incomprehensible without the context of the religion.   How can I write about Adventists without mentioning Adventism?  Why would one even try?  No, my book is not intended to proselytize, but reading my book is like a trip home, and home was an Adventist one.

In the course of our interchange, Ex-SDA asked me if I had heard of some of the major books and people in the anti-Adventist movement.  I have indeed.  (In fact, one of the people on the forefront of the movement is one Dale Ratzlaff whose family were neighbors of my family during the time period of the later chapters of Precious Jewels.)  In addition, I was alive in the 1980s when the current debunking movement began with The White Lie, and most of my immediate circle left the church over it.  Today, there seem to be two camps -- those who have read the debunking literature and were unable to retain their Adventist beliefs afterward; and those who refused to read the books at all, and remain in the faith. 

Clearly, the decision of whether or not to read the debunking literature is a very serious decision -- and that is my objection to those anti-Adventist crusaders who pressure people to read The White Lie and related material.  If the bitterness of their remarks and the angry sound of their narratives is an indicator, their motivation isn't to help people live safer, kinder, more peaceful lives but to destroy a belief system they despise.  Their destructive agenda counter-balances any merit their arguments may have.

The main characters in Precious Jewels lived their whole lives believing completely in the Adventist way.  They were colorful, even eccentric, characters, whose uniqueness was intensified by their unique beliefs.  They lived lives of purpose and fulfillment, and their impact was so strong that we who knew them speak of them today as if they left us only yesterday.  That is how they were and that is how I have written them.

My words to Ex-SDA and his fellows are the following: "You may disagree with me regarding what my book is about or how I have told the story, and that is your right, but… 

before you draw a conclusion, please…

...READ THE BOOK!"

Unforgettable Characters.  Pictured are the main characters in Precious Jewels, A Seventh-Day Adventist Family Saga, taken about four years after making the epic journey from northern Minnesota to the Carolina coast in a caravan like the one pictured.  They had been living in a chicken coop near the Lake of The Woods, and their lifestyle didn't change that much after they went South.  (Chicken coops as homes and schoolhouses keep cropping up in the story.)  Missing from the photo is the home-made camper built on a truck chassis that also made the trip.  The portable coop in the forefront of the photo would have made the trip also, along with the dog, a cow, and a flock of chickens, plus a newborn baby and toddler sisters.  The year was 1937, top speed for the journey would have been about 25 mph, so the trip took a good 3 weeks!