Judas Church

Episode 3

Chapter 7

After we stopped at Arby's we drove to Manley's apartment. He lived in a crowded neighborhood. The businesses and apartment buildings were so close together you couldn't stick a pencil between the buildings. On some blocks, the buildings were actually connected. We drove past small, locally-owned restaurants, a theater, a bookstore, and a museum. Even though it was late at night, a few people were still out on the sidewalk.

After parking on the side of the street, we walked up two flights of stairs to Manley's apartment. Abigail opened the door after Manley knocked. She was short, dark-eyed, and had the same dark hair as her brother.

"Hi, Delilah," I said.

She put her hand on her hip. "It's Abigail now."

"I told him," Manley said.

"I wasn't sure if he was lying or not," I said. "People don't just change their names, you know."

"Well, I did."

"Okay, fine. Abigail it is." I held the Arby's bag up. "Peace offering?"

"Only if there's a cheese melt in there," she said taking the bag.

"There's three," I said.

The living room we were standing in was small and compact. The white carpet was coffee-stained, and overstuffed velvet blue couches dominated the room. Abigail waved us into the kitchen which was also tiny. There was an island table for four and wrap-around counters. The tiled floor was a gold flower pattern. The light fixture in the ceiling cast a yellow glow over the room.

"How was church tonight?" Abigail asked as she sat down on one of the stools at the island.

"You don't want to know," Manley said taking a huge bite out of his sandwich.

"But I already know," Abigail said waving her phone. "The love of money..." She shook her head.

"What?" I asked.

"You're saying Pastor Johnny is doing this for money?" Manley said. "Why?"

Abigail nodded. "He's going to star -- if you can call it that -- in a new reality show called Life After God." She tapped a few buttons on her phone screen and slid it to the middle of the island. "See here. It says, 'Oxygen's new religion-focused reality docu-drama will chronicle the lives of four average Americans who make the decision to leave organized religion and pursue spirituality without structure -- or no spirituality at all. The show will focus on the lives of a Baltimore pastor, Johnny Dunmore, who plans to reveal to his church that he no longer believes in God; a Florida college student, Tamela Walbrind, who abandons her faith after her college studies led her to question her beliefs; a millionaire Wall Street broker, Jacob Lehman, who left his Amish community to pursue worldly success; and Georgia school teacher, Sharmon Sharpe, who was branded an apostate by his Imam and barred from attending his mosque after undergoing a sex change operation.'"

"Quite a cast," Manley said.

"You guys really think he's doing this for money?" I asked.

"I'm just saying it's convenient timing," Abigail said. "Johnny's been pastoring for twenty-four years. Maybe he had a real crisis of faith or something, but you don't just give up on something you believe in like that." She snapped her fingers.

"He said he was writing about it on his blog," I said.

"I guess you're going to say someone should have seen it coming," Manley said. He shrugged. "We'll see what Pastor Taylor says tomorrow."

I nodded, yawning. "Whatever the case, as you can imagine, this was not what I was expecting to hear my first time at church. I'm still trying to wrap my head around it."