Thank you's to reporters Emily Hamer and Tim Steller for writing Twisted Message, their series about and expose of autocratic church leaders still powerful in Tucson and elsewhere today. I hope you get the Pulitzer. This work deserves an award for outstanding public service and achievement in journalism.
It's an old story but still a new story, the abuse of children and women who don't comply with churches preaching condemnation for not submitting to a pastor's "voice of God." I knew it would be upsetting to read. I was raised Catholic and remember humiliation as a female in an institution that called itself mother. Some stories of people raised in churches like Golden Dawn hit home. I'm grateful I didn't experience the horrifying abuse of fringe sects based on Message.
The typography of Twisted Message — a crucifix replacing a "t" in "Twisted" — sums up the series. Immorality in the name of religion is what sin is all about. Twisted Message may help some avoid the seductive promises of predators.
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Sherry Machen
Green Valley
Disclaimer: As submitted to the Arizona Daily Star.
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