To my old church friends from Immanuel,
I hope this finds you well. I’m writing this open letter because I’ve written a book called Immanuel. It’s in part about SCOAN, and in part about Immanuel church, but really it’s about everything else as well, a meandering exploration of community, faith, doubt, evangelical Christianity, Nigerian Pentecostalism, the psychology of cults, and some other stuff. However, my reflections on my childhood and youth in Immanuel church do take a fairly central place in the book, a fact that some of you might be curious about, and possibly confused or alarmed by.
I’m not writing this letter to plug the book (though I think it's good, and will be shamelessly plugging it over the next few months). I'm writing because I'm aware that the existence of this book will be painful for some. I can understand how some might reasonably question my motivation for writing it. It’s hard to properly account for this, since I began writing it over six years ago and it’s difficult to remember exactly why I started. But I hope it is clear to anyone who reads the book that it comes from a place of love and bewilderment, not axe-grinding or resentment (ok, there is a little bit of anger in with the mix, but this is towards ideologies rather than individuals). The energy that drove me to write something came from two contradictory truths, both of which became apparent to me about a decade ago.
The first was this: there were certain teachings promoted in Immanuel
church that had a direct influence on a number of church members going to Lagos to
serve TB Joshua, whose disciple community turned out to be a cult-like organization in which sexual abuse,
violence, and extreme psychological manipulation were commonplace.
The second was this: I missed Immanuel church, and this
feeling was growing as I got older. Many of my memories were fond ones.
It gave me a sense of community and purpose that I have never found (to the
same extent) in my secular life since.
If I resented Immanuel and saw my leaving evangelical
Christianity as a straightforward liberation, there would have been no book to
write, or at least it wouldn’t have held my (or anyone else’s) interest for
long. If Immanuel had not got involved with TB Joshua, and if his church had
not been so abusive, there would have also been no book to write. I would have been
happy to not write a book - not writing a book is something I’d recommend to
anyone. But the contradiction fascinated
me. It seemed to me that the story of Immanuel, and the subsequent journey of
the Immanuelites who became SCOAN disciples, encompassed the worst and the best
potential of religion. How to untangle the good from the bad?
Of course, I could have opted to pursue these questions
in a less public way. Part of my motivation for writing was to publicize the
ongoing abuse and deception carried out by TB Joshua (whom I didn’t expect to
die so soon). I also wanted to
publicly name and acknowledge some of the messed-up teachings that took hold in
Immanuel, and countless other churches – particularly around healing – and
write about them in a way that didn’t disdain or ridicule faith altogether. I can’t pretend that my aims were entirely noble or altruistic. Ultimately, I
thought this would be a really good book. The stories of disciples were
gripping, strange, and tragic. There was beauty and tragedy in the Immanuel
story too.
Of course, nobody is under any obligation to read the book, but I'm aware that in writing it, I may be reopening old wounds for some people. Though the story I tell encompasses various perspectives, it is partial and incomplete. Your own experiences may be different. In researching the book, I reached out to a number of ex-Immanuelites - most were happy to speak, a few weren't - but there were many more I didn't contact. This was ultimately about time: the project has had to fit around work and family commitments and I've had a lot of material to wrangle. I’m also writing from a broadly secular perspective, and many of you will have different views on the topics I cover.
I have changed most names to protect people’s privacy or safety (a few real names remain, where there was no particular justification for changing them). Despite all this, the fact remains: I am making public a story that is intimately painful for some. I’ve thought about this a lot over the years, and I honestly still don’t know how the ethical balance sheet works out. Maybe there isn’t a balance sheet. I entirely understand if you conclude that I shouldn’t have written it. But this book was something I felt that I needed to write. As well as being a book about young people drawn into extreme religion, it is a memoir of some of the formative events of my own life. Its themes, I hope, resonate beyond Immanuel and SCOAN, beyond Christianity and faith. I hope it provides solace for some, as well as fruitful provocation. I hope it sparks good conversations. (If you want to buy it, it's available in the usual bookshops, as well as on kindle, but it would be even better if you get it straight from Fitzcarraldo Editions).
Speaking of conversations, in the preface of the book, I reflect
on the sense of connection and warmth I got when talking to old Immanuelites: “…meeting
old church friends always feels different from, say, meeting friends from
school. I ask after their families, and their names – ‘How’s Phil?’ ‘What’s
Anna doing these days?’ – work a kind of spell that brings Immanuel fleetingly
to life again.” The problem is this: having written the book, I'm now doomed to find every conversation with old church friends awkward. Still, there
are worse things than awkwardness, and no therapy like exposure therapy, and in any case it would be genuinely good to hear from old Immanuelites, whether it's just to catch up, or to talk about the book, whatever your response to it is. Do get in touch - my email address is on the sidebar.
Yours sincerely,
Matthew
PS- I'm currently in the painful phase of publishing in which I'm catching small factual errors in the book that evaded my attention in the multiple proof-reads. I got an important date badly wrong at the end of p132 (2006 should read 2003) which is corrected in the kindle version, but it's too late for the first print run. I also spelt Roberts Liardon's name wrong, which sucks but I can live with it. Hope there are not too many errors lurking, but please forgive any slips, and let me know if you find any egregious ones.
PPS- On a nicer note, the beautiful image above is a watercolour by Jon McNaught, painted especially for the book's release - I hope it transports you back to the Assembly Room as it did me.
