Ginny covered her face with her hands, and Ruth crouched beside her, patting the young woman’s hair. “Then what, Ginny? You can tell us. We’re here for you.”
Ginny removed her hands and wiped at her face with the hem of her shift. “One night, I had a troubling dream. There were a lot of images I couldn’t interpret, but by studying the doctrine, I came to understand. God wanted me to stop my sinning. He was telling me that I needed to purify in time for my consecration. He said if I continued to sin, the call would never come, and I would be cast out of his protection. I was scared, but I didn’t heed him. I continued my evil ways. The sin was too strong in me.”
“And then what?” Ruth prompted.
Ginny scanned the room, gravely meeting the eyes of the trembling campers before continuing. “That very night, a councilman came to our door to tell us my brother was dead.” Sniffles and stifled sobs broke out around the circle. Gabi winced at the counselor’s grief, but no part of her believed that Ginny’s brother died because she fooled around with some guy after school. When she turned to look at Marnie, the girl had a hand cupped over her eyes and was rolling them in disdain. Ruth gave Ginny a final squeeze and moved toward the objects arranged at the center of the circle.
“Thank you, Ginny. Your testimony is the best possible example of the wages of sin. We are so glad you purified and found your way back to us.” Ruth squatted and picked up the knife, holding the blade over the candle flame. “Now it’s time for each of you to come forward, confess your sins, and be purified, so that you, too, may be worthy to serve. If you have any doubts about what you risk by withholding your full confession, you have only to remember Ginny and the terrible toll impurity took on her life.”
Gabi didn’t like the look of that knife. She knew from studying for the Witness exams with Mathew that heat was one way to sterilize a blade or needle in an emergency. Unless you wanted to kill someone with infection, it was important to have a sterile blade before making a cut.
One at a time, Ruth called a camper into the circle. Ginny or Christina escorted the girl to where Ruth sat and guided her down to the floor. After a short prayer asking for God’s blessing, each girl was then asked to admit to her impurities. The first girl to go was the quiet one beside Gabi. When she finished, Ruth took her hand and pressed the blade into the girl’s palm, making a small cut. Then she instructed the girl to dip her finger in salt and rub it into the wound, reciting, “I confess to my God and to my sisters my most grievous sins. As Jesus drove the evil moneylenders from his temple, so I cast out all impurities in accordance with the Will, amen.”
At the first touch of salt, the girl yelped in pain and would have jerked away if Ruth hadn’t gripped her hand while Ginny pressed her salty finger back into the wound. Afterward Ruth daubed water from the bowl between the girl’s eyebrows in blessing and asked Ginny to escort her to the bathroom where she would take a hot shower, scrubbing with more salt, before donning her cotton shift and returning to the circle.
The confessed sins all sounded pretty similar. There was some lustful thinking, some speaking of untruths, some unsupervised flirting and illicit handholding. Nobody was judged for having sins to confess. In fact, the more things a girl admitted to, the more pleased Ruth looked, and the more she praised the camper’s commitment to true purity. Gabi kept it pretty general—keeping secrets was definitely on the list. The salt burned all the way up her arm, but it was over as soon as she stepped under the wonderfully hot spray of the shower. Gabi could have stayed in there forever. Too soon Christina thrust a towel and white shift into Gabi’s stall and cleared her throat.
Marnie was the last to be called as the watery gray light of dawn began to reach its tentacles across the floorboards. Ruth waited until the last girl emerged from the bathroom, rosy from her shower and scrub, before opening Marnie’s ritual with the blessing. “Now repeat after me, Marian,” Ruth instructed. “As Jesus drove the corrupt moneylenders from the temple, so I cast out all impurities in accordance with the Will.” Even from a distance, Gabi could see Marnie’s eyes flare as she pulled her shoulders back and repeated the sentence through gritted teeth. Ruth continued. “In my weakness and impurity I am unworthy to serve God….” She waited for Marnie to repeat the phrase, but Marnie’s jaw locked tight and she was glaring darts at Ruth. “Go ahead, Marian,” Ruth urged. “In my weakness and impurity, I am unworthy to serve God.”
Marnie remained mute. Silence yawned. Ruth sighed and laid a sympathetic hand on Marnie’s knee. “Oh, Marian, I know it’s hard. Sometimes the sin worms its way so far into your heart that you mistake it for truth. That is the skill of the serpent.”
“I haven’t sinned,” Marnie seethed, each word a hammered nail. Ruth’s expression remained placid as she removed her hand from Marnie’s knee and looked around the room.
“Marian is struggling, my sisters. Can you see what a hold the serpent has on
