Pure: Inside the Evangelical Movement That Shamed a Generation of Young Women and How I Broke Free

by Linda Kay Klein

I gathered up my broken body. There on the floor, with no one paying attention to me, I uncovered those parts of me that I had tried to hide or make small. And I watched, amazed, as these parts of me unfurled—some gorgeous, some terrifying, and others plain. From time to time, I felt something I thought I had lost—a holy presence, the feeling someone was watching out for me. In time, I came to trust, to know, that God was still with me. That God was in the hand, yes. But also here . . . and here . . . and here. That no hand can confine something so great. Today, I am a Christian, but I stand outside of the hand I grew up in. Waving to those in it and saying, “It is good in the hand. God is there. And s/he is also here. So let’s come together to end the shame that hurts all of us. For there is much work to be done.”