Muriel had calculated all of her life decisions around the equation that if she was pure, God would bless her. She would be gifted with a loving, romantic, sexual marriage. She would be kept safe in a strong, supportive, always-there-for-her religious community. “I was not one of those 99 percent faith, a little bit of question, people,” she insisted. “I was 100 percent: I will be pure; I will believe; I won’t crack.” But when the purity and community equations proved to be bad math, everything “just crumbled.” How could she believe anything evangelicalism taught her if the one thing they said
...more

