I believed Zach’s assessment, because in the months before I left Westboro, my grandfather had been one of the few men in the church who was encouraging more kindness, gentleness, and compassion. Only by pride cometh contention, the verse said, and after the new elders took over, Gramps had quoted and paraphrased it often. “If there is no pride, there will be no contention,” he intoned. “Where there is great humility, there will be no contention.” As if he were trying to reform the beast he had created.
