Leaning on the Everlasting

It is only an ice bath, but none of your parishioners ever describe it that way. They never mention the cold at all. Words like freezing or frigid or icy never escape their cerulean, trembling lips. They never recount any tingling or numbing in their pallid hands and feet, constricted like frozen amethyst in the aftermath.

Instead, they articulate the pain. The stabbing of many knives as the body meets the water, displacing thick clumps of ice, clinking against the tub’s steel walls. The sharpness of their last gasping breath, scorching the lungs as your bony fingers press their face underneath. The scalding of thousands of microscopic needles across every millimeter of exposed skin, as you hold them; fitfully, wholly submerged. The pain comes first, and it lingers in the mind long after the ritual is complete.

You repurpose the pain. What doctors refer to as the cold shock response, you call “the fire of the Holy Spirit purging the body of sin.” The skeptical and faithless recognize the gimmick for what it is, but you do not work with infidels. Yours are the credulous, yearning to be saved. They have made you rich.

Moments ago, you checked the bath in the rectory during the final musical interlude. Your staff know the proportions never vary: Fifty-five gallons of cold tap water and twenty-one bags of ice. Thirty-two degrees, full to the brim.

“It is supposed to hurt,” you tell the girl, after you’ve lifted her out.

The girl’s mother and several church attendants are doting over her and drying her with warm towels. Gloria brings her a white silk robe, adorned across the back with your name in gold calligraphy – Charlie Kingston Ministries. Off-stage, an EMT crew looks on, just in case. There’s been an accident or two over the years. Sometimes, the Spirit just won’t take.

The doting attendants make way, and you kneel before the girl, making sure your face is close enough to hers for your mic and the zoom lens to capture you both.

“Sweet Jessica, Child of God, the pain is your tangible assurance that you are forgiven and have received everlasting life. When I immersed you in the arctic water, He came to you with the Holy Spirit. When I held you under the ice, He baptized you in fire. Did you feel the fire?”

“Yes! Reverend Charlie . . . I felt . . . the fire!”

Her words are broken by convulsive sobs and frantic, involuntary gulps at the air, as if she remains submersed.

“I . . . I feel it still! The S-s-s-spirit moves in me now!”

You see the pulse racing in her neck. Exaltation is sometimes indistinguishable from desperation.

“And you are forever with Christ, my child. Now go with Gloria and your momma to the recovery room. I’ll be after you all in a moment.”

The girl is young for the ritual. Seventeen. Probably no more than ninety-five pounds. Her tiny frame made the experience harder for her than most. The State does not allow you to perform it on anyone under sixteen, and even then, only if a parent signs the waiver. If it weren’t a matter of faith, the government wouldn’t allow it at all.

You didn’t hold Jessica under as long as you typically would. Fifteen seconds, this time, rather than the customary twenty. Fifteen seconds is a long time for a child’s body to tell her that she is freezing and drowning.

The old church was not fond of the practice. Decades ago, they tried to stop you, claiming that ice water baptisms, along with the rest of your sermons and methods, were too unorthodox and dangerous. You left them behind. Now, the new conference – your conference – celebrates the ritual. Kingston Ministries is worth over half a billion dollars, if you include all its affiliates and subsidiaries. And it’s yours.

Well, yours and Gloria’s. Behind every successful televangelist is a strong, cunning woman. You, the Good Reverend Doctor Charles Kingston, would not be who you are without Mrs. Gloria Kingston (née Sterling) by your side.  Like you, Gloria stopped believing some fifty years ago, in her early twenties. But in your growing, collective doubt, she saw opportunity. When you wanted to drop out of the seminary, she convinced you to stay.

“You have a knack for this, Charlie. People like you, and you're charismatic. They want to follow you.”

Then, the words that assuaged all doubt.

“And there’s money to be made.”

--

You return to the pulpit. The congregation, twelve-thousand strong this Sunday, stir nervously in an arena more fit for a rock concert than a Baptist service. They know this is the part where they are called to action. The cameras represent maybe two million more watching from nursing homes and hospital beds and living rooms around the country. Before following the girl and Gloria off stage, you close with your customary call and response from Acts Chapter 2, Verse 38.

“Repent and be baptized, every one of you, in the name of Jesus Christ, for the forgiveness of your sins.”

Twelve thousand voices respond in unison. “And I will receive the gift of the Holy Spirt.”

You face the camera, palms open. “The promise is for you and your children and for all who are far off.”

They finish the refrain. "For all whom the Lord our God will call."

And then comes the call. To the thousands in the arena and the millions watching from home, you invite them one and all to walk forward to the altar. For those not present, a 1-800 number flashes on the screen, so that they, too, can arrange to be baptized by ice and fire like young Jessica was today. Even the already saved are invited to rededicate their lives by undergoing the ritual and experiencing a new kind of spiritual awakening.

What you never say on the broadcast, but believers later learn, is that a tithe must be paid before one is eligible for baptism. Forgiveness is never free. It demands a sacrifice. The Good Book establishes the importance of tithing in Leviticus and Deuteronomy, well before the savior appears.

Jessica’s family donated $10,000 to Kingston Ministries for the privilege of having your crusty, liver-spotted hands dunk their little girl into an ice bath for fifteen seconds.

--

It is the morning after Jessica’s baptism. You and Gloria will soon be taking the new Gulfstream G500 to Wisconsin to see about expanding Kingston Ministries in the north. A TV pastor there may be losing his flock amid allegations of sexual assault. The congregation will need a new home with a charismatic leader to shepherd their tithes. Gloria thinks you’re a good fit. You agree.

Your mind awakens as usual. You feel the cashmere mattress underneath your back, and the breeze from the overhead fan on your face. Instinctively, you reach for Gloria, but your arm will not rise from the sateen sheet. You try to call her name, but you cannot summon the breath to your lips. Even your eyelids fail to respond to your silent command. - Open! - But they remain shut. You hear her soft breathing next to you.

Finally, mercifully, she begins to stir. Her movements are slow at first – Gloria always has a groggy start – then suddenly frantic. Something is wrong.

“Charlie! Charlie!” You feel her shaking you. You want to tell her, Gloria, get a doctor, I feel okay, but I can’t move anything.

You hear her feet thud on the floor, then the pitter-patter down the stairs. She calls for the criada.

“Lupe, call 911! Something’s wrong with Charlie, he’s not waking up!”

But I am awake! I just can’t move or speak.

--

You hear the bustle of the paramedics surrounding your bed. Gloria and Lupe are whimpering behind them. Two fingers press to your wrist. A pause. Then to your neck. Another pause. Your head is tilted back, your jaw thrust open. You taste the nitrile as the paramedic compresses your tongue and sweeps your throat. You want to gag, to vomit, to scream.

You do nothing. Your left eye is forced open and a light flashes. For the briefest moment, you see the paramedic’s face, young and clean-shaven and stern. You recognize him, but from where? He appears again over your right eye, and you remember. He was at the baptism yesterday, just off-stage. The light flashes again, and he’s gone.

Your shirt is cut open, and two metal pads are pressed against your chest.

“Clear!”

The shock jolts you, your back lifts from the bed and for an instant you feel yourself suspended, levitating. You hope this restores your body to your mind.

“Clear!”

They jostle you again. And again. Each time you lay back to rest, silent and still.

One of the paramedics speaks, “I’m sorry, Misses Kingston, there’s nothing we can do. We have to call law enforcement and the coroner now. They’ll be here soon.”

“Okay,” Gloria says, “thank you for trying.”

She has regained her composure quickly. Almost too quickly.

“I have to make some calls. We don’t have much time.”

Time for what, Gloria?

Then you remember.

 No! Gloria, No! Do not call them. Wait for this to pass. I am not dead. Do not call them!

But you know she is going to call.

--

Your son arrives as the coroner is finishing up. Your daughter and her husband are a few minutes behind. They had to wrangle the grandkids. As best you can tell, only your family is in the room with you now. They begin to sing the hymn you favored for every funeral:

What a fellowship, what a joy divine. Leaning on the everlasting.

What a blessedness, what a peace is mine. Leaning on the everlasting.

What have I to dread, what have I to fear. Leaning on the everlasting.

I have blessed peace with my Lord so near. Leaning on the everlasting.

--

They say their goodbyes, and the dread consumes you. You know what’s coming next. Knowing makes it worse.

It must have been five years ago when Gloria first broached the topic of cryogenics. It seemed logical to you at the time. Neither of you believed any longer in the religious concept of the afterlife. If there is no soul, why not preserve the body and brain indefinitely until the scientists can figure the rest out? It was $250,000 a piece, but that was a drop in the bucket. What did either of you have to lose?

Within the hour, the cryonics team arrives to your home. You hear Gloria direct them to the bedroom. They shuffle in and you imagine them in white lab coats, or more likely blue scrubs, mundanely preparing another body for preservation. You rack your brain to try to remember the procedure, to prepare yourself for what’s about to happen.

A board slides underneath your back. It feels like wood, but you know it must be plastic. A gurney with a mattress would be more comfortable. Your body rises into the air. The men, there must be at least four of them, carry you gently down the hall and the stairwell, angling you feet-first out the French doors, then down the front steps. You feel your body rotate in mid-air and slide forward. A car door slams behind you.

The vehicle is moving now. One of the men inserts a needle into the vein in your left hand. The substance is cool at first, then warmer. This must be to simulate circulation.

You imagine you are riding in a black van, windows tinted. Or maybe it’s more akin to an ambulance, white with orange striping. How could you know? An hour passes. Then another. The engine finally cuts. The driver’s door opens and shuts. You feel yourself being lifted again, then placed on a stretcher of some kind. You are outside and rolling. The sun warms your face for the last time.

A new voice, a deep baritone, speaks with urgency and authority.

“It’s been over two hours. We’ve got to get him cooled to begin perfusion. Get him into the bath! Quickly now guys!”

A series of beeps is followed by the sound of sliding doors skidding open. Suddenly, you are lifted again. In a hurried instant, your remaining clothes are cut from your body.

The solution hits your back like a million blades. You never went through the ritual baptism yourself. Is this what it felt like? You never imagined cold could hurt like this. A million needles prick your skin with frozen fire. This must be something colder than ice water. You remember how your parishioners often struggled against the force of your arms, holding them under.

Your body is lifted violently from the solution, and again you feel needles, real needles, (you think) puncture the cubital veins of each forearm. From the tube in your right arm, you sense a sucking sensation. You remember this part. They are taking your blood. On your left side the sensation is reversed. The solution creeps up the inside of your arm, then into your chest, then everywhere. Is this perfusion? Is that the word the scientist used? You can’t remember. It hurts. This isn’t supposed to hurt. You aren’t supposed to feel this at all.

The needles are plucked from your arms. The authoritative voice is back.

“Good job guys, I think we’re safe now. Get him ready for deep cooling.”

“Who was he, anyways?” one of the men closer to you asks.

“One of those shyster preachers who bilks folks for money on TV. Real son of a bitch. Rich as hell, though.”

“Huh,” the man on your right muses, “don’t see many preachers in our line of work. Must not have practiced what he preached.”

You wish you had practiced what you preached. You wish you’d undergone the ritual baptism yourself. That now seems like a better insurance policy than this one. You wish you had talked Gloria out of her crisis of faith, rather than letting her talk you into your own. You wish you hadn’t paid for this damned cryogenic preservation nonsense.

The baritone is back. “Alright, guys, we’re at negative three-twenty, let’s commence the deep cooling.”

You’re lowered again for the final plunge. Is it liquid helium, or liquid nitrogen? You can’t remember.

This time, when the solution hits your back, there are no metaphors that suffice. No descriptors are adequate to express the pain. It would kill you instantly if you were not already dead. But it continues, unceasing, outside and in. You cannot move. You cannot wake. You cannot sleep. You are suspended in this vat, your own personal freezing lake of fire, until…

--

You lose track of time. Once in a while (Is it every month? Year? Decade?) the solution in your vat is refilled. It only hurts a little more than usual, and everything always hurts. You don’t know anything but the pain. You try to think of Gloria, of your children, of prayers and scriptures and hymns that once flowed so freely from your charlatan crimson lips. But the pain interrupts every thought. So, you hurt and you wait. You beg the god you betrayed for forgiveness and an ending. But revival does not come.

~~