Wild Goose Chase 3

The vicar of the Anglican Church in Piddledon knocked on the door of the farmhouse.  Pastor Boris opened the door.
"I've heard that Christians in Piddledon have started to live together on your farm.  Why is this?"
"If you love your brothers and sisters in Christ, where does that leave you?" asked Boris.
"Shaking hands with eachother on a Sunday morning, not living under one roof."  The vicar had a large bag with him.
"What have you got in your bag?" asked Boris.
"A flask of coffee, some sandwiches and a banana.  I'm spending a day here.  I've come to investigate."
"We would have been happy to provide you with lunch and coffee."
"Your wife was a nurse.  Goodness knows what kind of tranquillisers she puts in the food."  The vicar sat down at the large kitchen table which filled most of the room.  He poured himself a cup of coffee out of his own flask into his own sour tasting plastic cup.  He was sure there was LSD sprinkled inside the attractive mugs that were standing on the bench at the side of the kitchen. 

 

Debbie sat talking to Galina on the opposite side of the table.
"What would my responsibilities be if I joined the church?" asked Debbie.
"We won't be able to tell you what responsibilities you will have until you have joined the church," said Galina.
"Who would be responsible for my pastoral care?"
"We won't be able to tell you who your Caring Shepherd will be until you have joined the church."
"That's really boring.  Does anybody ever join your church?"
"You have to join the church or you will be used by the enemy.  I will also need to know what your husband thinks of you joining the church."
"I need to ask my husband's permission?"
"It's a big commitment.  Pastor Boris requires you and everything that is yours.  To have taken you on if you were married to someone who wasn't a member of this church would be unwise.  It would be a tremendous commitment to you and you'd get absolutely no help from him.  You would inevitably break your vows."
"But Tony's a Christian as well."
"But Debbie, your husband lives in the world.  He has a mortgage on the house, he owns his own car, he does a wordly job.  He is a second class Christian.  He may not appreciate you wanting to sell the house and the car and live here.  Most Christians are totally compromised.  They love money." 

 

A loud cry came from the dining room.
"Who bought these bananas?" yelled Pastor Boris.  "I have told you what I think of bananas.  They are the devil's food."
"But why?" asked Debbie.
"Bananas are a luxury that some people in this world can not afford," said Galina.  "We prefer the fruit bowl to be filled with fruit we have picked from our own farm.  Then we will have plenty of money to help the poor."
"What's this?  Peanut butter," came another shout from Pastor Boris.
"Put cheap margarine on your toast," said Galina, "it's only £1 for a big tub, and it's healthy."
"I'm sorry," said Debbie.  "I bought the bananas and the peanut butter.  I really didn't know you had such strict rules."

In the late afternoon Sarah saw Pastor Boris making himself a snack in the kitchen.
"What is this?" she asked.  "Pastor Judas.  I feel hurt and betrayed.  How could you?  How could you make yourself  peanut butter and bananas on toast?"
"Sister Debbie bought the peanut butter and bananas as a gift for us, in ignorance, she didn't know the rules.  In a world where two thirds of people are starving, surely it would be an even greater sin to throw good food away."
"Why didn't you give them back to Debbie?"
"She is not yet one of the community.  It would not have been good to feed her addiction to material things."

 

That night the vicar went to the police station.
"I have visited the Christians on Piddledon Farm.  They brainwash people."
"What do you mean, they brainwash people?" asked the desk sergeant.
"She's a nurse.  She has tranquillisers in little plastic capsules.  She pulls the two halves of the capsule apart and, inside, is a white powder that can be hidden in the sugar and the flour."
"Have you ever seen these tranquillisers?"
"No, but I'm sure they exist.  She injects the bananas with pethidene."
"I thought they weren't allowed to have bananas."
"She told a woman that she had to join the church or she would be used by the enemy, but that she had to ask her husband's permission."
"Ask her husband's permission?" said the policeman.  "That is weird."

 

Debbie waited in the kitchen for Tony to arrive home from work.  His querky Chevrolet mini car pulled up outside their house.  Tony came into the kitchen and picked up a jar of coffee.
"Tony, I need to discuss something very important."
"All right," he said, "what about?"
"Should we join the church on Piddledon Farm?"
"I thought we already had."
"We're not proper members.  Tony, if we really want to belong to the church, we have to live there."
"Live there?  We'd have to sell the house.  We've only just moved here."
"Tony, we need to be baptised, we need to make covenant and we need to sell the house."
"What's covenant?"
"It's an eternal vow the Christians at Piddledon Farm make to be faithful to eachother."
"How is it an eternal vow?"
"They have to make a will, and when they die their bodies are going to be buried side by side in the farm's own cemetery."
"Wow Debbie, the marriage vow is only til death us do part.  It sounds like these Christians want to be together for longer than that.  Are they going to hold hands in Heaven?"
"How do you feel about these things, Tony?  Do you find them exciting?"
"Can I just think about it for a few days.  I really don't know, this is all very sudden."  Tony finished making himself a cup of coffee and sat down with it in the living room.

 

On Saturday night Tony and Debbie went to have tea with Pastor Boris and the other Christians at the farm.  Tea was an economical affair but not unpleasant, a thick vegetable soup served with bread with cheap olive margarine and apples.
"We're going to have a baptism meeting tonight," said Boris.  "Tonight six new people are coming into God's kingdom."  When they had all finished their meal, the Christians followed Boris across the fields for half a mile until they came to a brook.  A man was wearing old trousers and a shirt that had a ragged collar.
"Pastor," he said to Boris, "before you baptise me, will you please take my wallet, my car keys and my mobile phone."
"I certainly will," said Pastor Boris, taking all these things and putting them in a zip up bag that his wife was wearing around her shoulders.  Tony wondered if the man would ever get these things back again.  Pastor David and Pastor Boris led the man down into the brook, where they stood in the water.
"I do so make covenant with Pastor Boris and his church," shouted the man.   "I lay down all my worldly goods and put them at the farm gate.  Never shall I betray.   When I die, I shall be buried side by side with the Piddledon believers."  The two pastors took ahold of the man and pulled him under the water.  He stood up again.  Debbie turned to Tony.
"Will you ever do that?" she asked quietly, her lips almost touching his cheek.
"Why?" asked Tony.
"Because I would love to."

 

The next Friday night there was a prayer meeting.  The Christians prayed together in tongues loudly for several minutes.  They were all mature adults.  They were all doing it the English way.  Matthew had finally succumbed to the pressure to conform to the habits of other worshippers, at least for one meeting.
"Oh Lord," said Pastor David.  "Call people to community.  Let them see it is the best way.  Call someone this very hour."
At that moment, a man in London lay down with his tablet computer on the lower bunk of a bed, in a room which reminded him of the prison cells he had seen on television, but which still had a good wi-fi signal.  He searched for a Christian community on a farm in England.  He came across the website Pastor David had created.
"The Truth About the Gospel," the title said at the top of the page, in big, menacing red letters.  Underneath, in equally terrifying gold letters, were links to the following pages:
"(1) Why Are the Other Churches in the UK not Like Us?  (2) The Love of Money - Why No One Tries to Fight It.  (3) Why You Won't Make It In the Christian Life Without Heavy Shepherding.  (4) Backslidden Christians - Worse Than Hellbound Sinners.  (5) Can Salvation Be Lost?  (6) Jesus Loves You, God Loves You and We All Love You.  (7) Come and Visit Our Farm."
"I'm feeling the call to live in Christian community," Barry said to his friend on the top bunk.
"Where is this Christian community?" asked George.  "Don't say you're going to become a monk?"
"No.  It's a modern kind of community.  I want to join some Christians living on a farm.  It must be better than living here."
"What?  Live with a load of religious nutcases?  I'd rather have a minimum wage job in London."
"My employer doesn't even pay me the minimum wage," said Barry.
"How's that then?  I thought it was the law.  They have to."
"I work for a window cleaner.  The job is supposed to equal the minimum wage with commission, but I've never earned any commission."
"Aren't you very good at cleaning windows?"
"I don't clean the windows, I work in the office.  I email people to ask them if they want their windows cleaned again.  If they say yes, I get paid commission."

 

Barry had discovered a way of making sandwiches that was useful for people who had no kitchen and couldn't afford take aways.  In the railway station there were some seats in a covered area.  It was quiet there during the evening.  Barry sat down and threw a sheet of newspaper over one of the other chairs.  On the newspaper he put 2 small slices of wholemeal bread.  He pulled the ring pull and opened a tin of pilchards.  He used a knife to remove the pilchards from the tin and spread them on the slices of bread.  Then Barry put 2 more slices of bread on top.  2 small square sandwiches made with healthy wholemeal bread for only 75p.  Barry finished eating the sandwiches and then opened a flask.  He poured the coffee into a large mug he carried, hating the taste of the tiny plastic cup that sits on top of a thermosflask.  The room he lived in had enough room for a small wardrobe, of which Barry was entitled to half, a kettle, a jar of coffee and a tub of coffee whitener.  There was no room for any cooking appliances.  When Barry had finished his coffee he walked to the public telephone box.  It was after six.  He had a mobile phone but the call box was cheaper long distance.  He would phone his mother, and get half an hour for £1.
"Hi Mum."
"Hi Barry.  Any news?"
"I'm going to join a group of Christians living on a farm."
"You're going to do what?"
"I want to live in a Christian community on a farm."  Mother made a noise that made Barry think she would have been so much happier if he had just informed her that he had cancer.
"Where is this farm?"
"In Piddledon, in the south west, somewhere."
"Do you even know these people?"
"I could go there and visit them first, don't want to sign my life away, I'll spend a week there."
"Just you make sure that you never sign your life away to these people.  It's called Love Bombing.  The Moonies used to do it."
"Who were the Moonies, Mum?"
"In the 1970s.  Followers of the Reverend Moon.  They brainwashed people.  They called it Love Bombing.  You go there for a week and you fall in love with them.  You want to live with them for the rest of your life.  Then they say, yes, you can live with us for the rest of your life, but you have to give us all your money."
"What money?  Mum, I live in the centre of London and I earn £200 a week.  I'm no better off than I was on the dole."
"You were hoping for a better job.  Get a few more years experience and you could earn twice as much money."
"Yes, and then I'll be able to live in a spare bedroom somewhere and have my own microwave oven.  At least I'll be able to afford oven ready meals from Marks and Spencers.  What a great future I've got.  Even if these people did try to rob me of everything I own, I'd probably be better off living and working with them on a farm."

 

Pastor Boris sat down in the lounge at the farmhouse with Tony and Debbie and another middle aged couple.
"Tony and Debbie, let me introduce you to Tom and Brenda.  They're your Caring Shepherds."  Tom had a little black notebook in his hand.  He smiled at Tony with a huge Blairite grin.
"Tony, do you show affection to your wife frequently?"
"Yes."
"I think it's good to show affection to your wife.  The Bible says, 'Do not deprive yourselves, only for a short time, and only to devote yourselves to prayer.'  When you show affection to your wife, can you write it down for me in this little black book?"
"We might be able to give you some advice," said Brenda, pulling out a book that she had been hiding in a brown paper bag.  The book was a huge hard back, with a bright red cover and a black border and a title in black letters that contrasted harshly with the cover and hurt the eyes.  It was called 'The Truth About Marriage and Sexual Relations.'