The Turbulent Life of One of America’s Last Snake-Handling Preachers

My favorite quote:

At one point, a young church member, a mountain of a man who just a few weeks ago preached against the theory of evolution — “I ain’t come from no monkey,” he said — reaches for the jar of strychnine. He takes a sip.

>So when someone goes down and the police want to know who brought the offending snakes or jar of poison, just shrug and say, “pastor’s privilege.” That, Jamie said, should be enough to get the police to leave you alone.

Very interesting to read further .. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Priest%E2%80%93penitent_privil...

The part of the Gospel of Mark that says one can handle snakes is widely regarded as a later addition. Modern Bibles tend to indicate its dubious status by enclosing it in [[brackets]].

The Serpent King by Jeff Zentner, is a great book on how this effects the lives of kids growing up in that cult.https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/22752127-the-serpent-kin...

A pastor I know put it best:

Yes, there are churches that believe in snake-handling. Statistically, those churches are not growing.

These churches pop up in the news every now and then, but somehow after a while, they all die out.

gotta hand it to 'em for their literal interpretation

Film idea: a young Indiana Jones and Samuel L Jackson's character from Snakes on a Plane attend a church like this as teenagers.

Anyone else got goosebumps?