Pentecostal hoedown. Every Sunday and Wednesday at Faith Chapel.

There wasn't really any snake handling at the church I was forced to go to when I was a kid. But there was a shitload of faith healing, speaking in tongues, falling out in the spirit and all kinds of hilljack hollering and crying and carrying on. When it really got cooking I would stand or sit back and watch the spectacle. For the first few years of my life it disturbed the shit out of me. Then I picked up on the fact that if I viewed it as entertainment and not some real shit then it would be a lot easier to take. That's when I often almost got in trouble because I would have to stifle so much laughter at these morons running around yelling and screaming for Jesus to swing down low enough to smite the fuck out of them with the fire of the Holy Ghost and send them off into "falling out in the spirit" land. Which could mean anything from frenzied boogying around or keeling over on the ground undulating and groaning for Christ. I am not even making this up. My youngest sister came and grabbed me once when we were really young and took me to where Joanne Dukes (wife of Plunky Shade Dukes) was down for the count between pews. She pointed at her and said, Look she's dead. So, it was fun too. Never any snakes or poison drinking though. I would have loved that. There were burnt offerings once. People wrote on pieces of paper what it was they wanted god to pull off for them that week and put it in the flame of this torch like contraption that was up at the altar. It was odd and sort of witchy and I couldn't figure out what the fuck it had to do with bible shit. But what the fuck did I know? I was 7 and freaked out by all of it.