“God’s Battered Child”
April Lorier is the founder of C.O.P.E., a non-profit organization formed for the retraining of abusive and neglectful parents and also for public education. Her testimony before the California State Legislature helped to promote the enactment of the Mandatory Child Abuse and Neglect Reporting Law in 1974. Her book, “God’s Battered Child” is an account of her life as a severely abused child and how she gained closure and recovery.
April was the daughter of a pastor. He was passive, while her mother was abusive. Her mother had talent and played the piano and sang in church and also gave lessons. Appearances were very important to April’s mother, even if that meant things were very different inside the walls of “home sweet home”, than they were inside the church.
It was difficult for April to have any friends at a young child since she did most of the housework. April’s mother was often in bed “sick”. Her mother expected perfection and if April didn’t do something right, she was required to do it all over again. If one wrinkle remained after ironing clothing, she would have to do every piece over. April having ADHD only caused her mother’s rage to escalate and the beatings and verbal abuse certainly didn’t instill any love. She was constantly referred to as the “bad child”, while her sister Janine was favored. April didn’t understand why until much later in life.
April knew God from a very early age, but wondered where He was while she was being abused. She believed God saved others, but couldn’t save “her”. She felt very isolated and abandoned.
Going to Grandma’s was a joyous event for April. She loved Grandma’s gingerbread cookies and how she always told April, “I always pray the angels are watching over you”. Those words later proved to hold great meaning. Her Grandma was the one person who showed her love.
April was diagnosed with epilepsy in early childhood. During these “episodes”, she gained attention from her parents, especially her father who had medic training. But, after the episodes were over, everything was back to “normal”, the only normal she’d ever known. Her mother’s insistence to keep up appearances didn’t allow for the family to discuss April’s illness. Her mother didn’t want to bring shame upon the family. Sometimes April was forced to hide in a closet while her mother gave piano lessons in their home. It was much later in life that one of the “angels” her Grandma had spoke of, appeared as a doctor, who told her she did not have epilepsy. This was a life-changing moment.
Her first marriage was at an early age. There were two more marriages and a path of self-destruction. Her life was filled with crisis, chaos, rape, severe abuse, obesity, weight loss and an increased inability to believe God could love “her”. She even began to question who her father was as secrets about him began to unfold, one by one. Both her father and mother’s past had greatly influenced the people and parents they had become and they transferred that damage onto April. April had children of her own and began to question her own coping skills and parenting.
In retrospect, April realized God had been watching over her and the angels her Grandma always talked about, had been sent into her life. She’d met Patty in her tender years, someone who became a close and trusting friend when she thought the rest of the world had abandoned her. One of her teachers was kind and encouraging and saw April’s potential. Her teacher referred to her as the “story-teller”, overlooking the lies April often told. The doctor who told her she didn’t have epilepsy led her to find out the reasons she had been “sick” and what she needed to do to get better. She eventually met a woman who became her God-mother and other people who filled in the gaps that had left her empty for so long. Her mother always said she never wanted to die a slow and painful death and even the “way” April’s mother died became a source of faith.
April needed a period of recovery and was advised to break all contact with her mother during this time. Her mother was not pleased, but April stood firm to the plan. She discovered herself in ways she’d never known. April met with her mother later on and was surprised to see how frail and old her mother looked. She was able to break through to her mother and gained closure. After her mother’s death she discovered parts of her mother she’d never known, hidden in an old trunk - the proof that her mother had always loved her, but didn’t know how to express it. At April’s mother’s funeral, there was a huge gathering and the crowd shared their words of love and admiration. April saw that her mother had given abundantly to others what she couldn’t give to her. Her mother had helped those in need and led many to Christ.
The twists and turns in this book are immeasurable. This isn’t fiction, but a true story that changed, not only the life of one woman, but many. God had a provision for April Lorier and He loved her every step of the way. God re-defined what she had experienced and who she had been to who He wanted her to be. Even as a writer, I fail to find the right words to describe the inspiration, profoundness and impact I gained from this book.
“God’s Battered Child” is available for purchase on Amazon. It’s a must-read and the inspiration will linger long after you’ve read the last word! 5 stars isn’t nearly enough!
The Age Of American Unreason
Susan Jacoby’s new book The Age of American Unreason, says that Americans are growing dumber and dumber. From Salon.Com
To top it all off, when she was invited back to her alma mater, Michigan State University, to receive an honorary award, she struck up a conversation with an honors student in the College of Communications Arts, only to find that the young woman had never even heard of Franklin D. Roosevelt’s fireside chats. Apparently, even when students felt like talking they didn’t know enough about their own disciplines to be worth talking to.
Such are the little disillusionments that vex a public intellectual’s soul. Furthermore, as Jacoby sees it, they are telling the same story as those shocking polls that show most Americans can’t list the rights guaranteed by the First Amendment or find Iraq on a map. All of it confirms her suspicion that “the scales of American history have shifted heavily against the vibrant and varied intellectual life so essential to a functioning democracy.”
She seems to be preaching to the choir, obviously the folks who buy and read her book don’t fit the description of the uneducated masses. To the educated, Jacoby isn’t saying anything new (Wow! Americans watch a lot of TV? I never knew that!), and the people she’s criticizing will never read the book.
From VioletEclipse:
The problem is, when someone — even someone I generally agree with — throws out a shock statistic like “99.99% of adults haven’t opened a single book this year,” you have to wonder about the data collection methods behind the statistic. Swallowing the numbers without knowing where they came from is participating in the dumbing-down. One might even say that throwing out such shock stats is helping to dumb down America.