the Trevor Project
The cover of ‘Hell Is a World Without You.’ Background photo by S. H. Gue va Unsplash. Graphic by Mitchell Atencio/Sojourners
I don’t think I’ve ever read a book quite like Jason Kirk’s Hell Is a World Without You. This book, a bildungsroman about a teen’s evangelical house of cards and the mounting life experiences, new friends, and cold fingers of doubt that threaten to knock it over, is a call coming from firmly inside the house.
Bullying word cloud, kentoh/Shutterstock.com
We’ve talked about bullying on this blog before. We’ve highlighted Christians who are standing with gays and lesbians, exposed racial bullying, discussed religious bullying, bullying of every stripe. We’ve tried to tell meaningful stories about support, healing and prevention.
But there’s more to say.
Eric James Borges via Facebook.
Eric James Borges was teased his entire life for being different. Though he didn’t come out publicly until his sophomore year of college, he recalls emotional and physical abuse as far back as kindergarten for his differences. And though most children undergo some degree of hazing from time to time, the seeming indifference of the adults in his life made matters dramatically worse.
In a video recorded for the “It Gets Better” Project, an LGBT advocacy group focused on offering hope and community to LGBT people on the margins, Borges, 19, recalls being physically assaulted in a full high school classroom while his teacher stood by and watched.
The distressed teen had nowhere to turn at home either. His Christian parents decided to perform a ritual exorcism on him with the hope of “curing” him of his orientation. When that failed, they kicked him out of the house.
Though Borges went on to advocate for LGBT rights through the “It Gets Better” Project and his work with The Trevor Project (a group committed to preventing suicide among LGBT teens), the demons of his past still lingered. Despite finding a community that affirmed and embraced who he was, the damage had already been done.
He killed himself on Jan 11.