Blessed Unbeliever

Sean grew up a privileged child nurtured in the womb of his Southern California fundamentalist church. He dreamed of becoming a missionary pilot and hoped Kathleen Wilberforce will share his dream. But he loses Kathleen to a rival, then watches his dream crash like a toy airplane when he washes out of the Torrey Bible Institute mission aviation program (Chicago). Flailing about with disappointments and unanswered prayers, he performs a blasphemous ritual to convince himself that he has become an atheist. Kathleen unexpectedly shows up at the Institute but carries a dark secret that shames her and isolates her from Sean. Meanwhile, Sean finds that being a good atheist is harder than he thought. In his anguish, he seeks a path back to aviation, back to Kathleen, and back to God.

James P. Hurd graduated from Moody Bible Institute (Chicago) and Pennsylvania State University. After flying ten years in Latin America with Mission Aviation Fellowship he taught anthropology at Bethel University, St. Paul. He speaks to churches and community groups on the Amish and other anthropological topics and publishes a monthly ezine (Wingspread) at: https: //jimhurd.com. He lives in Minneapolis with his wife, Barbara.