On Fire for God

Fear, Shame, Poverty, and the Making of the Christian Right - a Personal History

By: Josiah Hesse

Narrated by: Josiah Hesse

One part Educated, one part rebuttal to Hillbilly Elegy, On Fire for God explores the ways evangelical Christianity has preyed upon its followers while galvanizing them into the political force known today as the Christian right.

“Of all the books I've read about young people devastated by the fundamentalist religion they've grown up with, this one stands out.”­— Frances FitzGerald, Pulitzer Prize-winning author of The Evangelicals

Exvangelical journalist Josiah Hesse grew up in the stifling working-class town of Mason City, Iowa, raised in the institutions of fundamentalist Christianity: a toxic mixture of schools, ministries, and religious camps that taught creationism, instilled sexual shame, and foretold horrific tales of the rapture. In the churches where he worshipped, pastors siphoned their flocks’ wealth while preaching a doctrine of prosperity. Meanwhile, as economic struggles grew in the community, Hesse's fellow believers lambasted organized labor and shunned the social safety net, becoming an army for God against the evils of progressivism. Only upon escaping Iowa in search of something more would he consider the possibility that the world wasn’t about to end and that he was woefully unprepared for a future he’d never believed would arrive.

Written in vivid prose, On Fire for God is both an unflinching memoir of religious trauma and survival and a stirring examination of the emotional, political, and sociological effects of the Christian right. Returning to his hometown in search of answers about his upbringing and the political forces at work in the region, Hesse calls into question prevailing theories about the disappearing working class that point to opioids, automation, or globalism as the culprits. His story of awakening and escape exposes how conservative Christian con men have, over generations, trapped working-class believers in an isolated bubble of racism, xenophobia, and self-imposed martyrdom, while stripping communities like his of their wealth and self-esteem. In On Fire for God, Hesse plumbs the depths of his own experience to illuminate, with deep feeling and piercing immediacy, what he describes as the socioeconomic tragedy of the American working class.

Family on Fire

If this were just a travelogue through Evangelical small town Iowa, if it was just an explanation of "how we got here," with the white working class mobilized as foot soldiers in the cold war against their own republic, On Fire For God might have been one of the most important non-fiction books of the year. The fact that it is actually two books, that a second thread maps the same apocalypse-obsessed development in one family, and within one queer, neurodiverse child's life makes this claim beyond dispute. A great and unique work of autobiography, as indebted to Tim Robbins and Stephen King as it is to Hunter S. Thompson and The Late Great Planet Earth.

A harrowing story of conservative Christian indoctrination in small town USA

A book you think about long after it’s over, On Fire For God is an eye opening account of growing up in American conservative Christianity and how these beliefs intersect with class, mental health, education, and a capitalist/prosperity gospel ideology that wages war on the poor. Great writing, and an angle on conservative Christianity that we seldom talk about in the US, how poverty and shame affect the people that hold these beliefs.

The raw honesty.

A finely composed personal struggle. I was with you all the way! Thank you for writing this Josiah!