The Last Petal Falling

A Memoir

By: Lori Arnold McFarlane

Narrated by: Virtual Voice

In 2011, a minor news story made headlines and turned Lori Arnold McFarlane’s comfortable life upside down. Residing in Scotland, her life seemed pretty close to perfect – a beautiful family, wonderful friends, a breath-taking view of the Clyde, and a meaningful relationship with Jesus Christ. An evangelical Christian and a Calvinist, McFarlane’s deepest desire was to glorify and enjoy her God forever. But when a tiny group of religious fanatics began preaching doom and gloom and the End of Days, she found herself suddenly and unwillingly questioning everything she’d ever believed. Her memoir takes us through the next three years as she struggled deeply with her faith, grappling with feelings of abandonment and the soul-crushing silence of the heavenly Father she’d always trusted. Depressed and desperate, she tried everything she could to hold on to her hope in Christ, but as her faith flatlined and her resolve weakened, she began to wonder how much longer she could go on like this – or if she even wanted to. McFarlane tells her story with sensitivity and honesty, providing witty and touching accounts of her most formative childhood and adolescent moments of faith, and provides fascinating insight into many different sects of Christianity she’d encountered as an adult, from speaking in tongues to wearing head coverings. She deals with both the anger and the longing she felt when faced with the question that would ultimately make or break her faith: Do all saints really persevere until the end?