“I would read the expression on her face-wondering, how on earth did this happen?” Moore said, laughing at the memory. For years, Moore said Caldwell attended her classes, even though her style was very different from her mentor. Caldwell met her when Moore was first starting out-giving devotions while also teaching an aerobics class at First Baptist Church in Houston.Ĭaldwell told Moore that God was going to raise her up to teach the Bible and have an influential ministry. The first was Marge Caldwell, a legendary women’s Bible teacher and speaker.
One of the most gracious parts of her memoir comes when Moore gives thanks to two of her mentors.
Moore introduces her late mother, a lifelong chain smoker, with: “I was raised by a cloudy pillar by day and a lighter by night.” In her new memoir, Moore gives a glimpse into that troubled childhood and the faith-and people-who rescued her.ĭisplaying the skills that made her a bestselling author, Moore tells her story with grace and humor and with charity toward the family that raised her, despite their many flaws and the pain they all experienced. Raised by an abusive father and a mother who struggled with mental illness, Moore has long said that church was a safe haven from the chaos of her home life. The kindness of ordinary church people has long sustained Moore - providing a refuge and believing in her, even when she did not believe in herself. “Never underestimate the power of a welcome,” she said. She could just be herself, not defined by the controversies she’d been through. In that moment of kindness, Moore says she felt seen and at home in the small congregation, which became her new church. “Can I simply ask if you’re OK,” Moore recalls one of the women saying. They knew who she was and wanted Moore to know she was safe in that place and that there was plenty of room for her in the community. We’re glad to have you.”Īfter the service, a handful of women who had gone through one of Moore’s best-selling Bible studies, gathered around her. “Oh,” he said, with a smile, “Like Beth Moore.” Then, having no idea who he was talking to, he added, “Come right in. When she told him who she was, the rector brightened up. When they walked in, the rector greeted them and asked their names. In her memoir, All My Knotted-Up Life, out this week from Tyndale, Moore recounts how the couple ended up at an Anglican church in Houston, largely at the suggestion of Keith Moore, who’d grown up Catholic and felt more at home in a liturgical tradition. “I was a loaded presence,” she told RNS in a recent interview. When Moore would no longer remain silent about such things, she became too much trouble to have around. Once the very model of the modern evangelical woman, she was now a reminder of the denomination’s controversies surrounding Donald Trump, sexism, racism, and the mistreatment of sexual abuse survivors. But they knew who she was-and would probably prefer if she went elsewhere. Whenever she and her husband, Keith, would visit a new church, the results were the same. There’s a downside to going someplace where everyone knows your name.Īuthor and Bible teacher Beth Moore discovered that reality in the months after making a public break with the Southern Baptist Convention, which had been her spiritual home since childhood.
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