Maddy’s Update

Some people have asked what is going on with my books being taken down. Here is a (not so) brief explanation. On the morning of Saturday 1/27/24 I received an email from my pastor and the elder of my church. It was lengthy and detailed.

One line was: “When I (pastor) looked into what you were writing it grieved me. Your books glorify all kinds of sexual sin and describe sexual acts in explicitly pornographic detail.” And another was: “We urge you to no longer engage in the writing, reading, or spread of sexual content causing others to also stumble and fall into the sins of lust and sexual impurity. You have profited off of the sale of this material and have willingly put it in front of people, tempting them to sin and to lust as you have. It is a serious thing to lead others into sin and away from Christ.”

And what I needed to do: “Repentance looks like the following:
1. Confess your sin to the Lord and repent of it.
2. Cease selling and profiting off of this sin and take down or destroy any of your work that is sexual in nature and instead use your gifts, talents, and abilities as a writer to produce works that honor the Lord and do not glorify sin.
3. Continue to invest in your spiritual health by attending the ministries of the church and building relationships with godly people. Seek godly counsel and accountability from your sisters in Christ and others in the church.
4. Provide the church with a new email address for you that is not related to Maddy Barone. “

Before I go any further, I want to make a confession of faith. Feel free to skip down a paragraph if you don’t want to read about my faith.

I believe in God. I believe that I and everyone else is a sinner. No one can say they have never broken a single one of the 10 commandments even once. Our screw ups separate us from God. I believe that God loves us and wants us to be UNseparated from Him, but He is holy and cannot bear sin. So He made a plan so people can be in a relationship with him. He sent Jesus, who is God himself, to die so our sins are paid for. The Jewish people made sacrifices at the temple to pay for sin. They would find the most perfect lamb to sacrifice, but that sacrifice had to be performed on a continuing basis. Jesus was THE perfect lamb, the lamb of God, and His sacrifice was the last one required for forgiveness of sin. Anyone who believes they are a sinner and is sorry for it and asks Jesus to forgive them is a Christian. I am a Christian and I believe that Christians are called to be part of a local body of fellow believers.

Okay. So I got that email and was shocked. Horrified. Angry. So angry. And scared. I love my church. I have been there for more than 20 years. They have been utterly supportive of me while I battled cancer. I am not done battling cancer. How could I do it on my own? On that first day I was willing to do ANYTHING to keep my church family. I rushed to take down my books. I made announcements on my Facebooks pages. I made a statement on my website.

But the more I did, the more I realized I wasn’t doing it to please God. I was doing it so I could stay in my church. I do not think my books are pornography. I think they are love stories featuring one man and one woman in a monogamous permanent relationship. To agree with the demands my pastor and elder are making would be like agreeing that the sun rises in the west. It would be lying.

So I have left my church. It broke my heart. I’m not angry now, only very, very sad. Still a little disbelieving, actually. (Like HOW could this have happened? I have been going to that church for half my life, and I’ve been published for 14 of those years, but this is just happening NOW? Why?) It’s like I lost my whole family in a car crash or in some expected way. I am grieving. I have spent hours in prayer and tears. This was not an easy decision. Maddy Barone is not just my pen name. My SCA friends have known me as Maddy since 1998. How could I cut them loose because of a name?

I have decided to take some time reviewing my books for typos or minor updates and then put them back up, hopefully by April 1. So that is where I am at. I apologize for my hasty de-listing of my books. I was drowning in panic and denial when I did it and it confused some of you. I am sorry.