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That One Time At (Accidental) Bible Camp —How Mistakenly Going To Church Camp Made Me A Stronger Writer

A tale of Jesus, jellyfish, and suffering. Oh, and Choco-Tacos.

Emily Sinclair Montague
10 min readJan 23, 2021

I didn’t know I was going to Bible Camp. My parents, who literally chose and signed me up for said camp, didn’t know either.

To be fair, the brochure was pretty vague, but…the signs were there. My mom and dad just didn’t bother to read the whole thing. The attitude was more: “It has great safety ratings, and the bayside setting looks gorgeous. Let’s sign you up, kid!”

Thus began a very unwanted 2–week-long spiritual journey that not only caused me to renounce Christianity forever, but also made me gain at least 4 pounds in pure, Christian-Hippie-Counselor-fueled stress.

Oh, and there were jellyfish. A lot of them. I f***ing hate jellyfish.

It Began With Good Intentions — As Most Mistakes Do

Sometimes you have a wonderful, bestseller idea that ends up being…well, something else. Like so many fine writers, my parents and I had grand aspirations for my first summer camp experience.

Ah, summer camp — is there anything else so quintessentially American? The sun, the watersports, the…

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Emily Sinclair Montague
Emily Sinclair Montague

Written by Emily Sinclair Montague

Author & Full-Time Writer. Embracing life’s chaos one word at a time. Get in touch at emsinclair@wordsofafeather.net (or don’t, but I love the attention)!

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