Monday, May 11, 2015

Soul Cleansing/Heavenly Bodies pg.290-296

During this soul cleansing section I felt like it was the "passing of the torch". Deborah had put the burdens of the Henrietta Lacks story and entrusted Rebecca to telling her story through this book.

Deborah and Rebecca decided to take a break for their reporting trip and decided to visit Gary Lacks who was Deborah' cousin. Gary was also a lay preacher.

While they were there Gary performed a faith healing on Deborah because Deborah looked like she was under a lot of stress, she was covered with hives and was very talkative, nervous, and seemed like she was having an anxiety attack.

The description of Gary performing the faith healing seemed like he was performing an exorcism, I felt pretty creeped out.

The main thing is that the faith healing worked and Deborah felt way better and felt light because she passed her burdens on to Rebecca.

What stood out to me in Heavenly Bodies was when Gary called HeLa Henrietta's spiritual body. "The immortality of Henrietta's cells makes perfect sense.

"Of course they were growing and surviving decades after her death, of course they floated through the air, and of course they'd led to cures for diseases and been launched into space. Angels are like that. The Bible tells us so."

I'm not sure if I believe the bible version of why Henrietta's cells were immortal because I'm leaning towards the science aspect. But I can see why people would think that way.

Skloot attended mass with Gary and Deborah and Gary invited to speak to the church with a huge introduction from Gary.

What got to me was when Deborah was in tears when Rebecca said "Most people think her name was Helen Lane, but she was Henrietta Lacks". That was probably one of the happiest moments in the book aside from Zakariyyah showing gratitude.
 

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