In the Name of God

An anonymous caller tells a detective in a small Oregon town that a woman has just bitten off a man's finger. But the man is not the victim, the caller says. The woman is. She's being held against her will by a group of faith-healing fanatics who are trying to cure her depression with violent exorcisms. The detective rescues her, but she is afraid to press charges against the people in her church. Then the detective gets an even more ominous message: Children in the church have been dying mysteriously for years, and now several more are in immediate peril, facing blindness, disability, and death. Unwilling to stand by and allow more children to suffer, the anonymous caller -- a church insider -- risks everything to work with three detectives and a lone prosecutor to fight faith-based child abuse, and to change the laws that protect its perpetrators. They are joined by a mother who'd suffered a faith-healing tragedy herself, and afterwards dedicated her life to saving others from the same fate. Masterfully written by author Cameron Stauth, In the Name of God tells the true story of their heroic mission, which resulted in a historic series of sensational trials that exposed the darkest secret of American fundamentalism, and revealed the shameful political deals that have allowed thousands of children to die at the hands of their own parents -- legally. Though the battle against faith-healing abuse continues around the country, the victory in Oregon has lit the path to a better future, in which no child need die because of a parent's beliefs.