God Willing, I will both clock up 46 years in journalism and see my 65th birthday in 2024. But every year seems to be one of anniversaries marking the passing of either loved ones, or folk I knew from my teenage days as a preacher’s kid in the north east Ulster Bible Belt.
One such person is Bertie. This is not his real name given the tragic circumstances of his death four decades ago this year. I knew him from my days in the Boys’ Brigade and Christian Youth Fellowship in that part of the Irish Bible Belt.
Even today in 2024, I still pause for a few moments at his grave to say a heartfelt thanks for a piece of advice he gave me in the 1970s. His grave is located in the same cemetery as my late parents’ and no visit to mum and dad’s earthly resting place is complete without a respectful nod to Bertie’s grave.
Bertie and I became born again Christians in the early Seventies during one of the great Presbyterian evangelical missions of that era. We joined the Boys’ Brigade together as well as a local Sunday evening Youth Fellowship.
I was a cross country runner at Ballymena Academy in my teenage days and on Tuesday afternoons after training, I would meet Bertie outside a sweet shop in the town centre, purchase our soft drinks and crisps and ‘go up the town for a chat’.
Bertie had a strong Christian faith and I regarded him as a stalwart of the Youth Fellowship. But as I moved through my teens, life as a Presbyterian minister’s son became increasingly more challenging.
Primarily, there were a number of assholes in that north east Ulster Bible Belt who thought they could demonstrate to their peers that they were ‘the big lads’ by making an example out of me as a preacher’s kid.
Mostly, the abuse was verbal, but for some, the abuse was physical. I vividly remember a Presbyterian elder punching me in the face when I had just been a born again Christian for a few years just to make an example out of me in his Sunday school class.
Among our peers in that north east Ulster Bible Belt, the born again Christians were a significant group - the so-called ‘in crowd’. However, there was one thug who clearly wanted to set up a rival alternative to the born again believers.
It soon became clear that the only way you could become part of this thug’s clique of mates was to recant your Christian faith and give the impression you were a hard-cursing, ‘hard man’.
It did not take long for this thug to target Bertie. Within a matter of months, Bertie stopped coming to the Youth Fellowship and ended our meetings at the sweet shop.
When a born again Christian recants their faith, it is known as back-sliding. One by one, I watched as the thug bullied or cajoled born again believers into giving up their faith.
We were at a BB event in the mid Seventies. I knew the thug would soon target me as he had already been ‘mouthing off’ to my face.
During that BB event, I’d had the chance - albeit a few moments - to chat to Bertie alone as to why he’d given up his faith. He simply told me he was afraid of the thug. Other lads had told me the same thing.
After the event, I found myself in an amusement arcade. Bertie came over to me and checking over his shoulder to ensure the thug was not watching and using the excuse of asking me for the loan of five pence for a game, he warned me that the thug was out to get me.
It was not said in a threatening way, merely a very strong piece of advice. I would have to alter my routine radically if I was to avoid getting a beating from this thug, who merely wanted to give the minister’s son a battering just to send a message to others - if this is what I do to the preacher’s kid, what will I not do to you!
What many folk took for granted, especially among my peers in the Seventies, I had to plan very carefully - namely, walking from the front seat of my dad’s car to my pew in church without getting a kicking from the thug. It did not matter to this thug that the kicking would be administered in God’s House; it was to be a severe lesson for the preacher’s kid.
And so my routine was simple on Sabbath mornings - dash from dad’s car into his minister’s room and hide there until the opening devotions for Sunday school and Bible class in the church hall and then walk with dad into the hall. There would be no way the thug had the courage to blazingly walk into dad’s minister’s room and batter me.
For a number of months this strategy worked perfectly. Bertie’s advice had been sound and I felt safe in church on Sunday mornings. Bertie maintained the thug still had me in his sights, but my weekly routine in church seemed to be working.
After a few months, I felt the coast was clear. It was just after the Hallowe’en school holidays when I decided that Sunday in the Seventies that rather than hide in the minister’s room, I would go directly into the church hall, take my seat, and await the opening devotions.
I did not see the thug sneak up behind me. During my life, I have felt the pain of tonsillitis, a broken toe playing church football, and an abscess in a tooth. But that single kick to my lower back on the left hand side - whether by accident or design - was so well placed by the thug.
This was agony on a whole new level. I looked around to see the thug sneering at me; Bertie had been spot on in his warning. For the rest of the opening devotions - which although only lasted minutes, they seemed to go on for an eternity - I simply prayed that in spite of the painful spasms, God would not let me collapse in front of the thug.
As the minutes passed, the pain got worse; there was no way I could make it into the Bible class. Imagine the delight on the thug’s face if I collapsed in the class?
After the devotions, I walked coolly as if I was Hollywood icon John Wayne in one of his famous Westerns. I headed for dad’s minister’s room - and safety. I had only just entered his room, when my legs gave way and down I tumbled, the soft carpet in the room breaking my fall.
Minutes later, dad found me on the ground, in tears and in tremendous agony. I didn’t want a doctor, ambulance or to be taken to Ballymena’s Waveney Hospital because that would give satisfaction to the thug as to how badly he had injured me. It was one of the very few occasions in church life that I had witnessed my dad really angry.
Ironically, my thoughts were not about getting hospital treatment for my injury, but on how this physical assault by the thug would affect my training routine for the forthcoming BB cross country championships.
I kept thinking - if only I’d listened to Bertie and kept up my safety routine, this wouldn’t have happened.
Reading this in 2024, you may be thinking - Coulter, this happened when you were a teenager in the 1970s; surely you need to ‘man up’ and put it behind you? I wish I could, but twice a day, I still have to take my medication for my back as a result of that Sunday assault.
It has led to some embarrassing incidents. It’s as if I am transported back in time to that fateful Sunday and suddenly a spasm will shoot across my lower back, triggering the collapsing legs. One of my sons christened it “Daddy’s Falling Down Trick!”
I’ve had numerous hospital visits, scans, X-rays, pumped countless powerful pain killers into me and had physio treatment for the injury and had the embarrassment of collapsing shortly after a relative’s graduation ceremony.
It has been a challenge, too, on my Christian spiritual journey. It is very hard to echo the words of Jesus Christ in St Matthew’s Gospel when asked by Peter how many times he should forgive someone, and Christ replied ‘seventy times seven’.
It is especially difficult to think of these words of our Saviour in the wee small hours when you are lying in bed and those spasms are shooting across your lower back and you are struggling to get your bedside lamp on to get the water and medication.
The last time I saw Bertie face to face was at a BB Ballymena Battalion parade in the Seventies. He gave me ‘the fingers’ as the car in which he was a passenger drove past. Had he been told to do it by the thug, or was he giving me a message - I told you so!
I was never to see either Bertie or the thug again once I started my journalist training in the late Seventies. Several years would elapse. I kept the extent of my back injury a secret from all but close family for decades. It only leaked out into certain sections of that north east Ulster Bible Belt when my parents died.
In the Eighties, I remember I was covering a UUP Press event in Ballycastle involving my late dad, the former North Antrim MLA Rev Dr Robert Coulter MBE, the former Mayor of Ballymoney and former Northern Ireland Forum North Antrim member the late Joe Gaston, and the former UUP MEP John Taylor.
A radio news bulletin detailed an incident involving someone with Bertie’s real name. When I got home, my mum confirmed that it was Bertie who had died.
Even though he had become a friend of the thug who injured me, I hoped Bertie found his Christian faith again before he died. I guess I will never know until we meet again in eternity.
I don’t know if the thug is still alive. I hope he becomes a born again Christian if he hasn’t already, then the severe pain of my back injury will have been worth it.
In the meantime, I will remember the good times at BB and Youth Fellowship I enjoyed with Bertie and will continue to pay my respects at his grave every time I visit my parents’ resting place.
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Follow Dr John Coulter on Twitter @JohnAHCoulter Listen to commentator Dr John Coulter’s programme, Call In Coulter, every Saturday morning around 10.15 am on Belfast’s Christian radio station, Sunshine 1049 FM. Listen online. |
Great piece of writing John.
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