Summary

Bowler writes about a time when her body failed her before. When she was twenty-eight and writing her dissertation on the prosperity gospel, her arms and hands suddenly stopped working properly. They suffered extreme weakness and could only be used sporadically as if they "had a limited battery life" (14). As she was researching the prosperity gospel at the time, many people around her wanted to heal her by reviewing her possible sins. As she writes, "in a spiritual world in which healing is a divine right, illness is a symptom of an unconfessed sin [...] a suffering believer is a puzzle to be solved. What had caused this to happen?" (16).

Over the next six months, Kate visits "more than thirty-five doctors," but none of whom can offer a successful solution or reasonable cause. According to both the prosperity gospel and general American ideology...