AN OPEN LETTER TO ANONYMOUS

Usually, my fan mail goes to a PO box, to be sorted by my assistant before it comes to me. It’s one of the ways I keep my life as an author separate from my personal life. So I was surprised to find a handwritten envelope addressed to Richard Paul Evans sent directly to my home address. The letter had no name or return address.

As I read the letter, my anger rose. The writer had heard me speak at a church. The letter said I had no right to be in a church, since I was clearly a sinful man, manifested by my facial tics—something I’ve had since childhood.

At first I crumpled the letter and threw it away. Then, after thinking about it, I decided to answer it. The problem was, the letter was anonymous, so I had no way of reaching the writer. I couldn’t even know for sure if the writer was a man or a woman, though I assumed the latter from the feminine handwriting and stationery.

Then I had an idea. I’d post my response on Facebook and ask my readers if they would share it. That’s the power of social media. With enough shares, there was a reasonable chance she might actually see it.

I posted my letter around midnight. The next morning, I checked my computer to see if anyone had noticed my posting. To my astonishment, it already had more than eighty thousand likes and tens of thousands of shares. The letter had clearly hit a nerve. There were hundreds of comments, some more than a page long, with people sharing their sympathy and outrage.

This is what I wrote:

Dear Anonymous,

I was very much disheartened by your letter. I was saddened that you hadn’t the courage to include your name so I could help you understand the truth. Since I must believe that you wouldn’t possibly friend a “man like me” on your Facebook page, I can only hope that someone you know shares this post on their page and that God guides you to this letter.

I came to your church to tell you about God’s love for His children and to talk about the beauty and power of His grace. I don’t think you heard me. Or, at least, believed me. You wrote in your letter that I had no place in a house of God, as I was clearly a sinful man and that my sins were manifested across my face, revealed by my facial tics.

Yes, there’s no doubt that I am, like the rest of God’s children, a sinner. But the tics you saw on my face were not caused by sin. They come from a neurological disorder called Tourette’s syndrome. I was born with them. I cannot stop them.

Sadly, as a boy, I would have believed you. My mother got mad at me that day my first tic manifested—a painful, constant shrugging. And, though I was only eight years old, I felt guilty for disobeying her when she told me to stop. As a nine-year-old I thought that maybe, if I was a good enough boy and I had enough faith, I could be cured of my tics. But they wouldn’t go away, so I thought it was my fault.

One time a church leader came to speak at my church. The adults at my church said that he was someone important. I remembered the Bible story of the woman touching Jesus’s garment and being healed. I thought that maybe if I shook this man’s hand I might be healed. So I waited in line and I shook his hand. But my tics remained.

Earlier that summer, my family had moved to Utah and I had ridden a school bus to an overnight camp called Mill Hollow. Some of the children on the bus noticed my tics and one of them called me a “freak.” As I got off the bus—a scared child in a strange place—a group of children surrounded me to get a better look. And I was ticcing like crazy, not because I was a sinner but because I was afraid and humiliated.

Your letter reminded me a little of that day. Only I am no longer that helpless little boy. I now know that there are hundreds of thousands of us with behavioral disorders. And what you, or even a million people like you, might say, doesn’t affect me anymore. I have moved on. I have a beautiful life, a beautiful family and home. I have seen the world. I have danced in the White House and spoken to audiences of thousands. Tens of millions of people have read my books and watched my movies. I have built shelters that have housed tens of thousands of abused children. And I still tic.

Sometimes when I tic, my wife will lovingly lay her hand on my cheek and ask if I’m okay. It’s very sweet. And it means a lot to me. My children don’t even notice my tics. They only see the father who loves them. The truth of who I am has set me free. It can set you free too. Because with whatever measurement you use to judge, you must judge yourself. And you are using a very barbed ruler.

In all honesty, I must admit that I was angered by your letter. But not for me. I am beyond your reach. I am angry for those children who are still trying to figure out who they are: children who are teased and ridiculed and bullied by cruel, self-righteous people like you. I am angered for those sweet, innocent children, who would rather die than show their tics, because you are so eager to let them know how unlovable and imperfect they are. And some of them do take their precious lives. Yes, this makes me very angry.

The other day, at a book signing, a young woman I had never met before put her arms around me and told me that she loved me. I asked her why. She told me that she had Tourette’s syndrome and the kids at school made fun of her. But now many of her schoolmates are reading my books and, knowing that I have Tourette’s, are now treating her better. I told her that she is not her Tourette’s. I told her that I loved her too.

Dear Anonymous, I hope you read this letter. I hope it opens your eyes. Or better yet, your heart. But whether you change or not, remember this: we, the “abnormal,” are not the ones to be pitied. The greatest disability is the inability to love those who are different from you. May God bless you with His unfathomable and unconditional love.

Your flawed servant,

Richard Paul Evans

#1 New York Times bestselling author and

a man with Tourette’s syndrome

I never heard from the woman. But I did hear from thousands of caring, sympathetic people. I was glad I wrote it.