Barry Morphew is my cousin and allegedly murdered his wife and her vote for Trump

On Mother’s Day 2020, 49 years old Suzanne Morphew missedg in Salida, Colorado. Mother of two grown daughters, Suzanne is the wife of my first cousin and childhood hero, Barry Morphew. Although Suzanne’s body has yet to be found, Barry has been charged with murder. He is out of prison and will appear in court later this year.

Barry is a few years older than me, roughly the age difference between his dad Rodger and my dad Joe. When Joe grew up idolizing Rodger, I grew up revering Barry. It’s easy to do — Barry is handsome and charismatic, a gifted and talented athlete. I still keep the article announcing the existence of high school boy Barry edited by Toronto Blue Jays on my bedroom wall until I leave home for college.

Barry lived as a child near Alexandria, Indiana, not far from where my father grew up with his 12 siblings. I myself grew up in Hot Springs, Arkansas, where I lived with my mother, her husband, and their two children. Barry and I both grew up in religious homes, a situation that led to many conflicts in my home and estrangement from both sides of the family.

The lasting trauma of my Protestant childhood proved too traumatic for me to get over in the presence of my family, largely because they were still Protestant. It took me years to realize that I wanted an apology for being conceived by them, for having been programmed by them, for having belong to surname. Since that’s an unreasonable expectation, I’m learning to let go.

Before I realized I needed to escape that world, I met Suzanne Morphew in 2012, at a family reunion in Indiana. None of the extended Morphews were able to attend my California wedding in 2009, and since my wife Lauren is pregnant with our first child, I thought this was the right time to introduce her with the clan. We had a fun, somewhat stressful day (the older my dad got, the more he hated his siblings), and then Barry invited Lauren and I to follow him in his Porsche Cayenne He went to his large impressive estate nearby.

My constant admiration for Barry makes it impossible for me to predict what comes next. After showing us his orchid, Barry, Suzanne, Lauren, and I sat in Barry’s living room, chatting. Suzanne is kind and warm. Then, as Lauren and I started to say goodbye, Barry turned to his wife and said, “Can you share your testimony?”

Suzanne’s expression is that of a child ordered by her father to perform a difficult task. She pulled up her stool and recounted earnestly the story of her struggle with Hodgkin’s Lymphoma, how her doctor told her she couldn’t have another child, and her remission. fall and the “miracle baby” that followed – all stemming from Suzanne’s unwavering faith in Christ.

Although Lauren and I were deeply moved by Suzanne’s story, the quality of its execution made us wary. Thanks to my Protestant training, I knew what was coming next. Barry thanked Suzanne for telling her story, then looked at me and said, “Jason, do you believe in God?”

“Sometimes,” I said truthfully.

Inside, I was offended, confused. Barry knows that I was raised to make mockery presentations, like this salesman. Every Wednesday evening in my mid-teens, I went door-to-door in the neighborhood around Hot Springs Second Baptist Church, asking if the poor residents would accept Jesus as Lord and their savior or not. The “call” of the Gospel is to spread the Gospel, to give people the opportunity to choose to save their souls. I am the last person to be informed about the stakes of the Gospel, through the process of evangelization.

Then I remembered the arrogance of “witnessing,” the lie a missionary must tell himself to believe that the person he was trying to “save” hadn’t heard Jesus at all. thousand times. I recall the centuries-old fantasy some missionaries loved, where they were noble missionaries educating ignorant barbarians about the only thing that mattered. I suspect that in Barry’s eyes, I have become ignorant because of a liberal, bi-regional upbringing.

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What I never realized while witnessing was that, by imposing myself on strangers, lecturing them on what they already knew, I had committed a kind of violence against them. I interrupted precious leisure and family time to impose a memorized message without taking into account the personal experience of my audience. I am a robot made of flesh and blood. It was a miracle I didn’t get shot.

Growing up, I never heard an authority figure explain how to bring back to Jesus someone like the person I have become. I have yet to meet anyone who has completely pivoted from one end of the spectrum to the other, who once marched across the Arkansas capital to protest against abortion rights and who now gives her Jewish children join the masked protests against police brutality in downtown Los Angeles.

When he knew he didn’t want to be saved again, Barry leaned back in his chair, narrowed his eyes, and said, “Jason is a good guy.” He spoke as if the question had been debated, like he was the authority on the matter. Like he was God.

When my father passed away in 2018, I had a disagreement with relatives about the details of an obituary, which led to my publication adjusted in the local newspaper. This experience prompted me to set up Morphew’s “Google alerts” to monitor published information about my people.

That’s how I learned first about Barry and Suzanne’s move from Indiana to Colorado and then about Suzanne’s disappearance. I sent a letter to Barry, expressing my sympathy and offering to help. He texted thank you, and in December 2020, he texted me a picture of him and his daughters smiling by the Christmas tree.

Then, in May 2021, Barry was arrest for allegedly killing Suzanne. Soon after, I learned that Barry had also been accused of voting by mail by his missing wife in the 2020 presidential election for Trump. According to an arrest affidavit, he admitted illegal voting, even as he staunchly denies killing his wife. About 130 pages oath details the development of alibis, his business manipulations, and his narcissistic manipulation, but what I find most fascinating is what I consider Barry’s theology.

Not only did Barry suggest to the FBI that if something bad had happened to Suzanne, it could have been God’s Punishment because of her recent behavior (after surviving cancer for the second time, Suzanne has started drinking and taking CBD pills, and she is having an affair with a former high school friend in Indiana) . I also told a Colorado television news reporter that “Suzanne believes in God, and if a person were to be saved from this, she would think it was worth it.”

That quote got me thinking — not because of its blatant cruelty but because of its courageous theological accuracy. Barry made it clear a truth about evangelical Christianity that he had only one place to discover: Absolutely anything that gave Jesus a soul was justifiable, including uxoricide. God’s sending of His son Jesus to earth to pay the price for all sins – including Suzanne’s murder, which should have been on Jesus’ mind while hanging on cross – renders murder meaningless compared to its ability to bring eternal happiness to unbelievers.

If reading Barry’s quote seems mindless, I encourage you to correct it from a Gospel theology perspective. Saving souls is everything. As one of the last of Barry document The eternity in heaven mocks the nanosecond comparison of earthly existence, Suzanne attests.

If Barry killed Suzanne – a human woman on earth who seems to be searching for happiness in the here and now – I doubt he would because he thinks she lost her eyes, her eyes. God, lose the eye of death. If he dismembered her and buried, burned or drowned her, I believe he would because “Husband is head of wife, even as Christ is head of church. If he did it, it would seem that he was trying to justify or at least explain it by his faith.

Who better to be called the prophet to the MAGA crowd?

I hope that Barry’s steadfast faith, combined with his current existential crisis, will inspire him to make further discoveries — that, even if he must separate from people, he will continue to spread the gospel with his blood and bandages.

Now I want to see him in a new light – as a spiritual force that frees me from my past.

Editor’s note: Barry Morphew has been charged with first-degree murder, tampering with a corpse, possession of a deadly weapon and attempting to influence a public official. He has pleaded not guilty.