Christ semi-risen in polyester. Exhorting the sinners to repent - the sweat dripping from his lips - his incredible energy, the strange sexuality. Strutting, ranting, raving, waving the Bible - raising it high above his head, almost tauntingly, a marvelous balancing act. I had only seen him on television.

'Don't you recognize him?'Listen to There Is a River by Jimmy Swaggart, 308 Shazams. Behind her - a mass of painted red curls, orange jacket - radically clashing. 'I'm not afraid to live and I'm not afraid to die - that's freedom.' The young woman stared at me intensely - eyes shining - face enraptured. Swaggart’s father was a sharecropper before becoming a Pentecostal preacher in the Assemblies of God. He was defrocked by the Assemblies of God in 1988 after a sex scandal involving prostitutes.

The courage - grace - trust it involved. The wonder of the 2,000 pound animals soaring over 7 foot walls. 'washed in the blood, washed in the blood of the lamb.'The last time I was at the Garden, it was for the National Horse Show. Marking the rise and fall of the music with his hands for those who could hear only with their hearts. To my left, a man gently gesticulating. Thousands of faces blurred into a faceless unit.

A scene worthy of Leni Riefen- stahl's famous documentary on Hitler's rallies - 'Triumph of the Will.' But here was a triumph of a different kind of will, Swaggart's - will be done.The singing continues for a half hour - the sweet, swelling gospel music. Right hands raised in a gesture of semi-supplication, semi-salute. The kind that promised freedom through blind obedience. The kind that took away the fear of living and dying. But I didn't know about this kind of trust. Trust myself, my horse and a little in fate.

There must be a reason.' He gives me literature. People, happy, having a good time. 'What's a nice Jewish boy like you doing in a place like this?' He takes the bait.'Look - the synagogues are empty. Orthodox Jew - side-curls and skullcap - passes in front of me. Little children being held up on daddy's shoulders to see him better.

'I've been saved for 8 years.' She put her Bible in my hands. 'It's your first time, isn't it?' Yes, I nodded. We want God in Government.'The young woman next to me squeezes my arm. Standing among false palm trees - a dais lined with family and supporters - the preacher fretted and strutted his way about the stage.'We don't want religion in politics. They weren't 'nice to the Jews.' This message - that the Jews were truly the chosen people that Jesus, after all, was a Jew himself was an overriding theme of Swaggart's sermon. A large print story line depicts why Egypt and Germany fell.

Swaggart's voice - rising and falling fails to move me (perhaps the TV image enlarged him). She would translate the buzz words and key phrases 'blood of the lamb' 'rapture' 'holy spirit'. Pages worn, notations and markings.

(Ronald Reagan is of a like mind.) He exhorts them all - the Baptists, Pentecostals, 7th Day Adventists, Catholics, Protestants - all, all are false because they haven't been washed in the blood. He especially wants the Jews. It comes, 1.5 million babies killed a year.But Jesus is coming. - he's speaking against it - ah, I'm waiting now for the inevitable.

His freedom, as all of ours, is very limited.Outside, the city is the same - always different. All black with a white star. Only souls to be saved.1 think of that young woman - the one unafraid of life and death, the one who talked of freedom. The halls of the Garden are oddly quiet - the hot dog stands weren't open.

While the cleaning crew at the Garden cleans up the dirt, remnants of God's children and Tiny Tim's tulips. Confident in their answers to questions that are unanswerable. Doorways decorated with bodies waiting - for something.Tomorrow, or perhaps tonight, Swaggart and his soul-savers fly high - privately jetted - with their Bibles, wicker baskets and fake palms.

Jimmy Swaggart Music The Move Is On