Cut to a church. We see the young man's girlfriend, Gracie, now revealed as being pregnant, and an older woman, Iris. Both mourning a recent loss.

"Jared's in a better place now," says the kindly-looking Reverend Samuel Mackey in an attempt to reassure the women.

Mulder and Scully approach the pastor, who tells them Gracie and Jared recently left a fundamentalist church that practices snake-handling.

Since the defection reportedly made Enoch O'Connor, who ran the church, very angry, the agents drive to the snake-handling church on the outskirts of town.

Using flashlights, they enter the darkened, apparently empty church, only to encounter a hissing rattlesnake.

Before things turn ugly, Rev. O'Connor enters. He is nearly as unfriendly as the snake, telling Mulder and Scully that snake encounters are a test of righteousness and chiding the agents for not knowing what "side" they are on.

Back at the town church, Iris tells Rev. Mackey she'd fielded a call from Jared the night he died. Mackey says they'll talk about it after Bible study.

The scene shifts back and forth between an intense snake-handling session at O'Connor's church and Mackey's moderate discussion group.

Unfortunately, Iris is overwhelmed by snakes in the restroom and expires. As her body is rolled away, Gracie, distraught, tells the agents this was Satan's work.

Gracie denies that O'Connor could be responsible. Mackey informs the agents that O'Connor is Gracie's father, which surprisingly they did not know.

Mulder and Scully go back to the snake church, where Scully struggles with the pastor in a serpent-filled trailer. Mulder breaks it up and puts the preacher under arrest.

At the county sheriff's office, Mulder interrogates the contemptuous O'Connor, who says the Devil will make a fool of the agent despite his fancy education. Meanwhile, Scully tries to reassure Gracie.

That night in jail, O'Connor is beset by snakes. He prays as the rattling serpents approach, but we next see him in the hospital, severely injured by snakebites. Gracie refuses to allow medical treatment for her father, pleading religious grounds.

As Mulder and Scully investigate Jared's old house, Scully inveighs against intolerance, but Mulder responds that he can see the attraction of sectarian certitude in a society that seems bereft of answers.

Medical tests show that Jared was sterile. So who impregnated Gracie?

At the hospital, Mackey gently encourages Gracie to allow medical treatment for her father. She agrees, but then, left alone in the room with her father, sees snake-like protuberances on O'Connor's body.

Mackey informs the agents that Gracie and O'Connor have vanished from the hospital. He also, with apparent sad reluctance, tells them O'Connor impregnated his own daughter.

Once comfortably ensconced back at the snake church, O'Connor gives his daughter a forced baptism as the other parishioners look on.

Then he unveils Gracie's pregnant belly, from which the unmistakable hissing and slithering of snakes issues.

When Mulder and Scully arrive, the cops have gotten there first. Gracie is on a stretcher.

The parishioners aren't talking, but bloody lines on the floor indicate that Gracie gave birth to a serpentine brood.

In the moderate church, O'Connor confronts Mackey, who says that Gracie came to him to escape her father's bullying intolerance.

O'Connor closes in with a knife. But Mulder enters, gun in hand, and when O'Connor persists in the attack, Mulder shoots him.

Scully rides in the ambulance with Gracie and attempts to reassure the girl that her father can't hurt her.

"You don't understand," says Gracie. "He saved me."

O'Connor, lying injured on the town church floor, advises Mulder to be smart "down here," in the heart.

Mulder suddenly pulls his gun on the startled Mackey, accusing the liberal Christian of killing Jared and Iris, and of attempting to destroy the devout O'Connor by all possible means.

Mackey seems startled for a moment, then stares at Mulder with a calm intensity.

"Are you a righteous man?" he asks. The doors suddenly all slam shut. There is hissing.

Snakes climb all over Mulder. Bitten, he screams. Scully enters just in time to see a big snake crawl away. O'Connor might be dying, but watches all this with perhaps a touch of self-vindication.

Later, we see Mulder in the hospital, wondering whether he's passed or failed a test of righteousness. Scully tells him there's no sign of Mackey.

In Connecticut, the seemingly moderate Reverend has a new name and a new church. A middle-aged woman tells him it's "a real joy to find a reverend with such an open way of looking at God."

After she leaves, the Reverend casually leans back and holds a mouse above his head. A large snake emerges from his mouth and swallows the rodent.