Home by Marilynne Robinson

I just finished savoring Home by Marilynne Robinson – wow, what a great book. I had read Gilead, Marilynne’s Pulitzer Prize winner for Fiction in 2005 and Home was the follow up novel. It examined home as a place to return to, home as a place in the heart – really asking the question – what is home and where is it and do we have a home? The rich narrative that Marilynne writes in, how she draws you into the lives of her characters, the way she portrays faith are all reasons I love her literary work.
In one way or another, every character in Home is searching for the answer to the question of what it means to come home. Glory is 38 when she returns to Gilead, Iowa to take care for her dying father, pastor Robert Boughton, a widowed father of 8 children. Glory’s wayward brother Jack also finds his way back; however, his homecoming is marked with awkwardness as reflections of a difficult past resurface. Glory has not seen Jack in 20 years when he left Gilead with his scandalous reputation. Jack and Glory bond while taking care of their father, but Jack relapses into bad habits which affects their father. Glory continues offering grace to Jack, trying to get him to stay, but he worries the other siblings will not be as understanding as some will be making their way home to see their father before he passes away. Grace and forgiveness and what it means to come home are strong themes here, and the question of whether home is ever the same once you leave and return is always in the back of one’s mind.

There's No Place like Well-Being

The man’s words just would not leave Kari the nurse’s heart. He did not have a safe place to go for a meal on Sundays.

During the weekdays he had a place, but not on Sundays. No safe place to just be on this most sacred of days.

Kari and her husband Les kept hearing the words and the words turned into a calling.

Open up The Well on Sundays.

Offer a home cooked meal.

Serve the home cooked meal on real china -- not on paper plates. Serve the home cooked meal on a table with a table cloth and warm candles burning and serve up sweet conversation.
Make it safe. With no judgments. Make it like home.

Call it Well Being.

And they did. And people came.

On the other side of town, another call came. This one for Dan and Sally Waritz.

Well Being needed help. Last minute help.

Would Dan answer the call?

Yes, he would.

”But, I’ll be the first to admit, when they told me who we’d be serving, I was hesitant at first. I will not pretend,” says Dan. “But after the one time, I knew this was where I needed to be.”

Now his community group comes back every month.

Last Sunday, they brought shepherd’s pie. And salad and dessert to share.

Kari and Les love having Rolling Hills Community Church helping http://www.rollinghills.org/ . It has eased the weekly burden, so they can focus on making those who need a safe place on Sundays to feel part of a community.

“For a lot of HIV positive people the church is pointing the finger. Here we do no preaching. We open up our church home to them. We serve them. It allows those living with HIV and AIDS to see that there are others in the church that care. Many of those who come have never stepped inside a church before. Some will then come to Sunday service. It is always in the background,” says Kari.

The people who come are etched into their hearts.

Dan says: “We notice that you see people each time you are here and all of a sudden you notice when they are not here anymore.”

And, you wonder if it is because of their health.

And, you are never ever the same again.