Gilead was written by a woman descended from Europe living in the United States who could be called white and American. Marilynne Robinson has articulated a deep familiarity with corners of the country that were laid forgotten by the movement of history, where families had choices and chose familiarity; they built legacies and had property and told stories and left behind something more than memories. Many people are drawn to her books because they express a comfort in the spirituality of the mundane, the divinity of nature, and faith in the midst of ambiguity. This particular story is of a man who is a minister, like me, who struggles at the end of his life to write a letter like this one to leave to his young son. Reverend John Ames is a man who lives in his head. He is a brilliant man, not in that he is the most educated in his town, but in that he possesses a deep sense of wisdom. His greatest wisdom is to know that he does not know. He is a man whom life has taught that life itself is sacred. He saw the world change around him but spent most of his focus on remembering the things closest to himself—family, close friends, the simple paper in his hands, facial expressions, weather, and water. This seems appropriate. Often when people look back over their lives the things that seemed important in earlier years take on less importance, and we are left with the people we love and the joy of life itself.

Robinson is a master at capturing this feeling and reimagining it into a world, a world that is able to bask in life’s sacred everydayness. Son, it is important to know that worlds like this exist and to take time away from screens to drink in the holiness of the day that surrounds you. This was certainly true for Reverend Ames. But Robinson also reminds us that those privileged to live long lives are also left with the task of working through their feelings, especially the difficult ones, in order to find peace. Ames was moved to his writing by the mournful but meaningful reality that his son would have to grow up without him. He was moved with love and uncertainty about whether he had done justice by his young wife. And he was moved with unnamed anger toward his grandfather, his father, and his godson Jack Boughton.

Jack had the difficulty of privilege most of his life. His privilege was derived from his place as a pastor’s son. He was a white boy living in a small town where he could easily be shielded from responsibility, and as a result he struggled with the identity that his privilege afforded him. He was able to do just about anything and get away with it; he was protected from guilt. As he grew older he began to resent the loneliness that his shield of privilege brought him, which only caused him to pass his greatest responsibilities to his family. Ames deeply resented this lack of accountability but also recognized the burden it was to Jack. But Ames was often confined by his own internalized resentment, unable to communicate his fear of Jack’s irresponsibility contaminating his precious family for most of the book, like a disease of privilege that could contaminate all the legacy he had built, that could render his holy life filled with sin.

Later in life, Jack’s privilege again came back again to confront him and became a burden that finally cost him his relationship with his own son, the son of a black woman like your mother. She faced deep loss because of his irresponsibility and privilege and made a choice to care for her child and family instead of waiting on Jack’s irresponsible love. You see, love without responsibility is dangerous. And while Reverend Ames was finally able to reconcile with Jack, he could not help him overcome his privilege because he was wrapped cozily in his own. One of the major privileges that Ames could not see, one that Jack had to come face-to-face with, was their white privilege. That privilege allowed both of them to have innocence in society, a benefit of the doubt that allowed guilt to occur as a concept in their minds or an accusation to be avoided instead of a persistent, embodied reality that threatened their lives.