City of God: Faith in the Streets

“You are dust and to dust you shall return.” One wouldn’t think a book about death would be so vibrant, but Miles (Take This Bread) is able to interweave characters and portraits of her city of God, San Francisco, to bring her theology and practice of Ash Wednesday liturgy to life on the streets. Miles is herself a character, a woman who wrestles with her spirituality as a recovering reporter sympathetic to a plurality of religious movements beyond Protestant Christianity. She introduces other personalities who put flesh and blood on her story of repentance on Ash Wednesday 2012, like an “ancient Mexican bearded gnome-lady” who blesses Miles, or Mr. Claws, the homeless man who sparks her adventure with a visit to a medical clinic, only to disappear. San Francisco’s Mission District is not only the setting but also the protagonist of the book, moving the narrative forward with its urban flavors and faults, influencing Miles’s theology and making “the presence of God most real” for both author and reader. This is a convincing Lenten adventure into a dynamic Christian view of faith in the streets, of repentance and blessing, life and death, in the cracked sidewalks and fractured realities of the city of God. Agent: Greg Daniel, Daniel Literary Group. (Feb. 4)