Anne Lamott's Traveling Mercies: An Analysis

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Many may believe that reading a book about religion would be challenging to accomplish for someone who is not religious. But those people have never read Anne Lamott’s, Traveling Mercies: Some Thoughts on Faith. If one were to ask non-religious college students to read a book by a random author about spirituality and “Finding God” through conversion, they would most likely roll their eyes and bear through it. In Lamott’s series of essays, one does not have to “suffer through the readings” because her writing style is one of a kind. She has strategically chosen every word because she is aware of how important her spiritual experiences are to so many people, religious or not. Her story is one of great strength, power, and faith and if it was not for her superb writing skills, that message would not get across as clearly as it does. “I took a long …show more content…

In many cases, reading religious stories would not be something that excites college students, but Traveling Mercies is not the average religious tale. The turning point in the novel is Lamott’s conversion; she sees Jesus in her bedroom and decides to stop resisting and let him into her life. The moment she does this is when her life changes completely and she is able to communicate with God through people and places in her life. Her friends, her home town, her church, even her neighbor are seemingly able to possess traits that God’s “perfect human” would have: kindness, generosity, patience, approachability, etc. The person who stood out the most, being Rick Fields of Lamott’s essay Fields. He possesses all of these characteristics and more, he is able to help her whenever she needs it, and gives her God’s guidance first hand. Anne Lamott is able to communicate with God through Rick Fields as a result of her conversion and her belief that God’s grace works through people in her

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