The Father and the Son

In this powerful, moving, and sometimes painful work week -- part memoir, part reportage -- Wall Street Journal reporter Matt Murray explores the reasons his widowed father, a middle-class homeowner and government worker, abandoned his world and moved to a rural monastery to become a monk. He thoughtfully traces his father's life, from his dirt-poor Depression-era childhood and his days as a struggling young writer to his sometimes frustrating role as a husband and parent, to the death of his wife from cancer. Throughout, Matt Murray wrestles with the impact of his father's return to the Church, with his subsequent decision to follow a life of faith, and witch the dramatic reshaping of his family that ensued. As he tracks his father's spiritual journey, he delves into his own beliefs, questioning not only his father's faith but his own and offering, with stark honesty, profound reflections on the complex relationship between father and son.