PLAN B: FURTHER THOUGHTS ON FAITH
ANN LAMOTT

(Review: Jim Abbott)

I first encountered Ann Lamott’s irreverent, off-the-wall wit at a community education writing class through her book Bird by Bird.  Lamott’s phrasing gave me some genuine involuntary laugh-out-loud moments.

 Her latest book, Plan B, deals with coping.  Coping in our new, harsher, war-is-normal world—and this as background for the added strains of being a single parent turning 50 with aging altzheimered parents and a fiercely independent 14 year old son..  I’m not even a parent—much less a mother—but I again was treated to some laugh-out-louds.

 Lamott can be classified as an off-beat member of the newly emerging Religious Left.  At a time when Christianity is almost automatically associated with Fundamentalism, Republicanism, and the born-again-Bush, Lamott stands out as a refreshing dichotomy.  She’s a regular church-goer at a Methodist Church (granted, a So. Californian one) and offers brief and humorous descriptions of her faith, e.g.:  “I didn’t need to understand the hypostatic unity of the Trinity; I just needed to turn my life over to whoever came up with Redwood trees.”

 Lamott calls herself “born again.”  Can such a person be critical of our president? Here’s an excerpt:  “But then a small miracle—I started to believe in George Bush.  In my terror, I wondered whether he was really smarter than we think he is, and had grasped classified intelligence and nuance in a way well above my understanding or that of our era’s most brilliant thinkers. Then I thought: Wait—George Bush? And relief washed over me like gentle surf, because believing in George Bush was so ludicrous that believing in God seems almost rational.”

 If this brought a chuckle, check out Plan B, take your prayer mat and go to the back of the bus.

 If it brought a frown, forget the book, join the Save Karl Rove phone team, and say a prayer for corporate tax breaks.