Themes
Key
LitCharts assigns a color and icon to each theme in Gilead, which you can use to track the themes throughout the work.
Life, Death, and Beauty
Christian Faith, Mystery, and Ministry
Memory, Vision, and Conviction
Estrangement and Reconciliation
Loneliness and Love
Summary
Analysis
All this happened two days ago; now it is Sunday. In a minister’s life, it always seems to be Sunday, or Saturday night. No sooner do you prepare for one week than the next week begins. This morning for his sermon, John read one of his old sermons. Some of it seemed right and some of it embarrassingly wrong.
Life goes on for John as it always does: a continual cycle of Sundays and the duties of preparing for the next Sunday. But John has changed over the years, as shown by the fact that he’s ambivalent about some of his old sermons.
Themes
Jack Boughton was in church, and it particularly embarrassed John to stand there reading an old sermon while Jack smiled at him. Yet afterward, he wonders if Jack might have been comforted by the sermon’s very irrelevance. He no longer feels his old dread around Jack. In fact, he almost wishes he could bequeath Jack a wife and child to make up for the ones he’s lost.
Before, John felt threatened by Jack’s smiling expression in church; it felt like a knowing insult. But now he feels like the two of them stand on more even ground, having arrived at a better understanding. Neither one of them has life figured out, and they both know it.
Themes
This morning, John woke up thinking that Gilead might as well be “standing on the absolute floor of hell,” and it’s his fault as much as anyone’s. He thinks about everything that’s happened there over his lifetime—droughts, the Spanish Flu, the Depression, and three wars—and wonders why they never considered what God might be trying to teach them through it all. Since they didn’t, the question was taken away from them. One might ask why there’s a town left here at all. He wonders if he never left Gilead because he was afraid he wouldn’t come back.
The conversation with Jack rattles John and his view of the town he loves so much. He doesn’t say so explicitly, but he implies that God has sent various disasters to urge the people to repent of their sin, or at least to teach them something important. But because the town never heeded those warnings, God has abandoned them. John struggles with the idea that Gilead, once an abolitionist haven, might not welcome a family like Jack’s.
Themes
John’s parents did leave Gilead. Edward built a cottage on the Gulf Coast, and their parents moved in partly to get away from the climate. At one point John’s father came back after Louisa died to try to persuade John to leave, too. John asked his father to preach at the church, but he said he just couldn’t do it anymore. He told John that he and Edward had always hoped John might seek a “broader experience” elsewhere and reminded him that he doesn’t have to remain loyal to this place and its old ways. John was upset by this. He’d always understood that his loyalty to God transcended his loyalties to things like local customs and memories. Did his father think he was ignorant of that?
Earlier, it was implied that John and his father disappointed each other, but only now do the details come out—that even if John’s father didn’t lose his faith outright, he seems to have become disillusioned with the ministry and with Gilead. In his disillusionment, he didn’t respect John’s choice to remain here. John was offended that his father implied he was small-minded, or at least falsely loyal, by choosing to stay here.
Themes
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John doesn’t recall what he actually said at the time, but all his father accomplished was to deepen John’s loyalty to Gilead. He hadn’t realized how low his father’s estimation of him was. It was a dark time. A week later he got a letter from his father that felt like a “cold wind” sweeping over his life. It caused him much sorrow, but it also forced him to throw himself on the Lord, so he can’t ultimately regret that time.
Part of John’s deep attachment to Gilead comes from his father’s rejection of the town. He doesn’t say what was in his father’s letter, but he hints that it was the final breaking-point in their relationship and that they were estranged after that point. If they ever reconciled, John doesn’t say so. This adds another dimension to John’s long years of loneliness.
Themes
John isn’t sure why he was thinking about this to begin with. He supposes he was thinking about life’s many frustrations and disappointments. He hasn’t been totally honest with his son about how many there are.
Even though John has learned to seek God’s grace in all kinds of circumstances, that doesn’t mean he has a falsely hopeful view of life. Things remain unresolved in his life, and he wants his son to understand how heartbreaking life can be.
Themes
This morning he went to the bank and cashed a check, in hopes of helping Jack out a little. But when he offered it to Jack, Jack put the money back in John’s pocket and pointed out that John doesn’t have money to spare. John tried to give away what very little he has—his wife’s and son’s money, at that—and this is how it was received.
John feels hurt and rejected by Jack’s response to his generosity. He’s trying to treat Jack as a son, in a way, and it feels as though Jack is throwing that back in his face. Really, Jack is probably just aware of how little John has and doesn’t want to take from him and his family—but it’s hard to tell.
Themes
John asked Jack if he was heading back to Memphis, but Jack said he was going “anywhere else.” He’s received the long-awaited letter from Della. John’s heart felt heavy. He tried to make small talk with the family, but Jack and Glory were clearly upset, and Boughton was just staring into space. Then John tried to do Jack a kindness and only managed to offend him. When he got home, Lila made him lie down. She lowered the shades and stroked John’s hair for a while.
Jack implies that Della has rejected Jack, or at the very least set him free from their relationship, given the incredible strain they’ve been living under. Jack can’t tell his family why he intends to leave Gilead, so they’re baffled and hurt. The news seems to take a physical toll on John, too.
Themes
