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When Matt Murray is 13 years old, his mother, a gifted writer and an unconventional Catholic, dies. His father, an official in the Washington, D.C., city government, suddenly changes jobs. He functions poorly as a single parent, and the family, a sister and two brothers, begins to drift apart. The unconventional Catholic faith of his father gives way to new religious behaviors that seemed bizarre, even embarrassing, to young Matt. His father joins a Benedictine community and eventually becomes a priest. Had God "stormed into his father's life" or had his father "gone crazy?," Matt wonders.