This blog comes from Scott Aldrich, an English teacher from Thornapple Kellogg High School in Middleville, MI. His project, One Book One Community, Middleville, was awarded a 2020 Bridge Builders microgrant. This blog post was originally posted on Mr. Aldrich's blog on October 28, 2020.

A brisk fall evening, the last teasing tidbits of sunshine disappearing behind the golden leaves of the maples lining the riverbank. The chilled whisper of winter lingering in the air. A seemingly random group of strangers, each with book in hand, gradually converged under the pavilion nestled in our quaint little town.

Organizing a community book club in this, of all years, has been an arduous endeavor for sure. But there we were, sixteen individuals from various backgrounds and back stories, bundled and masked up, ready to talk about a book, a story that moved us like few can. A story of compassion, of humanity, of justice, and of mercy. While 2020 may have been a tough year to launch this effort, it has never been needed more.

This idea was born of the collective experiences and shared desires of three individuals: a village trustee, a small town librarian, and a high school English teacher. But none of us is just a title or just our job, and each of the three of us brought our own life experiences, passions, and struggles into this combined effort. What we found is that many others in the community were ready to explore these ideas, share their stories, and face the tough conversations that need to be had. And despite the obstacles of 2020, we found a way to start those conversations in one way or another. We started them in living rooms, in churches, in classrooms, in coffee shops, in online discussion groups, during neighborhood walks, and over the phone with distant relatives and friends.

With a generous grant from the Michigan Municipal League Foundation, we were able to purchase and provide free copies of the book for those who wanted one for our book club. And we spent the month of October walking with author Bryan Stevenson on his journey to bring justice and hope to so many in desperate need. We shared in his hard fought triumphs as well as the painful struggles and devastating defeats he witnessed and continues to work toward rectifying. Just Mercy tells us stories we don’t want to imagine happening in our world, but it also demands we acknowledge their existence and contemplate what can be done about them. What our role can be in bringing about change. And that starts with having the conversations. It starts there, but hopefully it won’t end with a single event like a meeting on a cold October evening in a small Michigan town. The end goal, the purpose of a community book club like ours, is to initiate small waves of ideas and discussions that will continue to reverberate through families, neighborhoods, and workplaces, into the consciousness of communities so that we may work toward a mindset of valuing and supporting all individuals in society.

One part of Stevenson’s book that sticks with me is near the end of Chapter 15:

“I guess I’d always known but never fully considered that being broken is what makes us human. We all have our reasons. Sometimes we’re fractured by the choices we make; sometimes we’re shattered by things out of our control. But our brokenness is also the source of our humanity, the basis for our shared search for comfort, meaning, and healing. Our shared vulnerability and imperfection is what gives us each our capacity for compassion.

We have a choice. We can embrace our humanness, which means embracing our broken natures and the compassion that remains our best hope for healing. Or we can deny our brokenness, deny compassion, and as a result, deny our own humanity.”

In all, just shy of fifty participants from our community and surrounding areas joined in reading the book together so we could share our thoughts, learn, and grow – our ages ranging from seventeen to over seventy. Work schedules, weather, quarantines, and those random life interruptions may have prevented many from joining us under that pavilion, but they nonetheless engaged in other ways, infusing their own voice into a community conversation about how we treat those struggling at the fringes of society. And this was but the first wave. In just the 24 hours since our group discussion in that chilly pavilion, book club members have already begun talking about the book with friends, lent it to neighbors, passed it along to friends at church, and advocated for next steps in our communities, workplaces, and neighborhoods. Our “end of book discussion” is really just the start of something much bigger. At least it has the potential to be, if we all continue to do our part.

At the conclusion of our evening discussion, members expressed their gratitude for an opportunity to share, to listen, to collaborate, and to connect – something so many of us find ourselves longing for in an environment with so much uncertainty. Despite physical distancing requirements and restrictions in our lives, our minds and hearts are still free to wander, to connect, and to open up toward a better understanding and love of others.

And just maybe that will lead to a better understanding and love of ourselves along the way.