The author of previous memoirs, this one looks at James Martin’s life through a lens that identifies with readers everywhere. Each job that the popular priest and author of New York Times bestsellers remembers served an important purpose in his life, as he says all things do, and each taught him something about being a good human being.
Readers will know Martin, who has spent more than a decade dedicated to opening up the Roman Catholic Church to greater acceptance of LGBTQ+ people, from his many appearances on “The Colbert Report” and “The Late Show with Stephen Colbert”; also for his top-rated podcast, “The Spiritual Life with Fr. James Martin.”
Work in Progress is a warm memoir full of anecdotes from jobs Martin held, beginning with ordinary work as a child. Paperboy-ing, lawn-mowing, and caddying are just three, and the author talks about them with simple stories, not grand conclusions. There is absolutely nothing “preachy” here. Each job — no matter how small — is shown to be “good work” from which this now-famous priest concludes he obtained essential life lessons. He summarizes these, at one point: “Work hard, be on time, apologize when you need to, forgive frequently, ask if you don’t know something, don’t misuse power, pay attention to those who are struggling, Don’t be mean. Be kind. Listen.”
There are also lessons learned from play, including anecdotes from the author’s life as a child on teams, or struggling to be accepted by teams, and by his own father, as well as play that sometimes turned too raucous in Martin’s college years.
The title of the book is meant as double entendre, indicating what every human life is: a Work in Progress, and how ordinary experiences make us who we are, and who we are meant to become.
Before the end, Martin turns to the corporate job he held at General Electric where he was well-paid and on track to become a success in every way that the world understands that word. But, Martin writes, going to business school and accepting a corporate position was, for him, like stepping onto a conveyor belt. And at no point did a professor or supervisor ask him, “‘What kind of life would you like to lead?’ ‘What is your calling?’ Or, more basically, ‘What kind of person do you want to become?’”
His corporate job consumed his time and energies, but didn’t meet other needs, or answer those bigger questions. “It seemed circular,” Martin writes, “I go to work so I can make money so I can support myself so I can go to work.”
So when one day he learned about a Catholic monk named Thomas Merton, who wrote a memoir about stepping out of others’ expectations to become a monk, Martin was primed to respond somehow. He started, then, on the way toward becoming a member of the Society of Jesus (a Jesuit).
As is true of all of Martin’s books, this is approachable and full of anecdotes, including ones that reveal personal faults and weaknesses in the author’s life — a quality one rarely finds in writings by clergy of any kind. There are good reasons why so many people love James Martin and his books — because he understands people, and his love for others shines from his pages.
