Paradise Lost

LETTER FROM POINT CLEAR

By Dennis McFarland

Henry Holt. 290 pp. $25

Preachers in literature -- from Arthur Dimmesdale to Elmer Gantry -- tend to be a sanctimonious, hypocritical lot who do not practice what they sermonize. At first blush, the foil in Dennis McFarland's new novel, Letter from Point Clear-- a charismatic evangelical minister -- seems straight out of the feet-of-clay seminary. But, as he has amply demonstrated in his five previous novels, McFarland's attitude toward even his most flawed characters is nuanced and compassionate.

Brother and sister Morris and Ellen Owen have long ago escaped from their gloomy childhood in Point Clear, Ala., dominated by their "drunken, narcissistic" father, Roy. They have settled in orderly New England with loyal spouses and prosperous careers, far away from the South's racism, homophobia and "ignorant mean-spirited people."

Their complacency is knocked sideways when a letter arrives from their younger sister Bonnie, an out-of-work, overmedicated actress who has moved back to the dilapidated family manse after Roy's death. Bonnie announces her quickie marriage to a man she met on the beach who "said he was a preacher," with the preposterous name of Pastor Vandorpe. He's head of a booming church that has just launched "a big fund-raising campaign" for a mall-sized Christ Center. Bonnie gushes, "I felt that when he looked at me he saw me."

Ellen and Morris suspect that Pastor has indeed seen Bonnie all too clearly -- a "train wreck" with a million-dollar beachside house and a trust fund. Airplane tickets back to Point Clear are booked, bags are packed.

But when they meet the man of God in the flesh, Ellen and Morris are unnerved by . . . well, by his charisma. Boyishly handsome with "plundering midnight blue eyes," he espouses his faith with disarming sincerity and conviction. He chows down on the old family cook's blackberry pie and cinnamon mashed potatoes with endearing gusto. The siblings have to admit that Bonnie, now three months pregnant, has never seemed so happy -- or so sober.

Ironically, Pastor proves to be more judgmental of his new in-laws than they are of him. He tries to save Morris from "the sin of homosexuality" by inviting an ex-gay parishioner for dinner to deliver an inspirational chat. The plan backfires, of course, leaving Pastor chastened. Later, at a beach picnic, when Morris accuses him of misusing his pulpit to get "the last word," Pastor, in a wonderfully Cheeveresque moment, tackles him face first into the sand.

By the end of their visit to Point Clear, the members of the newly minted Owen-Vandorpe clan find their belief (or lack of belief) in Pastor's words "all shook up." In Letter from Point Clear, McFarland turns a comic showdown between New England skeptics and Bible Belt fundamentalists into an eloquent meditation on the many meanings of faith.

-- Caroline Preston's most recent novel is "Gatsby's Girl."