Acts of Faith by Philip Caputo. SPOILERS

It follows several people who live in or have come to Sudan in different capacities (aid workers, missionaries, bush pilots, rebels). They are all initially driven by faith in one form or another. But they compromise their beliefs one small act at a time—initially in the service of something ostensibly good—until their purposes for being there are completely corrupted.

It made me feel hopeless. Like no matter what people do for the good, human nature will find a way to destroy it from the inside out. I think I connected with it because one of the subplots is about a young woman who travels there with her church to liberate slaves. She marries a man from the tribe they work with but there are a lot of cultural disconnects that they can’t bridge.

I was early in my dating life and it reinforced that love isn’t enough. It changed how I looked at relationships, especially ones that required one party to give up a lot of who they are to make it work.

As she sees her marriage failing, she becomes desperate to protect it. So when her husband expresses interest in a former slave that had escaped and was being sheltered by the tribe, she orchestrates the girl’s return to her captor. It was so despicable and unconscionable. And she knew it, but she could justify it to herself. The book did such an incredible job of making her sympathetic even as she slowly changed into this person she never thought she’d be; all the little compromises and self-deceptions. The ultimate decision was surprising yet inevitable.

It made me more introspective in my decision making, always asking if this one small thing compromises my integrity or my larger purpose.