The Marble Room: How I lost God and Found Myself in Africa
By Bill Hatcher
Lantern Books
ISBN: 978-1-59056-406-6
$18.00; 288 pp.
Reviewed by Forrest Whitman
When the missionaries came to Africa they had the Bible and we had the land.
They said “Let us pray.” We closed our eyes. When we opened them we had the Bible and they had the land.
That’s an old African joke attributed to Bishop Desmond Tutu. Many a young Peace Corps volunteer went to Africa to try and ameliorate that ugly situation. Bill Hatcher, a current resident of the San Luis Valley, was no exception. 
He was somewhat unusual in that he was a believing, conservative Christian. He did not believe in evolution, and he considered African religions definitely inferior to evangelical Christianity. Through the course of his time in Africa, he came to see that western civilization was not necessarily better as a way of living than African traditional ways. He also gradually lost his faith in the God and Jesus he’d long believed in. Instead, he came to have what I’d call a modest faith in humans and our ability to exhibit loving kindness. Gradually he came to value Taoism, Buddhism and the animism of some of his students. He even decided science was right about human evolution. The glossary of Swahili words and phrases is a plus as you read along.
The book isn’t only a personal journey of faith lost and a new faith found, it’s a gripping adventure story as well. We follow Hatcher down into a mysterious cave, up to Mount Kilimanjaro (19,000 feet high), up Mount Meru, and even all the way to the summit of one of Africa’s toughest climbs, Mount Kenya. He almost bought his lunch on that one. Also well written are his accounts of learning to teach in a Tanzanian school for young women. There’s also a tragedy, but a good reviewer doesn’t spoil that part of the story. Personal accounts like this one are hard to pull off, but Bill Hatcher does it.
Visit Bill Hatcher’s website at www.billhatcherbooks.com
