Foreword by author Ann Patchett, who writes of the beloved Nashville priest’s posthumous memoir, “You hold in your hand a manual for decency and kindness.”
Now available for pre-order; release date September 17, 2024
In the months before he died in August 2023, Nashvillian Charles Strobel, founder of a national model of care for the unhoused called Room In The Inn, decided to commit to paper the stories he’d told his whole life of the people who had guided him in the ways of unconditional love. Many of them were destitute. All of them were poor in body, spirit or both.
These simple tales, compiled in his posthumous memoir The Kingdom of the Poor: My Journey Home, tell of the father who died when Charles was four, of the mother and aunts who raised him on selflessness, of the family friend who ignited his passion for baseball, of founding Room In The Inn with a peanut butter sandwich, of losing his mother to murder, of forgiving her killer – and so much more.
By turns funny, tender, heartbreaking, and profound, Strobel’s stories wield the power to convince the reader of the truth that shaped his life and work: that everyone has the capacity for good. “We are all poor and we are all worthy of love,” he says.
Advance praise for The Kingdom of the Poor: My Journey Home has come in from across the literary and social justice spheres:
“He has left us an enduring testament to the power of good works—and a reminder that all of us have the capacity to bend the arc of the moral universe a bit closer to justice.”
– Jon Meacham, Pulitzer Prize–winning historian and author of The Soul of America
“In The Kingdom of the Poor, Charlie Strobel reminds us again and again what true light looks like in even the most unbearable darkness. It looks like communion. It looks like mercy. It looks like love.”
– Margaret Renkl, author of The Comfort of Crows: A Backyard Year and Late Migrations
“This tender book invites us all to a larger love and a flourishing joy. It will leave you with the breathless longing to stand at the margins so that they get erased. Charlie Strobel was the shape of God's heart."
– Father Greg Boyle, author of Tattoos on the Heart and founder of Homeboy Industries
“Funny. Tender. Bursting with compassion and insight. But I’d be careful if I were you. This little book might change your life.”
– Kate Bowler, author of Have a Beautiful Terrible Day! and The Lives We Actually Have
“If we’re lucky, we’ll meet someone who truly opens our eyes to the suffering of others, and so our hearts to the healing power of forgiveness, compassion, and simple kindness. Our Charlie full of Grace.”
– Emmylou Harris, singer-songwriter and activist
“Seeing Christ in all of us, Charles Strobel has given us one final blessing: beatitudes for our time and a blueprint for joy and wholeness.”
– Matthew Desmond, Pulitzer-prize winning sociologist and author of Poverty, by America
The Kingdom of the Poor (Vanderbilt University Press, 2024) is edited by Katie Seigenthaler, Strobel’s niece; and Amy Frogge, his Room In The Inn colleague. It includes a foreword by internationally renowned author Ann Patchett, who wrote about Strobel and his way in the world in “The Worthless Servant,” which is included in her essay collection These Precious Days.
The Kingdom of the Poor is available for pre-order through its independent bookseller partner Parnassus, as well as independent and online booksellers nationwide. It will be released September 17, 2024 and featured at the 36th annual Southern Festival of Books (October 26-27).
All royalties from the sale of The Kingdom of the Poor will go to Room In The Inn.
About Room In The Inn
Room In The Inn was founded by Charles Strobel one winter night in 1986 when he offered shelter and sandwiches to people sleeping in their cars in the parking lot outside the church where he served as pastor. Today, its Winter Shelter program works with hundreds of local congregations to offer emergency shelter during the coldest months of the year—a model that has been replicated in more than 35 cities across the US and Canada. In addition, the Room In The Inn Campus offers year-round crisis support and long-term solutions focused on four areas: health, education, income, and housing. Through the power of spirituality and the practice of love, Room In The Inn provides hospitality with a respect that offers hope in a community of non-violence. The staff and volunteers of Room In The Inn daily fulfill its mission to provide programs that emphasize human development and recovery through education, self-help and work, centered in community and long-term support for those who call the streets of Nashville home. To learn more, visit www.roomintheinn.org.
About Vanderbilt University Press
Established in 1940, Vanderbilt University Press is the principal publishing arm of one of the nation’s leading research universities. The Press’s primary mission is to select, produce, market, and disseminate scholarly publications of outstanding quality and originality. In conjunction with the long-term development of its editorial program, the Press draws on and supports the intellectual activities of the university and its faculty. Although its main emphasis falls in the area of scholarly publishing, the Press also publishes books of substance and significance that are of interest to the general public, including regional books. In this regard, the Press also supports Vanderbilt’s service and outreach to the larger local and national community. To learn more, visit www.vanderbiltuniversitypress.com.
About FINN Partners
Founded in 2011 on the principles of innovation and collaborative partnership, FINN Partners has grown from about $24 million in fees to almost $170 million in fees over ten years, becoming one of the fastest growing independent public relations agencies in the world. The full-service marketing and communications company's record setting pace is a result of organic growth and integrating new companies and new people into the FINN world through a common philosophy. With over 1,000 professionals, FINN provides clients with global access and capabilities in the U.S., Europe, and Asia. In addition, FINN provides its clients with access to top tier agencies around the world through its membership in the global network PROI. Headquartered in New York, FINN's other offices are in Atlanta, Boston, Chicago, Denver, Detroit, Fort Lauderdale, Frankfurt, Hong Kong, Jerusalem, London, Los Angeles, Munich, Nashville, Paris, Portland, San Francisco, Seattle, Shanghai, Singapore, Southern California and Washington D.C. To learn more, visit www.finnpartners.com.
