Action and Discussion Guides for White Picket Fences: Head Heart Hands, Discussion Guides, Bible Study

by Amy Julia Becker

I wrote a memoir, White Picket Turning toward Love in a World Divided by Privilege, in what seemed like a time of unprecedented social divisions. It was published in the fall of 2018, and since then we have only seen more political polarization and civic unrest.

In the midst of the social turmoil of these past few years, I have held onto the belief that we can respond to the harm of injustice and division with hope. We can participate in healing.

I developed a series of resources in response to people’s thoughts and questions after reading White Picket Fences, and those resources are all compiled in this book. We need conversation, prayer, and action that leads us towards love now more than ever. I hope these resources help you begin those conversations, prayers, and actions in your own communities.

Head, Heart, Hands

Inside these pages, you’ll first find Head, Heart, Hands. This companion to White Picket Fences lays out how we can respond—with our whole selves, our heads, hearts, and hands—to the harms of social division. It includes lists of resources and questions for reflection.

Discussion Guides

You will also find three different discussion guides.

• The first two guides are opportunities to gather a group of people to consider the themes of White Picket Fences and how to respond to social divisions with our whole selves.

• The final discussion guide is longer. It is both a discussion guide and a Bible study that looks at themes of social division and social healing in the Bible, designed to be used over the course of seven weeks.

The Next Small Steps

None of us can heal our society by ourselves. But we can each take the next small step towards love. I hope this book is one such step, and that you will find an invitation to the next small step within its pages.

92 pages, Paperback

Published November 9, 2021

About the author

Amy Julia Becker is the author of To Be Made Well: An Invitation to Wholeness, Healing, and Hope, which releases in March 2022. She is also the author of White Picket Fences: Turning toward Love in a World Divided by Privilege (2018), Small Talk: Learning From My Children About What Matters Most (2014), and A Good and Perfect Gift: Faith, Expectations and a Little Girl Named Penny (2011). A graduate of Princeton University and Princeton Theological Seminary, her essays about personal, social, and spiritual healing have appeared in the New York Times, the Washington Post, Christianity Today, and more. She is a big fan of frozen yogurt, her Ember mug, and hiking in the nearby woods with her family. Amy Julia lives with her husband and three children in western Connecticut.