Cedric Willow is a middle-aged journalist and senior warden at St. Bartholomew by the Lake, a small Episcopal parish in Minneapolis. St. Bart's church is a widely admired icon of mid-century modern architecture, but its congregation is aging and attendance is on the decline. When the incumbent rector resigns, Cedric forms a search committee—a "discernment" committee, in Episcopal parlance—and embarks on a nine-month search for a new spiritual leader.

Complicating his task: a bitter feud between two members of the vestry, the fact that he's an atheist, and a disruptive voice in his head called Op Ed. There's also the Church Lady, a mousy junior warden who aspires to his position, who strikes him as pious to a fault, and with whom he is falling in love.

Discernment is a novel about trying to do the right thing in a world with no easy answers, and what happens when altruism and self-interest collide.