Anselm Coleman, 45, and Jordan Moore, 28, are both priests in the Dominican Order in the Order’s South African house of studies in Stellenbosch. It is the sixties and change is in the air. The Second Vatican Council has initiated change in the Catholic Church. In South Africa opposition to the racist policy of apartheid is growing.
Through their relationships with two women, Francoise, 35, wife of a wealthy businessman, and Dawn, 23, a librarian, both men are forced to question their vocation and the meaning of their lives. The effect of their relationship – at once both spiritual and sexual – with the priests is just as life-changing for the women. Through periods of pain as well as moments of bliss, all of the characters undergo a kind of conversion which, though with different results for each of them, gives them all a new understanding of themselves and a new direction to their lives.