Misfit Sermon Analysis

Register to read the introduction… The hate and bitterness of his “snarl” is the final implication as to how the Misfit feels about religion (O’Connor 645). Bellamy insists that the reason for the devilish message in the Misfit’s speech is due to his mission to play to role of the Anti-Christ. Bellamy asserts that, “The central message of the Misfit’s sermon, for a sermon is what his remarks amount to, is a familiar one in Flannery O’Connor’s fiction; there is no middle ground between absolute belief in Christ’s messianic fiction and a belief that like is nasty, brutish, and short,” (200). Katherine Feeley notes that the Misfit “embodies all reason and no faith,” which is the opposite of the faith-based personality of the grandmother (202). As Madison Jones remarks, the Misfit “may be haunted, at times tormented, by vision of Christ raising the dead, but he cannot believe it: he was not there. All that he can believe, really believe, is what his eyes show him: this world without meaning or justice, this prison house where we are confined,” (208). The Misfit is thus likened to the Anti-Christ because of his rejection of Jesus and his abhorrence for …show more content…
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