“My aunt told me that when you were saved you saw a light, and something happened to you inside! And Jesus came into your life! And God was with you from then on! She said you could see and hear and feel Jesus in your soul. I believed her. I had heard a great many old people say the same thing and it seemed to me they ought to know.”(179) In “Salvation” the community has a big impact on Hughes religious experience when he went to get “saved”. As a result of the community and his aunt’s beliefs and interpretation of being “saved”, which was by hearing, feeling and seeing a light as well as Jesus in your soul. Hughes ends up misinterpreting the meaning of being “saved”. He is under the impression that he is physically going to see, feel and hear Jesus. When Jesus doesn’t present himself to Hughes, but he notices that the rest of the children there with him are getting “saved” and seeing Jesus, he then feels pressured and forced to the point where he feels that he has to lie, please the community and his aunt and give them what they wanted to see. Hughes stands up acting as if he was “saved” and saw the light even though he didn’t actually see or feel anything because he didn’t want to disappoint his aunt and the community, causing him to lose faith and no longer believe in Jesus.…
Hughes story reveals how he was forced into accepting Christ into his life by his Aunt Reed, his friends, and the church community. The pressure begins to be evident when his Aunt Reed creates a false stigma of what it is to be saved. “My Aunt told me that when you were saved you saw a light, and something happened to you inside! And Jesus came into your life!” (Hughes 369). Aunt Reed paints a picture in Hughes head of what it will feel like to be saved, creating false expectations for him. Creating it of great importance not only to…
In John Steinbeck’s The Grapes of Wrath, Steinbeck uses several characters and situations to symbol something greater. The character, Jim Casy, is portrayed as an allegorical figure that represents Jesus Christ. Casy’s ideals and beliefs are very similar to those of Jesus Christ. Jim Casy is used to represent Jesus Christ, and to give the people going through a hard time a glimpse of hope and strength.…
In the Christ hymn, Paul endeavors to get his message across through a chiastic structure. By using this structure, Paul helps his recipients to be able to “feel” the decent of Christ from God to the worst death possible. The death that only belonged to non-citizen slaves. Paul then helps to to “feel” the wonderful and mighty exaltation that was given to Christ in return for the sacrifice He made.…
According to Viramontes, the unique challenges by Latina females is caused greatly by their ethnic background. Often women are oppressed by society, but when the issue is of color these challenges are harder to avoid. This does not only occur in this novel, but exists today in the real world. Many Latina females are often discriminated and harassed by societal influences, which makes them feel forced into specific roles. As seen in Under the Feet of Jesus, Estrella is a victim of these ongoing challenges, for being part of a low socioeconomic status, lack of education, and not being a legal U.S. citizen.…
Our story begins like many other stories with a setting, main character, and a catchy introduction. Like many other stories it attracts the reader’s attention with something vague, making the person reading the story want to continue on further into the piece. This reading is like many other’s which portray real life situations, and show a different culture coming from a first person point of view. In the story, the main character, Langston, is a young boy who seems to be going through a common religious ritual that is normally bestowed upon young people when they reach a certain age in what seems to be a different sort of society. At this age, young people are asked, or maybe better yet, told to believe in God, and only then will these children be able to achieve pure “salvation.” This is highly evident within the first paragraph where the author writes, “Then just before the revival ended, they held a special meeting for children, “to bring the young lambs to the fold”” (Hughes 1). It is during these ceremonies that Langston feels that he has almost committed a crime for which his sins will never be forgiven.…
Resurrection in Christian belief is the rising of the dead at the Last Judgment. Resurrection is most notably associated biblically with Jesus Christ. Christ’s rising from the dead three days after having been crucified on the cross is a story well known among most. It is the first ever and authentic report of a resurrection in our history. “Never before had anyone been raised from the grave in such a way as to be completely transformed and thus beyond the icy fingers of death.” (Deffinbaugh) Resurrection is a common biblical theme noted several time in the scriptures within the Old Testament and the New Testament of the Bible connecting the two.…
In conclusion, A Prayer for Owen Meany is a very powerful novel that creates a comparison of similarities between Owen Meany and Jesus Christ. Throughout the novel, Owen shows many Christ-like characteristics. For example, both Christ and Owen were born to a virgin mother. They both knew how and when they were going to die, but they chose against altering these events and just letting fate lie in God’s hands. They each sacrificed their lives to save others. These similarities are not the only ways that Owen and Jesus relate. Although, these are the most remarkable similarities shown in the…
Hughes was a young and impressionable boy who wanted "salvation" and to see Jesus so badly that when he couldn't see Jesus and the others could, he found himself in a position of disappointing himself as well as others in his community. Hughes "saved" himself by pretending to see Jesus. He was saved not by his love for Jesus like the congregation had probably hoped, but instead by his desire to conform, obey and please. What would have happened if he did not step forward and claim to be saved ? Regardless, it is evident that he was frightened by rejection. Because of his fear of rejection, Hughes fell into his own trap of trying to please everyone, and instead met the needs of nobody because of his deception of all the other people attending church that day, not to mention himself.…
Christians have traditionally believed that Jesus died for our sins and this belief has given rise to some questionable explanations like the idea that God would be appeased with the execution of an innocent person. Other questionable inferences include the idea that Jesus became human simply for him to be sacrificed because he is the only person of sufficient value to pay a ransom to God or Satan. More adequate reflections on the death of Jesus highlight the notion that death is an integral part of the human condition and one which is shared by Jesus. Other ways of appreciating the importance of the death of Jesus include…
Have you ever wondered how Christians keep on going through all the trials, both large and small that they encounter. In the Pilgrim’s Progress, Christian embarks on a journey, full of trials and triumphs,to reach heaven. During his journey Christian meets many people, both friend and foe. He is helped and mislead both by others and by himself. Leaving his family and friends, Christian seeks the Celestial City, because he knows it is everlasting and that his hometown and its people will eventually come to ruin. He is also given a burden to carry. Christians first difficulty is the Slough of Despond, many previous pilgrims have been weighed down there by their doubts and fears. With some difficulty Christan manages to make it through…
As I read paragraph by paragraph I could feel the hairs standing up in the back of my head with thrill and excitement. The paragraph in which he describes his feeling of why he was crying and his doubt for Jesus was all too familiar in my younger years of life. I was very interested in this part because I felt his pain and confusion for having such high expectations and beliefs from what people explained what would happen when he was saved and it becoming a big disappointment and caused doubts when nothing happened.…
The cross, it may seem to be something so simple, yet the Christian community, and other bible believing communities, treat it like it is the air they breathe. Why is something so facile, so salient to a society of people? The Christian community finds the cross to be their solitude; the cross is their symbol of freedom from torment, and the love God has for them. Just as the American flag shows American citizens freedom, or the Statue of Liberty told the immigrants they were safe. The cross tells the Christians that they do not need to worry about what will happen after death anymore. They believe God has them and will not let them fall into an eternity of torment. The Christian community holds on to the cross with vigilance and will fight…
The short story Salvation, written by Langston Hughes, is based on his personal experience at church as a young child. Langston Hughes aunt takes him to a meeting for the children at her church. At the meeting all the kids were to sit on the mourners bench and wait for Jesus to save them. Towards the end of the ceremony, all the children had been saved by Jesus except Langston and another boy. Eventually, he decides to get up and said that he had been “saved” by Jesus, although he never was. His tone in the story is somewhat a feeling of betrayal and that things aren’t always what they seem. Langston presents 2 contradictory views on religion in which are presented from Langston himself and his Auntie Reed. In the story Hughes says, “ I was…
Throughout the Bible, Jesus makes it clear that we are to be Christ-like and our attitudes should be the same as his. Jesus freely put his rights aside, in order to become a human, to serve the needs of mankind. Which made him submissive to death. However, while he was on the cross, Jesus Christ’s humility is exemplified because he bore an agonizing death that consisted of humiliation, in order to provide our requirements.…