house or doing some other meanness to him.(O’Connor 132)The Misfit’s view illustrates the active presence of an Evil force within the society. The grandmother assumed that if you came from “good people” that you would naturally be a “good person”. In contrast to this view of the old south, O’Connor presents the reader “with a world haunted by the sacred--a sacred with two faces now distinct and opposed, now enigmatically confused: the divine and the demonic”, and “in her fables the battleground where these two antagonistic powers confront each other and fight for possession of each man’s soul”(Bleikasten 139). The grandmother represents the active and faithful Christian servant, and the Misfit is symbolic of the devil or an Anti-Christ figure. Despite all of the good deeds that the grandmother has accomplished, God is not there to help her in her time of need. The old southern and traditional secular view was that good deeds would lead to a good life, but O’Connor recognizes that there is also an active force of Evil and presence of the Devil in this world.O’Connor’s antisecular and antiindividualistic views are also present in her short story “Good Country People”. Within this short story, the reader is presented with two differing views of religion: the devout Christian and the atheist. The devout Christians, Mrs. Hopewell and Mrs. Freeman, represents the old south as does the grandmother in “A Good Man Is Hard To Find”. O’Connor criticizes the old southern Christian for being faithful and trustful in “A Good Man Is Hard To Find”, yet the reader the does not quite know what to make of the ending in “Good Country People”. The story ends with the atheist being decieved by one who pretends to be a Christian. O’Connor could be presenting the reader with the view that one is not ...
