“Treat others the way you would like to be treated”, its the golden rule. Unfortunately that’s the opposite of what 's going on in Gabriel Marquez’s short story,“A Very Old Man with Enormous Wings”. Despite the possibility that the old man with enormous wings may be an angel he is treated as a circus animal. He is mentally and physically abused throughout the short story not only by the family, he is living with, but also the village and most surprisingly the church. Pelayo and Elisenda, the family, the very old man with enormous wings is staying with are the first to disregard the golden rule. From the beginning they mistreated the angel by making him stay in a unsanitary environment like the chicken coop. “..before going to bed, he dragged him out of the mud and locked him up with the hens in the wire chicken coop”.(363) Instead of helping the angel they used him for their own personal gain. They took advantage that everyone in town knew there was a flesh-and blood angel at their place to make money. “...Pelayo and Elisenda were happy with fatigue, for less than a week they had crammed their rooms with money and the line of pilgrims waiting their turn to enter still reached beyond the horizon.”(365) Also, while the family used the money from displaying the angel to build themselves a two-story mansion but paid no attention was given to where the actual angel was staying. Living conditions for the angel actually become worse. “..the sun and rain caused the collapse of the