Marielle Marino
Mr. Stewart
English 12 Honors
17 January 2023
The Significance of Hypocrisy in Alice Walker’s “The Welcome Table”
Hypocrisy often goes unnoticed, even in situations where one would assume it’s very obvious. In Alice Walker’s short story, “The Welcome Table,” the issue of hypocrisy is constant and very obvious to the reader, though ignored by most of the story’s characters. The white churchgoers in the story tend to overlook how the values of their actions don’t align with the values of their religion when a black woman attempts to join them in worship. In many ways, their cruel actions towards the old woman affect them negatively as well, even if they’re unable to see it. In the Christian religion, the church is known to
…show more content…
They assume that she is unaware that she is trying to attend a “white church” and find her behavior to be reprehensible. Their inaccurate beliefs prevent them from acting with respect, “Those who knew the hesitant creeping up on them of the law, saw the beginning of the end of the sanctuary of Christian worship, saw the desecration of Holy Church, and saw an invasion of privacy, which they struggled to believe they still kept.” (Walker 11) They see the woman as a threat to society, meanwhile their hypocrisy and ignorance is the real threat; they are contributing to the racial divide in America and countering their christian teachings. They are unable to see the woman for what she is: someone who wants to practice their religion safely and peacefully. As the old woman takes her place in a pew, she is approached by the usher who proceeds to ask her to exit the church, “‘Auntie, you know this is not your church?’As if one could choose the wrong one.” (Walker 11) Once again, the hypocrisy is unbelievable considering where the story is taking place. Like Walker mentions in the story, it is unheard of that someone could attend the “wrong” church. By attempting to remove the old woman from the church, the usher is proving his hypocrisy by disproving one of the core values of Christianity, acceptance. His hypocritical actions are hurtful and