All Cross, No Resurrection?
Having spent sometime reading a couple of Flannery O'Connor stories, I am confused about what is called "Dark Grace." The most recent Credenda magazine chose Miss O'Connor as its theme and made significant mention of what they termed "Dark Grace."
"Dark Grace" as I understand it is basically grace that comes in a form that we would consider dark (pretty deep huh?). The greatest example of dark grace being the cross. Grace came in the atrocity of the cross.
So now the crux of the issue, how does grace come through in Flannery's stories? I have read two stories that I have had particular trouble seeing how the grace is coming through, "A Good Man is Hard to Find" and "The River." These stories abruptly end with death and I am left wondering why that death is grace if death is the end of the story. It seems like both stories end with darkness and never have any resolve like the effects of Christ's death on the cross. Both stories seem to end with the burial and miss the resurrection.
What am I missing in these stories?
"Dark Grace" as I understand it is basically grace that comes in a form that we would consider dark (pretty deep huh?). The greatest example of dark grace being the cross. Grace came in the atrocity of the cross.
So now the crux of the issue, how does grace come through in Flannery's stories? I have read two stories that I have had particular trouble seeing how the grace is coming through, "A Good Man is Hard to Find" and "The River." These stories abruptly end with death and I am left wondering why that death is grace if death is the end of the story. It seems like both stories end with darkness and never have any resolve like the effects of Christ's death on the cross. Both stories seem to end with the burial and miss the resurrection.
What am I missing in these stories?
posted by Charlie at 7:12 PM
1 Comments:
Charlie, I've always wondered the same thing, having heard many good things about how amazing Flannery O'Connor's stories were with a "dark" Christian worldview, and then being at sort of a loss when I read "A Good Man is Hard to Find" and another one.
I never thought of that way before - what good is grace that ends at the grave? I can't think of any stories, anyway, that end in darkness and leave me thanking God...
~Amanda (Andrea's friend)
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