I really enjoyed reading this book. I thought the author did a really good job of portraying the emotions of a young girl. I laughed a lot throughout the book; however, they were also some parts that made me feel really bad for Jussy. One thing that stuck out to me while I was reading was Jussy's obsession with guilt. She was constantly worrying about confessing the little things she did wrong because she felt God would be mad at her. Therefore, the question I chose to ask in my paper was: How does guilt affect Jussy's faith and the changes that she encounters in the novel?
One of the passages that I focused on was when she went to Mass with Mac's family and then found out that Bubbe had had a stroke. She automatically thought that God was trying to punish her for wanting to be Catholic. I thought that this passage really showed Jussy's misconceptions about religion and how she related guilt to almost everything that happened to her. I also attributed some of Jussy's guilt to the personality of her mother. On page 105, her mother finds out that she was taking part in Communion in her closet. Instead of talking to her about the confusion that her 11 year old is feeling, she screams at her, causing her extreme guilt. I wondered if Jussy's perception of guilt might have had anything to do with her mother. Another part of the book that I mentioned in my paper was when Jussy found out that Bubbe had left her the necklace. The note that she left with the necklace helped Jussy to realize that she did not need to feel guilty for the confusion that she was feeling. Bubbe made it clear that if Jussy chose to convert to Catholicism, she would not be mad at her. She only wanted her to be happy. I thought that this was the point in the book that Jussy's conflict was ultimately resolved. Although talking to the rabbi and the priest taught her about religion, it was her grandmother's words that put everything together for her.
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2 comments:
It's really interesting that we asked the same question of the text - and that our answers are so different. I thought that Justine's discussion with her mother and Bubbe helped a lot, but the fact that she was still lying about going to talk to the rabbi suggested that her guilt and fear weren't completely gone and that her questions weren't answered - especially because her focus was still on sin, even after Bubbe told her that it was ok to question.
I think the guilt that Justine felt throughout the book is what caused her to question her religion and ultimately figure out what was best for her. The guilt that Justine felt for hiding all of her religious escapades is what resulted in confrontation from her family, most importantly Bubbe, who allowed her to quesiton her faith and determine what made her happy. She felt guilty for doing such "terrible" things, but in the end her exploration of religion was not necessarily as awful as she had once thought.
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