Poor Sarah: Saved by God or Chained by Christ?

Poor Sarah was one of the most moving pieces of Native American Literature I have ever read. The story touches on a high controversial idea that people are saved by converting to Christianity. I grew up in a Catholic household, so my relationship with Christianity was quite intimate. In my experience with the Christian faith I noticed several different types of worship. The most common is much like the people surrounding Sarah, they go to church and call themselves Christian but fail to see the evil around them everyday. These people are incapable of righting wrongs because they do not see the wrongs as wrongs. Then there are the Christians that see the wrongs, these people don't always act upon their realizations of wrong doings. This is the narrator of the story, she acknowledges that Sarah is not being treated with the respect by fellow Christians, but does nothing. The third kind of Christian I came in contact with are so busy living a "Christian life" that they do not think of their own misfortunes. Chrisitianity aims for the last type of Christian as the prototype for all Christians. Marx says that religion is the opium of the people, meaning that religion blinds us to our own misery by vesting us in an afterlife. Sarah is the third kind of Christian. There are benefits and costs to be this type of believer. One benefit would be that the individual could escape an unavoidable life of misery. But, escaping misery is not a way to rectify and change the status quo causing the misery. The formula of life given by Christianity to its followers does not allow the individual to confront evil in this world. Christianity encourages its constituents to "rise above" and "WWJD," this is great and all but does nothing for the here and now. In my opinion Sarah needed to focus on the here and now, that is where her problem lies, not in some paradise that is set in some imaginary place in the clouds. Does Christianity benefit its disenfranchised converts or does Christianity just perpetuate their problems?

Comedrama: A Quick Thought

The fictional story Hard Riding uses comedic relief to strategically frame their issues for a more accepting message to the reader. This frame allows the reader to open their receptors so that the message is better understood and easily digested. The placement of comedy in a moment of complete sincerity allows the audience to receive a message without guilt. The comedy in Hard Riding is also used to show incompetence in the opposition and to take away its credibility.
I got in a large argument with my roommate a while ago and her logic was so counter to my own that I started laughing. I did not quite know how else to react and after a little she laughed to. But, this laugh was not your typical that-is-funny laugh, it was I am going to lose-control laugh. This tension quickly diffused in an "agree-to-disagree resolution." Who knows how much further the argument would have gone had I not laughed in that sincere moment. Since then we have laughed about the argument and come to understand each others' view points.
The author of Hard Riding is doing essentially the same thing I did, they are laughing at their opponent in an effort to break them down for a better understanding of their experiences.