Question

How is the Catholic Church represented in the story "Eveline" from James Joyce's Dubliners?

Accepted Answer

As Eveline sits at the window, watching "the evening invade the avenue, she reflects upon how the neighborhood once was. Considering her departure, she recalls that she has never learned the name of the priest whose yellowing photograph hangs on the wall next to the colored print of the promises she has made to Blessed Margaret Mary Alacoque.  This beatified French nun (one of the steps to sainthood) who was canonized as a saint in 1920, introduced devotion to the Sacred Heart of Jesus.  Most Catholic homes, then, had pictures of the Sacred Heart, and a list of promises of domestic security and blessings in life for those who maintain devotion to it and attend Mass regularly. 
With the yellowing photograph of the unknown priest, Joyce indicates that the Catholic Church is not a living, thriving part of Eveline's life. Furthermore, since she is the victim of abuse from her father and worries what will become of her little brother if she leaves, there is anything but domestic security and blessings in her life.  Therefore, the Catholic religion lack viability and relevance to Eveline.  Yet, as a child raised in the rigidity of this religion that Joyce felt caused Irish stagnation, Eveline clings to her Catholic prayer, aware of the promises that she has made to the Blessed Margaret Mary. When she does accompany Frank to the station at the North Wall, she desperately "prayed to God to direct her, to show her what was her duty."  But, her religion is no thriving part of her life, and Eveline receives no inspiration.  Instead, she is psychologically paralyzed with the pull of "all those commonplace sacrifices" which are part of her tragic Irish-Catholic life.

Answer

In Joyce’s Dubliners, references to the Catholic Church evokes a sense of moral rectitude which confines the young woman, Eveline, to the obligations she made in her past life. Eveline feels that she must keep her word, both to her mother and to God, as she leans her head against the window and hears the sound of a church organ.
One passage reads, “Down far in the avenue she could hear a street organ playing.” The imagery here is unquestionably connected to the organs that daily commence mass at the Irish Catholic Church and evoke in Eveline’s consciousness a feeling of deep-seated, Christian responsibility to her family and her mother’s honor. The passage continues, “She knew the air. Strange that it should come that very night to remind her of the promise to her mother, her promise to keep the home together as long as she could.”
The difficulty Eveline has in honoring her mother’s wish is her intense desire to escape Dublin with her love interest, Frank, and to leave her abusive father behind. However, the ever-present reminder of her mother’s dying request, combined with her Christian sense of familial virtue, traps Eveline into a bland, repetitive existence, which she is ultimately not strong enough to overcome. In this way, the Catholic Church is represented as a stultifying force that saps Eveline (and others) of the willpower to act on once-in-a-lifetime opportunities because of the unreasonable moralistic demands it puts on her. These demands are not manifested externally but rather internally, within Eveline’s own self-reflection.
The Church’s demand for obedience and uniformity is reinforced in Joyce’s description of George’s Church. Worshippers, either individually or in small groups, easily betray their “self-contained demeanor” by the way they uniformly traverse the space before the church entrance and hold church books in their gloved hands. The strict, monolithic way of thinking that Joyce earlier describes in Eveline's mind is here externalized in the behavior of church goers.

Answer

In "Eveline," as in most of Joyce's short stories, the Catholic Church is presented in a distinctly unflattering light. This is entirely in keeping with Joyce's fervent conviction that the Catholic Church was, to a large extent, responsible for what he saw as Ireland's cultural paralysis.
The Church exerted a great deal of influence on Irish public life in Joyce's day and would continue to do so for many decades thereafter. For many artists and intellectuals like Joyce, such influence was wholly pernicious and held Ireland back from contributing to the European cultural tradition.
In "Eveline," the title character could be said to symbolize Ireland in that she too is held back by the Catholic Church. In her case, she is prevented from joining her lover for a new life in Argentina by a guilt complex, the kind often associated with Catholicism.
Eveline has made a number of promises to God that she is loath to break. Implicit in these promises is the notion of sacrifice; Eveline has spent her whole life sacrificing her happiness for the good of her family, and in doing so has believed, encouraged by Catholic teaching, that she's been doing the Lord's work.
The written promises that Eveline's made to the Blessed Margaret Mary Alacoque hang there on the wall, acting as a constant reminder of her commitment to the Church's teachings. Eveline comes to realize that leaving her family behind and heading off to the other side of the world with her lover would not be consistent with those teachings. So she stays put, remaining loyal to her family and to the Catholic Church, if not to the dictates of her heart.

Answer

The Catholic Church is presented as an agent of repression in Eveline. Eveline longs to run off with the sailor Frank and start a new life away from Dublin. She has even made plans to meet him at the dock so they can sail away together. She wants to leave home because she fears her father's temper and tyrannies and dislikes her job as a bullied shop girl.
At the dock, however, her pious dead mother's voice comes to her, saying:

“Derevaun Seraun! Derevaun Seraun!”

These words mean that pleasure will lead to pain. Torn over whether to stay or go, Eveline prays to God about what she should do, framing the question as what her "duty" is, rather than what God wants her to do. Once the internalized and repressive voices of the church and her mother kick in, it is inevitable that she will stay behind in her constricted Dublin life.
Joyce shows how the church holds women in place, making it psychologically difficult for them to break free.

Eveline

How is the Catholic Church represented in the story "Eveline" from James Joyce's Dubliners?

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