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So Far From God

by Ana Castillo

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Student Question

How might Fe be considered "faith-less" in So Far From God?

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Fe might be considered "faith-less" due to her lack of compassion and connection with her family and heritage, her focus on appearance over inner goodness, and her neglect of warning signs in her life. Her name, meaning "faith" in Spanish, ironically contrasts with her actions, as she ignores familial bonds, spiritual warnings, and ultimately, her own wellbeing. Fe's choices reflect a lack of faith in family, heritage, and her future.

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The word fe is Spanish for "faith," so this name likely represents a deliberate choice on Castillo's part to invite readers to think about this character's relationship to faith, in multiple senses of the word. (Her sister Esperanza's name means "hope.")

Castillo nods to this explicitly in the title of chapter 11, which refers to Fe as "Sofia's faithful daughter." Fe's archetypal role to play in this family is that of the faithful daughter, which typically describes someone who works hard to make good on her parents' sacrifices and supports them as they age. Fe, unfortunately, does not get the chance to embody this role, since she is killed in her twenties by exposure to hazardous chemicals at work. There is nothing particularly faithful about her character; one may be basing this characterization on the fact that Fe's life, which seems set up for success and happiness, turns out...

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so badly, and Fe ignores the family and faith ties that could have maybe set her on a better course.

When Fe is first introduced, she is described as "above reproach." The narrator says, "She maintained her image above all—from the organized desk at work to weekly manicured fingernails and a neat coiffure." This description creates an image of Fe as an appearance-focused snob: someone who is very concerned with cultivating a refined image and not very concerned with inner goodness. This is reinforced by her attitude toward her sister nicknamed "La Loca," whom she sees as "a soulless creature." Despite their geographical and relational proximity to one another, Fe absolutely looks down on La Loca and resents the concern La Loca received from their mother. Her chief worry is that La Loca's craziness could be passed on to her or her children.

Usually, Fe did not feel compassion for La Loca, but simply disappointment and disgust for her sister's obvious "mental illness," the fact that her mother had encouraged it with her own superstitions, and finally, fear that it was, like her own Indian flat butt, hereditary, despite everyone's protest to the contrary.

This is just the first glimpse into Fe turning her back on her family: its members, and their beliefs. She even resents her own Pueblo heritage for ostensibly making her less attractive. When Fe "loses her mind" in the aftermath of receiving Tom's letter, she also prioritizes her own grief over the needs of the family she lives with and allows herself to become completely mired in a yearlong despair. With a pinch more faith that things could get better, her grieving period may have been shorter or less dramatic.

Finally, you could argue that Fe is "faithless" for jumping into her moneyed life with Casimiro and ignoring the warning signs of the dangerous chemicals at Acme when she switches jobs for the higher pay. Granted, exposure to toxic chemicals in the workplace shouldn't be the workers' responsibility to notice or prevent, but we are told that Fe did see some signs of her impending doom which she chose to ignore:

most of the people that surrounded Fe didn't understand what was slowly killing them, too, or didn't want to think about it, or if they did, didn't know what to do about it anyway and went on like that, despite dead cows in the pasture, or sick sheep, and that one week late in winter when people woke up each morning to find it raining starlings.

Fe allows herself to be oblivious to the darkness on her horizon (even when spiritually significant portents like dying animals could have warned her), choosing to continue chasing her dreams of marital bliss. Whether you are considering faith in a religious context, faith meaning fidelity to a partner or family member, or faith as a general quality of trust that things will work out for the better, you can argue that Fe's actions, from her yearlong scream to her untimely demise, show that she is not guided by this principle.

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