Will Derdeyn

Jr. Theology/Faith

August 22, 2007

“Was Holden Caulfield a Man of Faith?”

A man of faith is someone who can trust people and accept them with both their strengths and flaws.  Holden Caulfield is not a man of faith because he called people “phonies”, did not trust others, and could not make connections with anyone.

For example, when he found “Fuck you” written on the tomb and in the school, he said that someone would probably write it on his grave.  This shows that he doesn’t trust people.  Also, he calls Stradlater a phony because he acts all clean and smooth, but he is actually a slob because his stuff in the bathroom is messy.  He fails to make connections with people, too.  When he goes on a date with Sally, he ends up making her mad and saying mean things to her.  Also, when Sunny comes into his room he tries to talk to her, but it ends up in him getting beat up by Maurice.  Finally, he accuses people of being phonies, but then tries to talk to them, like Carl Luce.  Holden cannot accept the fact that he has phoniness in himself, so he just calls everyone phonies.  He rejects people who try to help him, like Mr. Antolini or his sister, Phoebe.  Mr. Antolini lets him into his house late at night and gives Holden advice and tries to help him, but when he touches Holden’s forehead, Holden freaks out.  He thinks that Mr. Antolini is gay because of that and he runs away.  Only later does he realize that even if he is gay, he still helped him out and gave him a lot of good advice.  He idealizes his sister and fails to see her flaws, even when she tells him that she put ink on someone’s jacket, or she immaturely chastises him for getting kicked out of school.  He calls all of the people at Pencey Prep phonies and doesn’t let them help him stay on track, and so he gets kicked out.  Even the one teacher he likes yells at him, and Holden leaves.  

A man of faith would recognize this "phoniness" in others that Holden sees, but he would not categorize them and just write them off as phonies.  He could see past their imperfections and see their good qualities.  Holden, on the other hand, condemns them for their faults and uses their phoniness as an excuse not to connect with them.  Also, a man of faith would trust his peers and his family.  However, Holden calls his brother D.B. a prostitute for Hollywood, and he does not have a good relationship with his parents.  He tries to hide that he got kicked out of Pencey from them, and even his sister, and when goes looking for help he talks to Mr. Antolini, instead of them.  It appears that he trusts his sister, but by lying about getting kicked out of Pencey, he shows that he does not trust her to not tell her parents.  Also, when Carl Luce says that he should see a psychoanalyst, he refuses because he does not think they do anything.  He does not trust Carl, or his dad, the psychoanalyst, to help him.  A man of faith would trust Carl and listen to him and see his dad to try and help himself.  Finally, at Pencey, the headmaster tries to let Holden stay there by giving him warnings, and meeting with him, but Holden does not listen to him.  Because of this inaction, and his continuing of having bad grades, he gets kicked out.  The headmaster did not want to kick him out, but because Holden did not listen to him or make an effort to stay, he could not stay.

Holden neither has faith in others or himself, and to be a man of faith you must have both.  Holden cannot have faith in people who he calls "phonies" and refuses to connect with.