Hypocrisy: A Theme in Frank O'Connor's First Confession

Hypocrites can be the hardest people to deal with. They claim to be good people, but their actions portray them to be something else. They are obnoxious because they go around proclaiming their piety, while those around them know otherwise. The perfect example of such a person is Nora in "First Confession" by Frank O'Connor. Nora's hypocrisy is shown in her actions, her speech, and in the way her brother Jackie thinks of her.

A prime example of Nora's actions proclaiming her hypocrisy is a series of events surrounding her and Jackie's trip to the church for confession. Jackie tells of Nora "hurling me through the church door." Then, when she enters the church, Nora acts very good at first:

"Nora's turn came, and I heard the sound of something slamming, and then her voice as if butter wouldn't melt in her mouth, and then another slam, and out she came...Her eyes were lowered, her head was bowed, and her hands were joined very low down on her stomach, and she walked up the aisle to the side altar looking like a saint. You never saw such and exhibition of devotion."

Only a few minutes after this exhibition, when Jackie falls out of the confessional, Nora loses all semblance of piety. Jackie explains it this way: "Then Nora came scampering down the aisle...Before I could even get to my feet to defend myself she bent down and gave me a clip across the ear." She also began yelling at him and making the already bad scene even worse. Shortly after this, she sticks her tongue out at Jackie, in an attempt to cause Jackie to become upset again. This time, though, she fails. Nora goes from being the good, pious person she claims to be to the mean, overbearing sister she really is. She is, in fact, betrayed by her actions.

Her actions are not all the betray her. Her speech does this as well. On more than one occasion, Nora calls Jackie "you dirty little caffler." It seems obvious that this is not the jesting sort of name-calling that all siblings do to each other. Rather, this is a mean, spiteful sort of name calling, intended to cause Jackie to feel bad. Jackie talks about how Nora smiles sadly and says how sorry she was for him, acting as if she cared, but then, a few minutes later, when she hurls him through the church doors, she says, "There you are! And I hope he'll give you the penitential psalms, you dirty little caffler." This statement clearly shows that she is not concerned at all for Jackie or what he is going though. In fact, it implies that she enjoys watching him suffer. So much for her piety! Her strongest display of hypocrisy in speech comes in the last couple of sentences of the story. Nora says, "Some people have all the luck! 'Tis no advantage to anybody trying to be good. I might just as well be a sinner like you." This is both ironic and hypocritical because she has already shown by her actions and words that she is a sinner like anyone else, yet she has the nerve to claim she is trying to be good.

Nora shows herself to be a hypocrite by both her actions and her words, but the biggest indicator of her hypocrisy comes from the thoughts of her brother. Jackie is quite convinced that Nora is indeed a hypocrite in the largest degree, talking about how Nora is hypocritical in the way she acts toward her grandmother: "Nora, my sister, just sucked up to the old woman for the penny she got every Friday out of the old-age pension, a think I could not do." This quote makes it clear early in the story that Jackie thinks his sister is a fake, a hypocrite. He thinks Nora is nice just so she can get money from her grandmother. Jackie tells about one occasion when his grandmother cooked their dinner and he would not eat it: "Nora let on to be very indignant (she wasn't, of course, but she knew Mother saw through her, so she sided with Gran) and came after me." Here, Jackie suggests that not only does he know that Nora is a hypocrite, but their mother does as well. This most likely goes back to Nora "sucking up" to her grandmother in an effort to get money. At the end of the story, when Jackie comes out of the church with the priest, he tells the reader of her reaction: "Nora was sitting on the railing, waiting for me, and she put on a very sour puss when she saw the priest with me. She was mad jealous because a priest had never come out of the church with her." Nora seems to get upset over small things that would not bother her if she were simply trying to be good. All of these examples of Jackie's thoughts show Nora to be a hypocrite, but there is another example that sets this in stone. When Jackie reveals to Nora that he told the priest everything, and he only had to do three Hail Marys, she gets upset, and Jackie thinks to himself, "All she wanted was to be able to go home and say I'd made a bad confession." This, without a doubt, shows Nora to be the hypocrite she is, as far as Jackie is concerned.

Nora is a hypocrite, of this there is no doubt. Her hypocrisy has been shown in her actions, her speech, and in the way her brother thinks of her. If Nora spent as much time and effort trying to be good as she did on trying to cause Jackie to be bad, she might not be such a hypocrite.