Flannery O Connor's A Good Man Is Hard To Find

Flannery O’Connor is a renowned Southern author, noted for her gothic works and heavily Catholic themes. She focuses predominantly on racial tensions, morality, and divine grace. The religious and moral themes of her short story, A Good Man is Hard to Find, converge on the character of the grandmother. Despite the self-proclamations of fulfilling what it means to be a Southern lady, Grandmother holds a superficial grasp of her religion. Throughout the story, the Grandmother never truly changed, only her ostensible actions did. Her final act towards the Misfit was not out of charity, but in attempt to save herself.
Set in the South in the 1950s, the grandmother dutily satisfied the stereotypes that blossomed within her generation. She speaks of the older days, when children were more respectful, and good men were easier to find. However, she never expresses what defines a good man, which suggests her unsteady moral foundation. The grandmother also explicitly articulates the racism that was unfortunately common in the South, ironically prevalent in the religious and upper middle class circles like the ones she belonged to. Despite her beliefs, one cannot be a good person, or a lady, as a racist. The grandmother fell definitively short of the title she was attempting to give herself.
As stated, the Grandmother is not alone in her opinions. The South in the mid-20th century was a hive of racism, oftentimes religiously-fueled. As Flannery O’Connor argued, the South is