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“And about this apple, how come God didn’t explain why they couldn’t eat it? He gave Eve curiosity but didn’t expect her to use it? Unless the apple is a metaphor?”
Toward the novel’s midpoint, Xiomara raises this question to Father Sean during confirmation class. Father Sean is teaching a parable about temptation, and Xiomara cannot silence her question, which reveals her growing disquiet about her Catholic faith. Up to this point, Xiomara has always attempted to accept the religious beliefs Mami has insisted she accept. However, as she grows, Xiomara cannot silence the unanswered and seemingly contradictory questions she has about her religion. In Eve, for example, Xiomara sees a struggle she herself faces as she experiences curiosity and desire that she’s not permitted to explore. She’s even told, especially by Mami, that such questions and feelings are sinful. For example, when Xiomara experiences first love with Aman and explores her feelings through physical expressions such as kissing, she cannot reconcile how something that feels good can be wrong. That dissonance creates conflict for Xiomara, leading to rebellion since she doesn’t believe she can have discussions about her questions with Mami. Like Eve’s rebellion against the orders of God, chaos and blame result as Xiomara is disciplined through abuse by Mami when she’s caught kissing Aman on the train and later when Mami reads Xiomara’s notebook where she’s written about her feelings and questions.
“Sometimes I feel my life would be easier if I didn’t feel like such a debt to a God that don’t really seem to be out here checking for me.”
Early in the novel, Xiomara is contemplating the suggestion that she and her brother Twin are miracles because Mami had such a hard time getting pregnant. She has grown up being told she is indebted to God. Here, Xiomara’s pondering reveals a disconnection between who she is and who she believes God to be. Her beliefs have created a sense of obligation for Xiomara and the idea that she has to earn and live up to the distinction of being a miraculous gift from God. In Xiomara’s mind, a relationship with God is transactional, and nothing is for free. Therefore, because Mami was able to have children, those children are expected to repay the debt of life through obedience and piety. This doesn’t seem to be an issue for Twin who embraces Mami’s religion and appears to enjoy his relationship with the church. Xiomara, however, feels burdened by the expectation for submission and obedience because she has questions about God and Catholicism. In particular, she doesn’t feel like God is doing anything for her. She is sexually harassed, and she is oppressed by her abusive mother. If the relationship with faith is, indeed, transactional, Xiomara does not see what’s in it for her.
“What’s the point of God giving me life if I can’t live it as my own?”
Xiomara is at church with Mami and is forced to take the communion wafer. She acquiesces even though she is reluctant due to her growing disquiet about her faith. Xiomara cannot reconcile being given a life that she is not entirely free to live. As Xiomara comes of age, she struggles with her desire for independence. The church and its teachings as Mami interprets them, however, deny Xiomara the freedom she craves. She sees a paradox in the idea that God gave her life yet doesn’t allow any autonomy. Even Father Sean acknowledges that forced faith is not faith at all, preaching that people must come to God of their own volition. For Xiomara, however, that isn’t an option, since Mami demands complete obedience to the religion she chose for herself and her children. Unfortunately, the questions Xiomara has as she tries to reconcile her desire for independence with Mami’s expectations for submission only exist in Xiomara’s notebook. When Xiomara questions her faith in front of her mother, she is chastised and sometimes punished. That results in Xiomara feeling even more repressed and constrained, causing her to question the point of a life that feels like a trap.
