![]() ![]() Although he eventually becomes an unbeliever, he continues to have some fear that the Catholic Church might be correct. But the Church continues to exert some small hold on him. His sensitivity to beauty and the human body are not at all suitable to the rigid Catholicism in which he was raised. The teachings of the Church run contrary to Stephen's independent spirit and intellect. The Church is perhaps the greatest constraint on Stephen, and merits its own entry. At the same time, he leaves Ireland hoping to forge the new conscience of his race. He also rebels against the nature of activities like petition-signing and protest in his mind, these activities amount to an abdication of independence. He finds the Irish people fickle and ultimately disloyal at one point, he says to a friend that the Irish have never had a great leader whom they did not betray or abandon. Though his father is an ardent nationalist, Stephen has great anxieties about Irish politics. He can do nothing to help them, and the continued ineptitude of his father exasperates Stephen. Stephen's family, increasingly destitute, is a source of frustration and guilt. Three major bonds threaten: family, nation, and the Church. Stephen eventually comes to see Ireland as a kind of trap, a restraint that will make it impossible for him to live and create. Buy Study Guide Entrapment and Constraint ![]()
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