Question

Why might the author have included the detail about Father Paul picking up the magazine?

Answer 1

It suggests that similar missionary work was causing conflict in other places as well

Answer 2

Answer:

3. It suggests that similar missionary work was causing conflict in other places as well.

Explanation:

In Leslie Marmon Silko's short story "The Man To Send Rain Clouds", the story revolves around the beliefs of the native American Indians and the Christian priest. The traditional Indian pagan beliefs and the Catholic faiths present the contrast in the story.

When Leon and his brother-in-law Ken found his grandfather's dead body in the fields, Len decided to take care of the burial according to their Indian beliefs. But his wife Louise insist on telling the Catholic priest about the death so that he may also give a proper burial to their grandfather. But the priest believes that the Pueblo color painting and other rituals are pagan and against the catholic beliefs.

When Father Paul came to the house of the grieving family, he asserts that the holy water is only for a Catholic burial and not for something like the Pueblo rituals and ceremonies that Leon had done for his grandfather. In teh process of negotiating the application of the holy water on the dead body, Father Paul picks up a "glossy missionary magazine... the colored pages full of lepers and pagans". This inclusion of the missionary magazine is suggestive of the there missionary attempts/ works that are undertaken in other parts, but which had also been opposed by the 'native' residents of wherever that work has been carried out.

This tiny detail is included in the scene to show that there had been other instances of conflict regarding missionary work in other places as well.