Visit to First Purchase Church

One Sunday while Atticus was away on legislative business, Calpurnia proposed taking Jem and Scout to her own church, First Purchase African M.E. Church, located in the Quarters outside Maycomb's southern limits. The church was an ancient, paint-peeled frame building, the only one in Maycomb with a steeple and bell, paid for from the first earnings of freed slaves. Calpurnia prepared the children meticulously, starching Scout's dress until it stood up like a tent, making her wear a petticoat and a pink sash, and polishing her patent-leather shoes with a cold biscuit until she could see her face in them. She insisted Jem change his green tie for a blue one to match his suit, muttering that she did not want anyone saying she did not look after her children.

Confrontation at the Churchyard

When they entered the churchyard, the warm bittersweet smell of clean Negro—Hearts of Love hairdressing mingled with asafoetida, snuff, Hoyt's Cologne, Brown's Mule, peppermint, and lilac talcum—greeted them. The men stepped back and took off their hats; the women crossed their arms at their waists in respectful attention, parting to make a small pathway to the church door. But a tall, bullet-headed woman named Lula confronted Calpurnia, demanding to know why she was bringing white children to a nigger church. Calpurnia replied quietly that they were her company, and when Lula pressed further, Calpurnia told her to stop right there, calling her "nigger." Lula accused Calpurnia of having no business bringing white children to their church, insisting they had their own church. Calpurnia answered, "It's the same God, ain't it?" Jem whispered that they should go home, but Zeebo, the garbage collector, stepped from the crowd and welcomed them, explaining that Lula was contentious because Reverend Sykes had threatened to church her. Calpurnia led the children inside, where Reverend Sykes greeted them and seated them in the front pew.

Lined Hymn-Singing and the Sermon

Inside, First Purchase was unceiled and unpainted, with unlighted kerosene lamps on brass brackets and pine benches serving as pews. Behind the rough oak pulpit hung a faded pink silk banner proclaiming "God Is Love," the church's only decoration besides a rotogravure print of Hunt's The Light of the World. There were no hymn-books, no organ, no piano. When Zeebo, the music superintendent, announced hymn number two seventy-three, Scout wondered how they would sing without books. Calpurnia told her to wait. Zeebo read the first line in a voice like the rumble of distant artillery: "There's a land beyond the river." Miraculously on pitch, a hundred voices sang out his words. Zeebo read each line, and the congregation followed, singing in simple harmony until the hymn ended in a melancholy murmur. Jem and Scout looked at each other in disbelief. Reverend Sykes's sermon was a forthright denunciation of sin, warning against heady brews, gambling, and strange women, and he freely named individual lapses from grace, such as Jim Hardy's five-week absence and Constance Jackson's spite fence.

The Collection for Helen Robinson

After the sermon, Reverend Sykes stood beside a table and requested the morning offering, a procedure strange to Jem and Scout. One by one, the congregation came forward and dropped nickels and dimes into a black enameled coffee can. Jem and Scout followed suit, receiving soft thanks as their dimes clinked. To their amazement, Reverend Sykes emptied the can onto the table, raked the coins into his hand, and announced that ten dollars was needed. He explained that the collection would go to Helen Robinson, Tom Robinson's wife, to help her at home while Tom was in jail. When the congregation stirred, Reverend Sykes called for the doors to be shut and declared that nobody would leave until they had ten dollars. Calpurnia contributed a quarter, and Jem whispered that they should put in their own money instead. The church grew stuffy as Reverend Sykes sweated the amount out of his flock, calling out individuals by name. Slowly, painfully, the ten dollars was collected, the door was opened, and the gust of warm air revived them.

Aftermath and Calpurnia's Double Life

On the way home, Scout asked why Helen could not find work. Calpurnia explained that folks were not anxious to have anything to do with Tom Robinson's family because of what he was accused of. When Scout asked what rape was, Calpurnia told her to ask Atticus. Jem asked why they sang hymns that way, and Calpurnia explained it was called "linin'," a method used as long as she could remember. When Jem suggested they could save the collection money for hymn-books, Calpurnia laughed and said it would not do any good because only about four people in First Purchase could read, and she was one of them. She revealed that she had taught Zeebo, her eldest son, using a copy of Blackstone's Commentaries that Scout's grandfather Finch had given her. Jem realized that Calpurnia did not talk like the rest of the colored folks at home, but she had talked like them in church. Calpurnia explained that it would be out of place to talk white-folks' talk at church or with her neighbors; they would think she was putting on airs. She said it was not necessary to tell all you know, and that folks do not like having somebody around who knows more than they do. The visit ended with Scout and Jem discovering that Calpurnia led a modest double life, having command of two languages.