Lula blocks Capone from taking a white child into church

On a Sunday when Atticus is away in Montgomery on legislative business, Calpurnia decides to take Jem and Scout to church with her rather than leave them unsupervised. She scrubs them with unusual thoroughness the night before, starches Scout's dress until it stands up like a tent, and polishes their patent-leather shoes with a cold biscuit until she can see her face in them. "I don't want anybody sayin' I don't look after my children," she mutters, and she insists Jem change his green tie because his suit is blue. The church is First Purchase African M.E. Church, located in the Quarters outside the southern town limits, across the old sawmill tracks. It is an ancient paint-peeled frame building, the only church in Maycomb with a steeple and bell, called First Purchase because it was paid for from the first earnings of freed slaves. Negroes worship in it on Sundays and white men gamble in it on weekdays.

Confrontation at the Churchyard

When they enter the churchyard, the men step back and take off their hats; the women cross their arms at their waists in weekday gestures of respectful attention. They part and make a small pathway to the church door for the three of them. Calpurnia walks between Jem and Scout, responding to the greetings of her brightly clad neighbors. But a tall Negro woman named Lula steps into the path behind them. She rests her left elbow in the curve of her hip, pointing at them with upturned palm. She is bullet-headed with strange almond-shaped eyes, a straight nose, and an Indian-bow mouth, and she seems seven feet high. "I wants to know why you bringin' white chillun to nigger church," Lula demands. Calpurnia's hand digs into Scout's shoulder. In tones Scout has never heard her use, speaking quietly and contemptuously, Calpurnia answers, "They's my comp'ny." Lula retorts, "Yeah, an' I reckon you's comp'ny at the Finch house durin' the week." A murmur runs through the crowd. Calpurnia whispers to Scout not to fret, but the roses on her hat tremble indignantly. When Lula comes up the pathway toward them, Calpurnia says, "Stop right there, nigger." Lula stops but insists, "You ain't got no business bringin' white chillun here—they got their church, we got our'n. It is our church, ain't it, Miss Cal?" Calpurnia answers, "It's the same God, ain't it?" Jem says, "Let's go home, Cal, they don't want us here," and Scout agrees, sensing they are being advanced upon. But when she looks up at Calpurnia, there is amusement in her eyes. When she looks down the pathway again, Lula is gone. In her place is a solid mass of colored people.

Resolution and Welcome

Zeebo, the garbage collector, steps from the crowd. "Mister Jem," he says, "we're mighty glad to have you all here. Don't pay no 'tention to Lula, she's contentious because Reverend Sykes threatened to church her. She's a troublemaker from way back, got fancy ideas an' haughty ways—we're mighty glad to have you all." With that, Calpurnia leads them to the church door, where Reverend Sykes greets them and leads them to the front pew. Inside, First Purchase is unceiled and unpainted, with unlighted kerosene lamps on brass brackets and pine benches serving as pews. Behind the rough oak pulpit, a faded pink silk banner proclaims "God Is Love," the church's only decoration except a rotogravure print of Hunt's The Light of the World. There is no piano, organ, hymn-books, or church programs. Calpurnia gives Scout and Jem each a dime for the collection, telling them they are her company. When Scout asks where the hymn-books are, Calpurnia tells her to hush and watch. Zeebo lines the hymn, reading a line and having the congregation repeat it in simple harmony, a method called "linin'" that Calpurnia later explains is used because only about four people in the church can read.

The Sermon and Collection for Tom Robinson

Reverend Sykes's sermon is a forthright denunciation of sin, warning against the evils of heady brews, gambling, and strange women. He also uses his pulpit to call out individual lapses from grace: Jim Hardy has been absent from church for five Sundays and isn't sick; Constance Jackson had better watch her ways for quarreling with her neighbors. After the sermon, Reverend Sykes announces that the collection taken up today and for the next three Sundays will go to Helen Robinson, Tom Robinson's wife, to help her out at home while Tom is in jail. When the congregation files forward to drop nickels and dimes into a black enameled coffee can, Reverend Sykes empties the can onto the table, rakes the coins into his hand, and declares, "This is not enough, we must have ten dollars." He orders the doors shut and says nobody leaves until they have ten dollars. Calpurnia scratches in her handbag and brings forth a battered leather coin purse, handing Jem a shiny quarter. Jem whispers that they can put theirs in and gives Scout's dime back. Slowly, painfully, the ten dollars is collected. The door is opened, and the gust of warm air revives them. Zeebo lines "On Jordan's Stormy Banks," and church is over.

Aftermath and Significance

At the church door, Reverend Sykes tells Jem and Scout, "This church has no better friend than your daddy." Scout asks why they are taking up collection for Tom Robinson's wife, and Reverend Sykes explains that Helen has three little ones and can't go out to work. When Scout asks why she can't take them with her, as is customary for field Negroes, Reverend Sykes hesitates and says Helen is finding it hard to get work these days. Calpurnia's hand on Scout's shoulder signals the end of questions. On the walk home, Calpurnia explains that folks aren't anxious to have anything to do with Tom Robinson's family because of what he is accused of: Bob Ewell accused him of raping his girl. Jem asks why Calpurnia talks like the rest of the congregation at church when she speaks standard English at the Finch house. Calpurnia explains that it would be out of place to talk white-folks' talk at church—folks would think she was putting on airs. "It's not necessary to tell all you know," she says. "It's not ladylike—in the second place, folks don't like to have somebody around knowin' more than they do. It aggravates 'em." The confrontation with Lula and the subsequent welcome from the congregation reveal the complex internal divisions within Maycomb's Black community, where racial solidarity coexists with suspicion of white intrusion, even as the church unites to support one of its own facing the town's racist legal machinery.