Go Tell It on the Mountain

by James Baldwin

It was his hatred and his intelligence that he cherished, the one feeding the other.

Yet he was treated, so far as John could see, with great respect. No one, none of the saints in any case, had ever reproached or rebuked his father, or suggested that his life was anything but spotless. Nevertheless, this man, God’s minister, had struck John’s mother, and John had wanted to kill him—and wanted to kill him still.