A Letter to God – Analysis and Theme

This is a story of a hard-working farmer Lencho. He is expecting a good harvest this year if it rains. The
rain does come bringing brief happiness. However, a hailstorm follows the rain destroying all his crops.
Being deeply hurt, he looks toward God. Having an unshaken faith in God he writes a letter to Him
demanding one hundred pesos. This amount is sufficient enough to sow his crop again. He posts it. The
postman has a hearty laugh when he reads it and shows it to the postmaster. The postmaster, being a
generous man, decides to help Lencho. He gives a part of his salary and collects money from the
employees. He sends seventy pesos to Lencho. Lencho’s happiness was momentary when he counts the
money. God can’t deceive him, it is the work of post office employees. He writes another letter to God
asking Him not to send the remaining 30 pesos by mail as post office employees are a ‘bunch of crooks’.
The lesson shows three things. It shows Lencho’s firm faith in God. His faith is rewarded through the
helpers are human beings. Secondly, it shows the utter innocence of the farmer, Lencho. Thirdly, the
lesson gives a message that sometimes even your generosity is not recognised. You may not get any
credit for your generosity and kindness. But on the other hand, you may be misunderstood as a ‘bunch
of crooks’.

--------------------------------------

Gregorio López Fuentes was a Mexican novelist. He often wrote based on experience, and was inspired
by interactions with various people, including farmers and laborers. He is well known for his humor
while writing, as well as the way he captures elements of Mexico and the Mexican lifestyle. His writing is
also realistic– this can especially be seen in A Letter to God. Despite the witty plot twist at the end and
the overall amusing finish, one cannot deny the truth he presents, especially about the reality of a
farmer’s life, misunderstandings and misconceptions. A Letter to God portrays how one situation can
look to two different people. This story is written in third-person, and Fuentes employs dialogue, vivid
description- especially in the scene describing the rain, hail and wrath of nature- and symbolism. The
main themes are faith, mother nature, intent and perspective. In addition, it presents the situations and
difficulties which many farmers face.

The story opens with a description. This is a clever way to set the scene- from just three lines, the reader
is now able to picture the location, bringing them closer to the story. As the main character, Lencho,
watches the sky, he can presumably see dark clouds approaching, which is how he tells his wife that
they will have rain. Her response- “Yes, God willing”– already shows the family’s faith in God. The line
“The older boys were working in the field, while the smaller ones were playing near the house” also
conveys a warm aura of a hard-working family.

As the rain and hail begins, Fuentes uses some beautiful imagery which aligns with the overall theme of
mother nature. Some examples of imagery are: “the field of ripe corn with its flowers, draped in a
curtain of rain.” and the hailstones resembling “new silver coins” or “frozen pearls.”- the latter of which
is also a metaphor. Further, when the rain begins, he tells his wife ‘‘These aren’t raindrops falling from
the sky, they are new coins. The big drops are ten cent pieces and the little ones are fives.’’ Here, the
rain symbolizes money. With the rainwater, the plants will be nourished and the cornfield will grow well,
which in turn will give the family a huge profit. The bigger the water drops are, the more it will aid the
crops, hence the bigger drops represent more money. When the hail starts, Lencho describes it as “new
silver coins”– once again, this aspect of nature symbolizes money, but in a contradictory way from the
rain drops. While the rain represented good fortune and promise of monetary return, the hailstones
represent misfortune and loss, as they will destroy the cornfields. This great dependency on a powerful
and unpredictable force like nature for their livelihood is a difficult reality of farmers which Fuentes has
subtly portrayed.

Despite this terrible loss and sorrow the family faced- along with the possibility of starving for a year-
they did not give up complete hope because of their faith in God, which is one of the overarching
themes of the story. “But in the hearts of all who lived in that solitary house in the middle of the valley,
there was a single hope: help from God.” His faith was so strong that he believed God would receive his
letter and send him money. Interestingly, in a way, he may have been right. While God may not directly
appear and respond with the 100 pesos, it is a mysterious way of the universe which leads to the
postmasters gathering money for Lencho. Therefore, it was an indirect facilitation. Another element of
this theme is the postmasters’ reactions- “What faith! I wish I had the faith of the man who wrote this
letter.” Though they laugh at the situation as a whole, they cannot help but admire Lencho’s faith- the
reason they open the envelope in the first place is because they want to attempt writing a response, so
as not to shake Lencho’s trust in God.

When the postmaster collects as much money as he can, we see the theme of intent. He had a very
good heart and intention with his action- “he stuck to his resolution: he asked for money from his
employees, he himself gave part of his salary, and several friends of his were obliged to give something
‘for an act of charity’.” The second theme is perspective– when the postman writes “God” on the
envelope and hands it to Lencho, there is content at having done a good deed- “It was the postman
himself who handed the letter to him while the postmaster, experiencing the contentment of a man
who has performed a good deed, looked on from his office.” From the postmaster’s perspective, he has
helped someone in need with no expectation of reciprocity. He looks at it as a happy memory.

Meanwhile, Lencho was angry because there was less than the requested amount. Readers may feel
that he is being ungrateful, but on the contrary, he simply misunderstood the situation. He is angry not
because of the fact that there is less money, but what he thinks is the reason for there being less money.
“God could not have made a mistake, nor could he have denied Lencho what he had requested.”- this
shows that Lencho believes that God definitely received his message. It confuses him to see only 70
pesos because it is impossible for the all-knowing to have misunderstood his request. His belief in God is
so great that he is certain God sent 100 pesos, which means, according to him, the only possible
explanation is that the envelope has been tampered with. This is the second perspective. From one end,
the postmaster watches with pride and contentment at a job well done, and from the other end Lencho
looks on with anger.

What does Lencho think happened? He writes a response letter to God immediately: “Of the money that
I asked for, only seventy pesos reached me. Send me the rest, since I need it very much. But don’t send
it to me through the mail because the post office employees are a bunch of crooks”.

In this humour twist, Lencho thinks that out of the 100 pesos sent by God, the post office staff had
stolen 30. Now we understand why Lencho was angry– he was not ungrateful, but rather furious at the
thought that his money from God had been stolen. We can see this in the way he writes “only seventy
reached me” rather than “you only sent seventy.” The letter hence symbolizes faith. Fuentes ends the
story in this irony– the content postmaster who tried to do a good deed; and Lencho, with his strong
faith, who completely misunderstood the situation and expresses his anger and distrust in the post
office that tried to help him.