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William Faulkner does not always indict Christianity. For example, in the final section of The Sound and the Fury, Dilsey draws solace and comfort from the church service. The service functions pragmatically to transition Dilsey into her changing reality. At other times, Faulkner does subject Christianity to scathing ridicule. This paper explores how Faulkner employs the minor character Whitfield in As I Lay Dying to belittle simplistic Christianity. Faulkner accomplishes this in three ways: exposing the potential for hypocrisy within simplistic Christianity, portraying it as a humorous fairy-tale reality, and demonstrating its inadequacy to cope with both spiritual sin and physical death. Faulkner exposes the potential for hypocrisy within Christianity. The obvious example is Reverend Whitfield. His hypocrisy lies not so much in the sin of having sex with Addie Bundren but in clinging to his image of himself as a holy man. Whitfield claims repentance: “all that night I wrestled with Satan, and I emerged victorious. I woke to the enormity of my sin” (177). Whitfield feels that God leads him to confess the adultery to Anse. Praying en route to the Bundren house, Whitfield divulges his true motive: “let me not be