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Themes
Key
LitCharts assigns a color and icon to each theme in Patron Saints of Nothing, which you can use to track the themes throughout the work.
Truth, Adolescence, and Justice
Responsibility, Guilt, and Blame
Culture and Belonging
Death and Meaning
Summary
Analysis
Jay and his aunts arrive at Jay’s grandparents’ barangay at sunset. The village has a big Catholic church in the center, and a volcano is visible in the distance behind the village. Jay thinks that the village looks both quaint and “forgotten.” He lived with his grandparents—Lola and Lolo—back when he was a baby and his parents were trying to figure out where to go next, and he instinctually remembers it from his last visit. Lola and Lolo greet the family on their porch. Tita Chato, with a bit of skepticism, tells Jay that Tito Danilo was called away on church business, which disappoints Jay, since he likes his uncle.
It seems that religion is just as important in the rural parts of the Philippines as it was for Tito Maning’s family in Manila. Once again, Jay recognizes a place in the Philippines “instinctually”—another sign that the Philippines is part of Jay’s heritage, regardless of what his mother or Tito Maning say.Tita Chato’s skepticism about Tito Danilo’s reason for his absence suggests that she thinks he is in fact trying to avoid seeing the family right now—another hint at the factors that have upset the relations between Jay’s Filipino family.
Themes
Jay hugs Lola, and she welcomes him home. He feels as comfortable with her as he felt when he first got off the plane. Lolo smiles at Jay. Jay wants to speak to them, but his Tagalog isn’t good enough and neither is their English. Jay stands between Tita Chato and Tito Maning’s family while conversation passes over him. Grace tells Jay that he won’t be able to text Mia here, since there’s no cell service. Only old people and babies live here, she says, because young people move to cities now. Jay asks if the family is speaking a language other than Tagalog, and Grace says that it’s Oasun, a local dialect.
Over the course of the novel, people have had complicated feelings about Jay’s place in the Philippines. Like Tomas, Lola seems to think that the answer is simple: the Philippines is Jay’s home, or at least one of his homes. This might be why Jay instinctually feels comfortable with Lola, as comfortable as he felt at the airport before interacting with the immigration officer and with Tito Maning. Jay is once again left out of conversation because of his inability to speak Tagalog, but he doesn’t feel excluded or panicked—instead, he’s curious about what language his family is speaking.
Themes
Grace, knowing that Jay has questions for her, says that she and Jay can’t talk now. For his part, Tito Maning ignores Jay and calls Grace over in Tagalog. Everyone goes inside. The house is the same as it was when Jay last saw it, filled with photos. Everyone circles around Jay’s second balikbayan box, and Tito Maning is about to open it when Jay grabs it first. He dispenses the items, guessing who each object is for. Everyone puts aside certain objects. The last item is a University of Michigan sweatshirt, which Jay gives to Lolo. Strangers begin entering and are introduced to Jay as extended family. Tita Chato grabs the objects everyone put aside and starts to dispense them to the extended family with Jay’s help. After, Tita Chato tells Jay that he did a good job.
Jay’s initiative in handling the balikbayan box shows his growing comfort and certainty about his place in the Philippines and within his Filipino family. The fact that there’s a U of M sweatshirt inside is noteworthy, since Jay’s dad must have packed it. Jay had assumed that his dad wasn’t enthusiastic about Jay’s acceptance at U of M, but it seems like he was after all. Jay clearly didn’t know that the items in the balikbayan boxes should also be distributed to extended family, but instead of berating Jay for his lack of knowledge, Tita Chato helps Jay finish the job and praises him.
Themes
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Everyone heads into the backyard for dinner. Jay can’t see much, but he knows the doghouse must be around here, which is where that dog gave birth years ago. Everyone begins to eat, and Jay asks Angel what the dishes are. As they eat, Jay thinks about the last time he was here with Jun. Everyone went to the fishpond, and all the men took an edge of a net and waded in. Jay had started falling behind and swallowed and gagged on some water. Jun dropped his side of the net and pulled Jay out.
Jay had his first experience with death at his grandparents’ house (the puppy), and now he’s once again grieving in their backyard. Jay’s memory of Jun fits with his perception of Jun as fundamentally good: only Jun, of all the men, stopped to help Jay. Finally, it’s worth noting that Jay once again doesn’t understand a part of Philippine culture—in this case, what the dishes at dinner are—but he asks for help instead of feeling bad about it, again demonstrating how changed he is from the start of the novel.
Themes
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Jun’s legs ended up covered in leeches, which made Tita Ami call out to Tito Maning, but Tito Maning said that Jun would be fine. Jun just stared at the leeches, pulled them off one by one, and tossed them back into the pond. Tito Danilo was concerned about Jay when the men returned, but Jun just told him, “It is life.”
Tito Maning’s careless cruelty is once more on display here, as is Jun’s remarkable kindness. Jun even saved the leeches, throwing them back in the pond. Jun’s comment about “life” is interesting, and seems to suggest that he sees meaning not in finding or creating meaning, but instead in recognizing life for what it is..
Themes
Tita Chato calls Jay’s name, bringing his attention back from the memory. She worries that Jay is sick, and Tito Maning jokes that they should have brought McDonald’s for Jay. Jay goes inside to use the bathroom, but since the bathroom is a new addition to the house, Jay doesn’t know where it is. One of the rooms he checks has Tito Maning’s family’s luggage in it, and Jay notices papers poking out of Grace’s bag. He grabs them and sees that they’re Jun’s letters.
Tito Maning is still trying to taunt Jay for not belonging in the Philippines. Meanwhile, Jay here also solves a big mystery in the novel: that Grace was apparently the person who took Jun’s letters, not Tito Maning (or María). Jay thought the theft of the letters was tied to Tito Maning’s involvement in Jun’s death, but that might not be the case. The truth might be more complicated than Jay previously believed.
Themes
Jay reads one of the letters. In it, Jun says that he recently decided to be a vegetarian after watching his dad kill a goat. Jun worried about the goat’s family, which, Jun says, isn’t something other Filipinos would think about. Jun comments that maybe Jay’s American attitude was impacting him. But when Jun told Tito Maning that he was planning to be a vegetarian at dinner, Tito Maning got angry and said that many people in the country were starving. Jun asked—sincerely—if he could bring his bowl of meat to those people instead of eating it.
Jun’s distress over the goat mimics Jay’s earlier distress about the puppy, which none of his Filipino family members—except Jun—understood. Jun might be partly referencing this incident when he says that Jay’s American sensibilities are rubbing off on him. Tito Maning’s comment that other people are starving is clearly not rooted in any empathy; instead it’s a way to control Jun through guilt. It's remarkably how Jun is able to turn Tito Maning’s efforts back against him by doubling-down on kindness.
Themes
Tito Maning responded by commanding Jun to eat, and even though Grace began crying, Jun still refused. Tito Maning said that he didn’t want his son to be bakla (gay). Jun said that he might not want to live with Tito Maning anymore. After that, Tito Maning locked Jun out of the house and Jun walked to a classmate’s house, which is where he’s writing this letter from. Jun states that he is going to remain a vegetarian. If Tito Maning is against it, then it’s probably the right thing to do, and people need to do what they think is right.
Tito Maning’s version of masculinity doesn’t allow for empathy, but instead seems rooted in a blind insistence on “traditional” values without regard for others. He asserts power by excluding others. Even as a child, Jun seems to sense that Tito Maning’s rules aren’t necessarily rules he should follow. Once again, Jun seems to be a fundamentally good and courageous person.
Themes
Grace walks into the room and finds Jay with the letters. She quickly gets over her surprise and confirms that she was the one who took them. After she apologizes, she begins to cry. Jay was angry, but now he shares Grace’s sorrow, and he wraps his arms around her. She says that she loved Jun, and Jay says that he did, too. Grace remembers that when she was a kid, a boy looked up her skirt. Jun called the boy over so Grace could explain to him why it upset her. The boy apologized and never did it again. Grace says that this was Jun’s gift: he could make people care about other people.
This is maybe the first time Jay has openly grieved Jun’s death with anyone who knew him well. Jay was solely focused on the mystery of Jun’s murder when he was at Tita Chato’s, and even though he discussed the circumstances of Jun’s death with Mia, she never knew Jun. Now, Grace and Jay can share their memories of Jun, since they both knew and loved him. Grace’s story about Jun fits with what Jay already knew about his cousin, about how he had an ability to turn conflict into connection.
Themes
But Grace never returned the favor by sticking up for Jun in front of Tito Maning, before or after Jun ran away. She never even insisted on a funeral. Jay wants to comfort Grace by saying Jun is with God now, but instead he just hugs her tighter. Grace says that Tito Maning told the family not to speak about Jun. The first month after Jun left, she and Angel constantly asked about him, but it made Tito Maning so upset that they stopped. Grace feels guilty about this: she was pretending Jun was dead even when he was alive. And she still feels like she’s pretending now, when he really is dead.
Grace’s guilt about not sticking up for Jun is similar to Jay’s guilt about not writing Jun back: both of them regret that they were passive in the face of Jun’s suffering. Notably, Jay doesn’t try to comfort Grace by suggesting that Jun’s death has some religious meaning, or even that comfort is possible. Even though he’s been trying to find meaning in Jun’s death, all he can do is mourn Jun now. But he mourns with Grace. After so much silence and lack of communication, they mourn together.
Themes
Grace says that she stole the letters when she went to wake Jay up for dinner that first night. She explains that Tito Maning threw away all of Jun’s belongings, so Grace just has Jun’s digital messages, and those aren’t the same as something physical. Jay says that Grace should keep some of the letters and share some with Angel, too. Jay admits that he stopped writing Jun because at the time, Jay had a girlfriend and spent all of his time with her. They broke up after four months because even though they had the same taste in video games, they disagreed on important stuff. Grace thinks she and Jessa are the opposite of what Jay describes, which Jay says is better.
Like Jay, Grace sees the letters—because they contain his words and thoughts in a physical form—as a kind of limited embodiment of Jun. In this scene readers finally learn the reason that Jay stopped writing back to Jun back, and it’s at once pretty silly and deeply relatable: he got distracted by a romantic relationship, even if it was a bit of a shallow one. Now, though, revealing that information brings him closer to Grace, who shares details about her own relationship with Jessa. Emotional truthfulness leads to more emotional connection, and admitting what you feel guilty about can be a way of taking responsibility..
Themes
Grace and Jay sit quietly with their arms around each other, and Jay realizes that Grace is now more like a sister than a cousin. But even Jay and Em never hold each other like this. Jay further realizes that Everyone is capable of this kind of love, not just people like Jun, but most people stifle it for some reason. Jay thinks it’s time to let it out, like a flood. Grace says that she won’t delete the Instagram account; she can finally do something for Jun. She knows the risk involved, but it’s the right thing to do. Jay wishes they could post something for Jun, but that would jeopardize the account. Grace says they should head back outside “to the fakeness.” But thinking of Jun’s bravery, Jay says that he won’t pretend anymore.
Throughout the novel, Jay has been craving a genuine connection with someone. Jun seemingly generated those kinds of connections naturally, but Jay now thinks that with effort, he can build honest relationships with other people just like Jun did. Jay’s flood comment to a flood can be seen as referencing the Biblical flood that caused destruction but also washed the world clean. He seems to be referring to the nature of truth and honesty here: truth can be painful and destructive, but it’s necessary in order to build relationships anew. Jay’s refusal to “pretend” is a refusal to avoid the truth. Meanwhile, Grace has chosen to take responsibility for doing the right thing, regardless of the risks.
Themes
