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Alan Paton seems to be privileging the church and standing more behind the church's idea of social order. John believes in a way that he must take over power to fix things. He talks of lawyers getting involved with the incident that Stephen's son is in. He thinks his son has no part in and goes on to blame only his nephew. He is getting fed up with his nephews mistakes and thinks lawyers will be the answer to this problem.

Paton does not privilege John though because he gives John a rude attitude that makes the reader want to disagree with him and his idea of moving forward. On page 134 he asks Stephen, "Who will believe your son?" and then it is said, "he says it with meaning, with cruel and pitiless meaning." Paton gives us the idea that John is just being cruel and not going on the right path to move forward, while the church is starting with the people and trying to uplift them and give the leaders jobs and encouragement so that they can have hope to go out and fix the problems. They do this by preaching sermons of God never forsaking human kind and helping the blind men.