The play begins with Sister Mary Ignatius on stage explaining who God is, where Heaven, Hell and Purgatory are and how one is able to get to each of these places. She has a young assistant of seven named, Thomas who comes on and off the stage to give her water and to answer her catechism questions. She is a woman who is obeyed and trained her student to know the answers the the vital questions that will keep him out of hell.
She then gets a stack of cards with questions on them and begins to answer them, refusing to answer the question as to why God allows evil things to happen on the earth. And then her former students arrive to put on a play she taught them as children, all before they reveal the sin they are living in which instantly horrifies her, and she condemns them before Diane tries to kill her for making her the way she is.
The play is about religion and how the effect of religion has trickled into society through the children being taught by teachers such as Sister Mary, who are void of relationship and true care and love for the students. Instead, she is focused on doctrine and legalism which leads to her condemnation, judgement and execution of two of her former students. Sister Mary Ignatius represents the part of the Catholic Church which lords its knowledge over others while being blind to the plank that resides in their own heart. It is this type of teaching that has caused so many to not only walk away from the faith, but caused them to defy the church and those who had the opportunity to care for them and mold them in love, but didn't.
Sister Mary Ignatius created an atmosphere of obedience to her rules, and her students learned falsely that this is the way God is as their impression of Him was created through teaching that came through legalism, rather than love. Unfortunately for Aloysius, Sister Mary who represents the Catholic Church has the power at the end of the play as she holds him up at gunpoint. Even worse, handing the gun to the seven year old Thomas who continues to keep the gun on the man while in the lap of the Sister. She is passing on her self-righteousness to a new generation.
