7 - 10 - 17 Lookin' Stupid

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“he [Jesus] said, ‘Go away! The girl is not dead but sleeping.’ And they ridiculed him.”

How many times have we thought of a very faithful response to a question, but then remembered the kind of reception it would receive and rethought our response. We temper our testimony for fear of alienating our friends who we think do not want to hear about how our faith impacts our life. On the other hand, they probably see us and wonder why we bother with Church as it doesn’t seem to be doing us any good, at least not that they hear about.

If we’re going to give effective testimony with our lives, we also need to explain it with our words. Surely if your friends see you doing terrible things and being ungenerous to the people in your life they probably won’t care to listen to you too much about how your faith improves you. But the almost always silent admiration you can gain from your peers when you’re being a particularly unselfish person can only be used to draw them into the Church if they think of the Church when they think of you.

Simply seeing a kind act doesn’t necessarily make me want to go to church. Nor does seeing a remarkably kind person. What’s going to convince me to go is if that very kind person tells me how they got that way, what’s helping them along, what tools they have that I do not have. We should be walking billboards for Jesus in our daily lives, even if the image is a bit crude.

I think part of the reason it’s crude is because the person we imagine wearing a billboard looks quite silly. The fear of looking stupid can be a debilitating one. It’s what keeps people off karaoke stages and dance floors, but it’s also part of what keeps people from approaching someone who could be their soulmate, or quitting a job they hate to pursue something they love.

The conclusion I’ve come to is that I’m going to look stupid anyways, most likely every day, so I may as well embrace it. The other thing I like to consider is whether I’m really saving face by not doing what I think would make me look silly. If everyone else at the wedding is dancing and having a good time, aren’t you the fool for having a straight face? If a little kid hands you a play phone and says the call is for you would you be more embarrassed by playing along or refusing a five-year-old?

Another consideration is what our motive is for the action. If we’re debating whether or not to do something stupid just for the attention, I think we could be cautious. For the happiness of others we love? There may be a stronger inclination to proceed. When we believe we will look stupid by acting out our faith, we must decide to look foolish.

A few stares, a joke or two at our expense, is nothing compared to a crucifixion.

I once heard a bit in a Lewis book (at least I think it was) about having to be humbled to develop humility. One of the ways we are most frequently humbled is by this social embarrassment, the condescending jabs of our peers. So let’s embrace the opportunity to be uncool.

Along a similar vein I can think of few better ways to develop the kind of cheer and good humor that will go so far in assisting our journey as accustoming ourselves to being the butt of the joke, and even openly inviting it. Self-deprecating humor is one of the less painful and most direct ways to combat pride in ourselves, so long as we are not simply being actors on a stage.

In an early part of the Gospel reading for today, a woman desires to touch Jesus’s cloak as she knows it will heal her. When she does he turns and says “Courage, daughter! Your faith has saved you.”

There are two virtues the woman exhibits in this story, even though it’s only about eight lines long.

Firstly, she desires a closeness to God. We need to really think about this one. Superficially, it seems immediately obvious that we would desire to be close to God but we really need to consider what kind of things are and are not happening close to God. We can’t bring our vices with us if we’re going to hang out with God. We can’t bring our meanness and pettiness, and we certainly cannot still harbor our jealousies. Once we really think about what a closeness to God entails, and still decide that we do desire that closeness, we have taken a large step forward in our development as Children.

Second is her sincere faith. She risks ridicule to chase down a notable rabbi and grab his clothing. I’m not sure that she was risking any physical harm to herself but it’s certainly an unusual action. And she exhibits not only this disregard for convention but such an elevated view of His power that she knows she does not need to draw his attention, to even speak to him, to even touch his flesh. She knows that she needs merely to touch the tassel on his cloak for the enormity of his healing power to extend to her.