In his short work, Humour and Faith, Reinhold Niebuhr explores what a healthy human response to suffering and despair looks like.
Whilst perhaps not immediately apparent, Niebuhr insists upon an intimate relationship between humour and faith in responding to life’s difficulties, asserting, “…both deal with the incongruities of our existence.”
Niebuhr goes on to suggest, “Humour is concerned with the immediate incongruities of life, and faith with the ultimate ones.” Where one offers release from the absurdly unacceptable, the other provides peace from the incomprehensibly unknowable. That which humour is impotent to transform, faith can hope for, mobilise and affect change.
“Both humour and faith,” Niebuhr claims, “are expressions of the freedom of the human spirit, of its capacity to stand outside of life, and itself, and view the whole scene.” They are lenses through which we can choose to see and respond to things disagreeable.
When we despair at the state of the world; at the excesses of the rich at the expense of the poor; at their brazen attempts to widen the gap, sometimes we don’t know whether to laugh or cry. From a place of powerless outrage, many turn to late night comedians while others turn to the streets.
Niebuhr notes that while “laughter has sometimes contributed to the loss of prestige of dying oligarchies and social systems,” Mussolini and Hitler could not be laughed out of power.
In a post-truth age of politics and corporate empires, humour helps us to maintain our sanity, but at some point, faith will need to do the heavy lifting if we are to see the social change that humour calls out.
As Niebuhr insist, “Serious evil must be seriously dealt with.” If we do nothing but laugh, nothing will change.
History details our successes and failings in response to greed and injustice, and a detailed plan to combat today’s ills is well beyond the scope of this post.
But what can be said of such a plan? What would it require from the education sector? The community? Our leaders? And how could faith and good humour inform the way forward?
In addition to insight, courage and wisdom, I would pray for a hope that sustains any such worthwhile movement, faith that believes such transformation is possible, and enough humour to survive the sacrament of the inevitable defeats along the way.
What about you??
Reinhold Niebuhr, Discerning the Signs of the Times: Sermons for Today and Tomorrow, Humour and Faith. 1945.
Photo by Thomas Griesbeck on Unsplash
whybelief.com 