Joy, Hope & Cheerful Tidings!
Simple “good-or-bad” answers are popular — but the Bibles message is clear!
Hedonism and fun-society, Sodom and Gomorrha, bread and games — this hostile image of the bourgeois-puritan high-performance society is outlined fairly quickly and is easily accepted in many Protestant circles. How we love, as human beings, to get things straight, get simple answers and clear instructions: yes or no, good or bad, right or wrong, for or against, friend or foe.
And this is exactly how we, as Christians, ask ourselves when confronted with a new situation, a new person: blessing or malediction, from God or from the devil, spirit or flesh, believer or heathen?
That is why many of us long for clear arguments in order to be able to reject and condemn the escalating hedonistic fun-society as sinful, with the help of a biblically based unambiguous morale. The Catholic Church early on defined seven deadly sins, among them gluttony and lust as vice.
Christianity as a challenge
Unfortunately, the statements made by Jesus, as well as the Bible and our Christian faith, do not make it so easy for us: God created our bodies out of clay and breathed in divine life. Jesus was both the Son of Man and the Son of God.
We now live here on earth as human beings with all our earthly needs and limits, hoping and believing at the same time that with our faith and prayer we can create a living communion with an otherworldly, eternal God. Not either or, but rather both.
And the first traditional miracle of Jesus is the transformation of water to wine at an exuberant festival. Obviously, that wedding party got out of hand, so there was a mishap at an oriental festival known for its generous hospitality — there was no wine left. But which words of Jesus are NOT passed down? “Guys, now that’s enough, go home.” “Be sensible.” “We want to be humble and satisfied and thankful for what we’ve got so far.” NO — Jesus turned water into wine so the festival could go on.
A dualistic division of the world into a one-sided exaggerated and universally glorified spirit on the one hand and an evil, sinful material-carnal world on the other hand is primarily gnostic and from a Christian perspective not so clear. Contrary to the worldview discussed in ancient philosophy, which the Christian faith was opposed to, we are not spirit beings trapped in an inadequate carnal body — we are human beings.
Especially as Christians, we are challenged that we as divine creatures are both at the same time: created by God as a human being with a body with hormones, needs and limits to live here and now on this earth — and at the same time inspired by divine breath with one great longing. We are challenged to live both qualities in two worlds. For example, in the medieval virtue canon of Christian knights we find on the one hand the demand for humility, dignity, restraint and discipline, but also that for friendliness, high spirits and bountiful generosity.
The message of the Bible is actually clear — the earth is not a vale of tears!
No — it is not as if we have a pre-life here on earth and real life takes place only in heaven. No — the Bible teaches us that this life here on earth is already a gift from God. Even though the concise biblical passage about the hardships of life is very present. Even though it is an important part of our faith and confidence that we believe in a God who loves, comforts and protects us.
Not misery and self-pity, not self-mortification and moralizing narrow- mindedness, but joy and kindness count among the outpouring of the Holy Spirit. The Vulgate, the old Latin version of the Bible, explicitly says «gaudium». Even as a non-theologian, I can easily find dozens of passages in the Bible that summon me to be happy and rejoice. Music and singing often play an important role and form the basis of the current worship culture since the 1980s.
Actually, as Christians, we shouldn’t just be a community of faith, but a community of joy. The customs of explicit Easter laughter were even found in various old churches. In the Easter service, the participants were supposed to laugh out loud after Lent and the mourning of Good Friday and also be happy and vocal about the resurrection and redemption at Easter.
The Christian problem with the fun society
Nevertheless, the cliché of earnest Christianity is widespread in our West European, Protestant society. “Everything that is fun is either a sin or makes you fat” is often understood as a mocking platitude towards Puritan-Calvinist morals. And so it is easy to find numerous social media articles, texts and sermons from moralizing Christians who complain about today’s fun society.
A differentiating view of fun and happiness
Obviously, from a Christian perspective, not every kind of “fun” is tolerated. Because of the biblical call for “fear of God” and the clear rejection of ridicule, nuisance, drunkenness, drinking and eating bouts as well as the deterrent effect of orgy-like banquets for pagan gods, the idea of fun seems to be an abomination, especially for evangelical Christians. In fact, jokes and laughter as such are hardly an issue in the Bible.
Work as a purpose and a perspective in life
The Reformation and the resulting Calvinist and Puritan currents brought us the paradigm of the performance society. In the beginning there was actually the upgrading of the third level — the mostly serf farmers and servants, who were not defined in the first level by their noble descent and not in the second level by their spiritual calling as clerics, but only belonged to the third level and their day had to indulge in hard work. Which noble, educated and spiritual person in the ancient world and the Middle Ages spent his everyday life with sudatory and exhausting work?
The well-known Bible verses from the Book of Proverbs, from preachers and from the apostle Paul about work and against laziness were first of all important bases for upgrading and strengthening the personality of those people who had to work as members of the third class, and secondly the basis of a bourgeois society. From a Christian point of view, the working person was no longer a subhuman, but a full human being. And that was good.
This is how work ultimately became a part of and a life perspective in our western, bourgeois performance society, a society in which human labour was necessary to enable growth, progress and prosperity. This was also underlined by the narrative of the story of creation, which tells us about a garden of Eden that Adam cultivated and designed and a world that Adam should submit to. So today we look back on great progress in technology and medicine in the past three centuries. This makes our current life span, our security and our prosperity attainable and it was made possible because many people found a purpose and a life perspective in their work.
But is the concept of relentless hard work and honest reliability really, for everyone, the only purpose of life that makes us happy and satisfied, especially in view of a digital future in which more and more traditional work is being replaced by computers and robots?
Laughter is good and healthy
Current medical and psychological studies confirm it again and again: laughter and joy are not only funny, but also healthy for our body, for our mental well- being and for our social community. The cardiovascular system is stimulated, the skin is supplied with more blood and our stomach is massaged. Our body also releases joy hormones. Our laughter strengthens our immune system and we are less susceptible to diseases. On top of that: laughter helps sick people get better faster, which speaks for the assignment of hospital clowns. The invocations of the Bible mentioned at the beginning that we should be joyful and happy are confirmed by modern science.
A Christian faith that wants to preserve past concepts? or a faith that wants to enable a future full of life?
No, I don’t think that our Christian beliefs and God give us simple patterns and simple answers. The study of the Bible and of Christ’s disciples constantly challenge us anew. I am deeply convinced that we, as Christians, are repeatedly called upon to enable and shape life and the future — the narrative of a Creator God gives us the genetic code that we should also be creative. It is therefore not only a question of combating the excesses of a fun society in a moralizing way.
Even though reckless maximization of pleasure at the expense of others, new forms of addiction and dependency and new manipulative concepts of “bread and games” to deceive and numb the masses cannot be approved of from a Christian perspective, we have to go one step further. The Bible tells us of a culture of joy and happiness — and we don’t see enough of it.
I founded the “Hoffnungsbarometer” — the Barometer of Hope — over ten years ago because, as a Christian, I am convinced that we must face a time of scaremongering with a competence of hope.
Perhaps, in the face of a manipulating and distracting fun society, we should ask ourselves what quality of happiness skills it takes to encourage and exhilarate people? What kind of humor is needed that does not work through malicious joy and discrimination, but amazes us and brings us together as a community and as dialogue partners?
Nietzsche, “Zarathustra” 1884, said: “They would have to sing better songs for me to learn to have faith in their Redeemer; and his disciples would have to look more redeemed!”
Let us take this advice to heart. Let us please the Holy Spirit and allow ourselves to enjoy fun, laughter and merriment!
