The Seriousness of Play

This is the text of my reflections (and the readings) from the service this past Sunday, July 8, 2018, at the congregation I serve here in Charlottesville.  This was a multigenerational service which was not just about play, but was, itself, a time of play.

Opening Words:

The German wildlife photographer Norbert Rosing has a particular affinity for polar bears.  His work has been featured in National Geographic, and in 2006 he published, The World of the Polar Bear, which follows a family of bears over the course of a year in words and pictures.  You may have heard the story I’m about to tell.  (I’m quoting here, with slight adaptations, from one of the one of the websites that recounts this well-documented story.)

“The location was a kennel outside Churchill, Manitoba owned by dog breeder Brian Ladoon, who kept some 40 Canadian Eskimo sled dogs there when Rosing visited in 1992. A large polar bear showed up one day and took an unexpected interest in one of Ladoon's tethered dogs. [The bear was estimated to weigh about 1,200 lbs.] The other dogs went crazy as the bear approached, Rosing says, but this one, named Hudson, "calmly stood his ground and began wagging his tail." To Rosing and Ladoon's surprise, the two "put aside their ancestral animus," gently touching noses and apparently trying to make friends.  [Rosing notes that “polar bears and dogs are natural enemies and "99 percent of the bears behave quite aggressively toward dogs."]

Just then another large polar bear arrived and advanced toward one of Ladoon's other dogs, Barren. The latter rolled on his back, then the pair commenced playing "like two roughhousing kids," Rosing writes, tumbling around in the snow as he snapped pictures of the surreal encounter from the safety of his vehicle. The bear returned for more play sessions every afternoon for 10 days in a row.”  [From ThoughtCo., “Polar Bear and Huskies at Play – Analysis.”]

Reflections:  The Seriousness of Play

During the summer season the fundamental human question – the “Big Question,” if you will –  we’re exploring together is, “how to live a good life.”  This week’s answer is, “playfully.”  Before going any further, though, I want to be clear that in doing so I’ll be conflating a number of different things.  Play, of course, but also foolishness, clowning around, humor, laughter, and probably a few other things too.  But let’s start with play – a subject studied by Charles Darwin, Jean Piaget, Sigmund Floyd, Carl Jung and a host of other pretty serious people.  So … what, exactly, is play?

Patrick Bateson is emeritus professor of ethology at the University of Cambridge.  (“Ethology” is the study of animal behavior, focusing on behavior in natural conditions.)  Professor Bateson has written, “’play’ as used by biologists and psychologists is a broad term denoting almost any activity that is not ‘serious’ or ‘work.’”

Peter Gray, research professor at Boston College says, “[play] is self-chosen and self-directed … [with] rules that are not dictated by physical necessity but emanate from the minds of players.”

There is no greater example of this than a game called “Calvinball,” which comes from the classic comic strip Calvin and Hobbes (created by Bill Waterson).  In Calvinball, “players make up the rules as they go along.  Rules cannot be used twice (except for the rule that rules cannot be used twice), and any plays made in one game may not be made again in any future games.”  Calvin himself noted, “No sport is less organized than Calvinball,” and that, “sooner or later, all [his] games turn into Calvinball.”  [from the page on Calvinball on The Calvin and Hobbes Wiki]  Sometimes it seems as though life is an on-going game of Calvinball, doesn’t it?  With ever changing rules?

People at the National Institute of Play – and yes, there is such a thing – have identified seven “types” of play:

• ·         Attunement Play
• ·         Body & Movement Play
• ·         Object Play
• ·         Social Play
• ·         Imaginative and Pretend Play
• ·         Storytelling/Narrative Play
• ·         Creative Play

Each of these seem to have two purposes.  First, they are just fun in-and-of-themselves.  Just about all animals seem to play, and while scientists have identified utilitarian reasons for this play, they’ve also had to admit that play behaviors are also simply enjoyable, are done just for the pleasure they bring.  Secondly, though, are those utilitarian reasons, and through play – as infants, children, and adults – we learn all sorts of things.  In attunement play, for instance, an infant and its parents smile and giggle at each other, coo and talk baby talk, tickle and laugh, and learn how to make connections with others.  When a young cub – whether a lion or a human baby – jumps up and down they’re experiencing the pleasure of their bodies, and learning about gravity and the realities of the physical world.  Object play – banging on pots and pans or playing with dolls (or action figures!) helps with learning how to manipulate that world, and builds eye/hand coordination and all that goes with that.  Social play helps one learn to read, and send, social cues.  (Here’s an interesting thing … in dogs, wolves, and other canids, for instance, there are certain cues that what’s coming is play.  We’ve all seen a dog throw its front legs out, drop its head low, while keeping its back up straight, with its tail wagging.  That’s a clear sign that it wants to play, and any animal that doesn’t follow that up with play, that’s “cheating” or “lying,” faces ostracism from the rest of the pack.  If you say you’re going to play, you’d better play.) 

In fact, play is so important that some social scientists have found a correlation between the amount and quality of play in children and youth and the ability later in life to creatively solve problems and engage successfully with others and the world.  “Recreational deprivation,” as it’s called, has been linked to violent, antisocial adults.  As a rule, mass murderers, for example, seem to have had extremely poor play experiences as kids.

Now … this has been a lot of words about play, and in a moment we’re going to actually do a little playing together (so get prepared), yet there is one more think I want to say about play:  play provides perspective.  Play, playfulness, can be an antidote to the seriousness that can so easily threaten to overtake us.  Why do you think that late night comedians like Stephen Colbert, John Oliver, Trevor Noah, Samantha Bee, and others are so popular today?  Because they take what’s oh so incredibly seriously – seriously disturbing, seriously infuriating, seriously scary – and they playfully skewer it.  They do what fools have done since time immemorial – taking the powerful down a notch, and in so doing, redistribute that power away from the tyrants and back to those of us who laugh and join in the game.  This isn’t to say that we shouldn’t take serious things seriously.  If that’s all we do, though, we risk becoming angry, bitter, and broken.

In her autobiography, Living My Life, well-known anarchist activist revolutionary Emma Goldman wrote,

At the dances I was one of the most untiring and gayest. One evening a cousin of Sasha [Alexander Berkman], a young boy, took me aside. With a grave face, as if he were about to announce the death of a dear comrade, he whispered to me that it did not behoove an agitator to dance. Certainly not with such reckless abandon, anyway. It was undignified for one who was on the way to become a force in the anarchist movement. My frivolity would only hurt the Cause.

I grew furious at the impudent interference of the boy. I told him to mind his own business, I was tired of having the Cause constantly thrown into my face. I did not believe that a Cause which stood for a beautiful ideal, for anarchism, for release and freedom from conventions and prejudice, should demand the denial of life and joy.

There’s a well-known quotation that’s generally attributed to Goldman, which she may well have never said, yet which sums up this sentiment both beautifully and memorably, “If I can’t dance, I don’t want to be part of your revolution.”

In these days when, perhaps, a little revolution is in order, let us not forget the importance of dancing, laughing, playing.  It may be what gets us through.

Invitation to Play

Warming Up:  We repeat the following words in a call and response style, going faster and faster until we can go no faster.

Flea.  Flea fly.  Flea fly flu.  Vista!  Cumalata cumalta cumalata vista.  Oh, no no, no no de vista.  Eenee meeny decimeny ou wa ou wa o meeny; exameeny salamini ou wa o wah o meeny.  Beep diddle oh den doten bo bo skediten doten.  Yeah.  [spelling is phonetic!]

Literary Mad Libs:  The congregation is asked to call out suggestions of various types of words -- noun, plural noun, adjective, past tense verb, etc. -- which are then placed, in order, into the reading in their appropriate places.  The result (with the words in parenthesis) was then read back to the congregation.

‘Twas the night before Christmas and all through the (rabbit/horse), 
not a creature was stirring, not even a/an (cucumber). 
The (oceans) were tucked, all snug in their (walnuts), 
while visions of (horrendous) plums danced in their heads. 
Then up on the (Wonder Woman) there arose such a clatter. 
I sprang from my (skateboard) to see what was the matter. 
It was St. Nicholas with his little (ridiculous) belly, 
That shook when he laughed like a bowl full of (funiculars). 
He spoke not a word, but went straight to his work 
And filled all the (ministers), then turned with a jerk. 
And laying his (screwdriver) aside of his nose 
And giving a nod, up the (pimple) he rose. 
I heard him exclaim as he (flew) out of sight, 
“(slimy) Christmas to all, and to all a good night!”

Telling a Story One Sentence at a Time:  The congregation is invited to create a story, with the first person saying only one line, and then passing the microphone to the next person, who will add the next line.

Offering:  The collection was taken with top hats rather than the usual plates, and people blew bubbles during this time.

Closing Words:

“Play exists for its own sake. Play is for the moment; it is not hurried, even when the pace is fast and timing seems important. When we play, we also celebrate holy uselessness. Like the calf frolicking in the meadow, we need no pretense or excuses. Work is productive; play, in its disinterestedness and self-forgetting, can be fruitful.”  — Margaret Guenther in Toward Holy Ground

“We don't stop playing because we grow old; we grow old because we stop playing.”  George Bernard Shaw


Pax tecum,

RevWik

Human to Human

"Laughing Christ" by Fred Berger

My kids like to watch the online talk show, "Good Mythical Morning."  This morning my older son came downstairs and said that he'd just watched an episode that mentioned a man named Alex Mitchell.  Mitchell had some fame in his native England back in 1975.  While watching an episode of The Goodies, a British comedy troupe, he suddenly died ... apparently from laughing.  (Okay, from a rare heart condition, but it was his laughing that triggered the heart attack.)  It turns out that he wasn't the first.  There's even a Wikipedia entry -- "Death from Laughter" -- that chronicles reports of these deaths (reports of which go back as far as the 5th century BCE!).

On the other hand, it's long been said that "laughter is the best medicine," and in his famous 1985 book, Anatomy of an Illness, Norman Cousins claimed to have "laughed himself to health," setting the stage for the modern "laughter therapy" movement.  The poet (and Unitarian!) E. E. Cummings once wrote, "the most wasted of all days is one without laughter."  As a juggler/magician/clown myself (in a previous life) I would have to concur.  It is good to laugh.  In fact, on an episode of the PBS program Nova titled, "What Makes Us Human?," one of the things lifted up was laughter.

So why does the picture above surprise so many people?  It's a picture of Jesus ... laughing.  That's not the way he is generally depicted, nor is it the way most people think of him.  Serious.  Otherworldly.  Detached yet intense.  Sorrowful.  Judgemental.  Spiritual (whatever that's supposed to look like).  These are all ways we've been taught to imagine Jesus.  But laughing?

Whatever else this Jesus was, he was a man.  Even those who affirm that he was God and man together have to agree that he was a man.  Yeshua ben Miriam.  Jesus, son of Mary.  He ate.  He slept.  (Those are both in the Bible!)  He also went to the bathroom, and bathed, and stubbed his toe, and burped, and got angry, and wept (those last two are in the Bible, too).  And if he was human, he laughed.

That might be part of the problem with thinking about Jesus laughing, that whole thinking-of-him-as-human thing.  The Jesus I was taught about in Sunday School was somehow above all of that mere-human stuff.  His hair was always neatly quaffed, his robe a brilliant white; his teeth sparkled, and despite wearing sandals in the desert his toenails were always clean.  (Maybe that's because he didn't so much walk as glide along the ground.)

Here's the thing, though -- what would such a being have to teach me?  Any lessons he could impart wouldn't be relevant to me because I live fully in this world -- the dust and dirt, blood and sweat of it.  I falter.  I fall.  I fail.  And even with the miracle of modern washing machine technology my clothes get dingy after a time.  So maybe this is one of the reasons so many people have felt the need to leave the Christian traditions -- because they intuit that this all-too-perfect God/man really has nothing to say to them ... nothing that could really apply to their own lived experiences.

And maybe that's one of the reasons he's been depicted like this.  It is likely that in the begining this gandiosity was intended to make him more relevant, more important, more trustworth.  Just as one might believe a king because he is, well, a King, so too this King of Kings should be listened to.  Yet over time this elevated status made it harder and harder to take Jesus seriously and, so, gave Christians an "out."  Perhaps if only unconsciously we were able to say, "these are good teachings, yes, profound, but not really anything I have to pay attention to because they can't be meant for me.  I'm a mere man, and he's a God-man."

Marcus Borg, Stephen Peterson, and so many others have made their careers on trying to re-introduce and reclaim the human Jesus.  (This was the intent of my first book, too -- Teacher, Guide, Companion:  Rediscovering Jesus in a Secular World.)  Because if this Jesus was a human being like me, who understood the kinds of trials I know ... then maybe his message could have meaning in my life.  Should have meaning in my life.

So it's important to me to know that Jesus laughed.  He asked his disciples to let children come to him -- and who can have a bunch of children hanging off them without laughing?  His first miracle was recorded as the turning of water into wine at a wedding.  You think he could do that without a smile on his face?  And if he could laugh, and he could cry, then maybe he could get scared, and feel alone, and worry about what to do next.  Maybe he could understand what it is to be human because he was really human too.  And when a wise human has something to say to me, something drawn directly from his own human experiences, then I don't really  have an "out."  Then it's harder for me not to listen.

One last thing -- if you are still having trouble imagining Jesus with a smile on his face, check out this collection on Pinterest.

Pax tecum,

RevWik

PS -- that bricklayer in England who died while laughing at an episode of The Goodies?  His wife wrote the group a "thank you" card, thanking them for making his last moments so enjoyable.

Will & Grace

These are the sermonic explorations shared on March 5, 2012 at
the Thomas Jefferson Memorial Church - Unitarian Universalist in Charlottesville, Virginia.

[To listen]

Thomas Collier:  Grace – the new topic for the month of March.  (Eric?  What are you doing?  Atonement, was hard enough, then Incarnation in December I had to stretch head and heart on that topic and now???? – Grace!!)

Well, as usual I don’t have a clue what Grace is.  I mean, I understand that the definition of Grace is, a free or unmerited gift, but that begs the question of who is the giver (religiously speaking), and why me?   There are more worthy and more needy people than me.  And if grace is accidental, a positive synchronicity then there is no giver, and without a giver, how can it be considered a gift. So grace, beyond reading the definition of what it is supposed to mean, I can’t say that grace makes a whole lot of sense to me.  The dictionary was not much help, this time. 

Grace – Graceful. Now that makes sense, that I can understand; fluid, smooth, flawless, beautiful.

That is grace I can hold onto – That is grace I can see – That is grace I can hope for.  I hope for you, for me, for us all – Life lived gracefully.  A Smooth, flawless, beautifully lived life.

That would be wonderful if it weren’t so incredibly unrealistic.  Sometimes life is graceful and sometimes life is a bellyflop. 

I struggled to find an image for this grace-less-ness and the best I could come up with is an old Calvin and Hobbs cartoon where Calvin is at the top of Mayhem Mountain and Hobbs is questioning the rationale behind pushing off.  They, of course, GO and Mayhem ensues.  They fly (uncontrolled) through the air, crash into just about everything they could crash into and then end up at the bottom, bumped, bruised, scratched … and triumphant! 

Sure, there are times when life is grace, beautiful moments; then there are times when Grace, the dancer, falls flat on her tukus and everyone stifles a laugh because they know its not socially appropriate to laugh especially when the person sitting next to you is genuinely concerned for Grace.  Yes, I too am concerned for Grace … but Grace just fell on her butt and that was funny. 

A life well lived comes with a fair share of grace-less crash-bang, fall-down, bruises and scars kind of moments.  The kind of moments that really make stories, that make stories great. The kind of moments that make us laugh.  We will wait through the entire series of credits to get to the outtakes – the crashes, the bangs, the epic failures of the movie.  And sometimes the outtakes are more entertaining than the movie.  I am not speaking metaphorically, so don’t go home and ponder that as a life lesson. 

 Look, its OK to laugh when another person has an epic crash because they are part of life, the person and the crashes.  I have done a lot of whitewater kayaking and we, the whitewater community, have gotten over the idea that laughing at someone adds insult to injury.  We laugh because the crash was funny, not because we are laughing at you (plus we have seen a lot of crashes an we know you are going to be OK). 

There have been times when I was laughing hysterically and offering a hand for support.  There have been many times when I was on the receiving end of someone laughing hysterically and offering a hand for support.  Actually the only time that laughter adds insult to injury is when someone is taking themselves a bit to seriously and in all honesty, we ALL crash so don’t take yourself too seriously.  Plus you are killing the potential mirth of the situation. 

In our daily lives, we are all usually in a crash or a state of Grace.  Usually.  There are those extreme times – Joyful times, which are more than just graceful, and Tragic times, where laughter can not penetrate. But the most of our time is spent in a crash or a beautiful flowing state of Grace. 

When life in is in the midst of a crash – when grace is gone – don’t forget to laugh.  The crash you are in may be physical, emotional or spiritual – don’t forget to laugh.  You may be on your knees alone or with a trusted companion - weeping OR pacing back and forth screaming (once again alone or with a trusted companion because its not Ok to do that in public).  Don’t forget to laugh.  It could be huge, “I have to write this down, this is a GREAT story” kind of hysterical laughter or it could be a small “I can NOT BELIEVE how messed up this is”  kind of laughter.  Don’t forget to laugh.    

There is as much if not more God in laughter as there is in quiet solemnity.

There is as much if not more Spirit in laughter as there is in quiet contemplation.

I really wish a beautiful, fluid Graceful life, for you, for us all. 

but when Not-So-Graceful happens

I wish for us all Laughter. 

Erik Wikstrom:  Our Universalist ancestors told the world, and tell us still, that there are no limits to the love of God.  Now we Unitarian Universalists, today, may want to have some freedom to express that phrase “the love of God” in different ways.  For some of us those words themselves are too limiting, they are too inextricably linked to images of a paternalistic Santa in the Sky who doles out goodies to the good and cosmic coal to everyone else.  (As if even God could make such a clear distinction between those two!)

Some people don’t like “theistic language,” or what our recent UUA President Bill Sinkford liked to call “the language of reverence.”  That’s okay, really.  We don’t need it.  In the Christian scriptures Jesus is remembered as saying that “God causes it to rain on the just and the unjust alike,” a passage often quoted by those long-ago Universalists.  We could just as easily, and just as accurately, say simply that it rains on the just and the unjust.  The sun shines on good people and bad people equally.  Green plants soak up carbon dioxide and exude fresh oxygen whether we deserve it or not.

And now we’ve come to a part of the concept of “Grace” that often causes fits for folks like us.  If grace is, as many would define it, an “unmerited” or “undeserved” gift or blessing, then many of us would draw the line right there.  What do I mean by saying “undeserved”?  It’s not like we’re still stuck in that “sinner” stuff, those old teachings that seemed to emphasize how “unworthy” we are.

Well no . . . we’re not.  And that’s part of the point.  But let me offer an illustration.

When I was candidating for this position the Search Committee looked at a lot of other highly qualified folks.  I had to demonstrate – prove to them and then to you – that I was up to the . . . opportunity . . . of pastoring this people.  And I think it’s fair to say that I earned my place in this pulpit; that I deserve to be here, ministering with all of you, co-creating this beloved community we call TJMC.

But do I – could I – deserve what it feels like when Scott plays?  Is there some way that I could earn the energy in this room when we’re weaving worship together?  The thrill that runs up my spine when I see what’s going on in our RE program, what could possibly make me worthy of that feeling?

Nothing.  Absolutely nothing.  These things are completely unmerited, undeserved . . . they’re grace.

As is the sunset that reminds you that life is worth living at the end of  that day when you’ve not been so sure.  As is the look in your child’s eye when they look at you like you know everything and can do everything and . . . are . . . everything to them.  Grace.  Nothing but grace.

So our Unitarian Universalist ancestors told the world, and tell us still, that there are no limits to grace; that it falls on the just and the unjust; that it shines on good people and bad people equally; that no matter what we may know ourselves to be, it’s there – all around us (and within us too!) – just ready for the taking.  They preached that the question of whether or not you “deserved” it, or were “worthy” of it, isn’t really the right question.  Of course you don’t; there’s no way that you could.  So stop worrying about that.

The real question doesn’t have to do with “worthiness” or “unworthiness” but, instead, willingness.  Because grace is all around us, like the air we breathe, but we have a choice about whether or not we acknowledge it; whether or not we accept it.

So there’s the question – the real question imbedded in the concept of grace – are you willing to accept it?  Are you willing to open yourself to it?  Trust it?  Live your life as though it were true?

Albert Einstein is reported to have said, “"The most important question you'll ever ask is whether the Universe is a friendly place."  It’s possible that he didn’t say this, but it’s an awfully good question nonetheless.  And the answer, I’m afraid is not quantifiable.  There is no definitive conclusion to be drawn by looking at the available data, because the available data unfortunately supports both hypotheses.  So we have to make a choice – you and I have to make a choice – with each and every day we’re above ground, with each and every breath we draw in each and every moment-by-moment encounter, we have to decide if we’re going to live in a friendly Universe or an unfriendly one. 

We have to choose whether we’re going to see the glass as half full or half empty because the objective reality is that it is both at the same time, yet it matters mightily which perspective we emphasize.  “It matters what we believe,” Sophia Lyon Fahs said.  A fuller rendering of her poem can be found in the back of our hymnal, but she said:

Some beliefs are like walled gardens. . .

Other beliefs are expansive and lead the way into wider and deeper sympathies.

Some beliefs are like shadows.. . .

Other beliefs are like sunshine. . . .

Some beliefs are divisive. . . .

Other beliefs are bonds in a world community. . . .

Some beliefs are like blinders. . . .

Other beliefs are like gateways opening wide vistas for exploration.

Some beliefs weaken a person's selfhood. . .

Other beliefs nurture self-confidence and ignite the feeling of personal worth.

Some beliefs are rigid, like the body of death, impotent in a changing world.

Other beliefs are pliable, like the young sapling, ever growing with the upward thrust of life.

It matters what we believe.  It matters how we see that glass.  It matters what we think of the Universe.  And it is up to us to choose.

Buddhists teach us that even though we are breathing all the time we are hardly ever aware of – really, fully, deeply aware of and awake to –something as simple as our breathing.  Yet if we wake up – when we become aware – even something as simple as our breathing is recognized as being miraculous.  Awake or asleep – it’s fundamentally a choice.  A choice each of us has the power to make.  Right now.

And right now again.

Each of us can choose to breathe the air, and feel the sun on our backs, and let the rain drench us to the skin – there are no limits to the love of God.  There are no limits to grace.

Unless we put them there.

That’s really the message I have to share this morning.  The sun is always shining, exuding its energy indiscriminately, lavishing its life-giving power without condition.  Unless we create smog and pollution to block it out.  (And, of course, even so its energy gets through . . . we just make it harder for us to see it.)  The rain falls, and even our going inside does not stop its fall – we just prevent it from getting to us.  But it’s there.  And when it transforms into water vapor and enters the air it lands on even those of us who’ve tried to be safe from its touch . . . we just don’t know it

In the coming weeks we’ll explore this idea of “grace” from several angles.   This morning I leave these fourteen words for each of us to ponder:

There is no limit to grace.  Do you have the will to accept it?