The Church needs to learn how to have Godly fun

It is right that the Church is a community that deals with serious issues, a community that takes serious things seriously; it is right that the Church looks to challenging injustice, healing the sick, freeing the oppressed and finding food and shelter for the poor and homeless. It is right that the Church takes these things seriously and it is right that the Church takes seriously its own capacity to get these things wrong; to oppress and to cause harm. But surely the Church is about serving the whole human being not just solving the problems.

Some of the Church is just serious or even miserable for no good reason - and some of the Church has a sense of fun that isn’t really as healthy as we might think. There is that 'worthy' sense of joy that many Christians get out of doing good to others and being good people. There is a sense of fun that, from the inside of the fold seems like wholesome, clean and holy fun. However, it is also a sense of fun that often comes across as dismissive or aloof to those on the outside - and as disingenuous to those who may be hurting, either in spite of or even because of their experience of Church.

I believe that what we need is more of that joy that digs deep into the well of human experience; that laughs alongside the broken hearted and the lost; that sees godliness in the laughter of the drunk and the deep holy reverence of the person who dances long into the night in celebration of the fleeting experience that is a human life. We need this more than the kind of joy that revels in judging itself superior to such lower people. We need the joy of singing our hearts out in the karaoke bars and in the back seats of cars; we need the joy of the ones singing football chants in the stadium as well as the ones who bristle with joy at the complex rhythms of a jazz tune or feel their hearts lift as the protest singer sings out ‘we shall overcome'. We need this so much more than the self righteous joy that will not laugh at a joke because it contains a rude word, that cannot bear the laughter of people with short skirts and long nails, that is immune – inoculated against the effects of a samba beat upon their feet and panics at the ambiguity of sophisticated humour.

Christ ate with sinners and associated with outcasts and in amongst all the other stuff was washed by prostitutes, met politics with satire, shared food and drink with friends and was accused of gluttony by religious leaders. He went to parties and told stories about banquets, weddings, new wine and young women.

Ecclesiastes said there is a time to weep and a time to laugh, a time to mourn and a time to dance - I wonder, what time is it for you and where do you find true joy in your life?