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 Holy Laughter


“Give to us laughter,
O Source of our life.
Laughter can banish
so much of our strife!
Laughter and love
give us wholeness and health.
Laughter and love
Are the coin to true wealth.”
words: Walter Farquharson (Voices United 624)

Recent research has demonstrated what our grandmothers always knew: LAUGHTER is GOOD MEDICINE. Humor and laughter make a significant contribution to both our physical and mental health. Learning to adopt a lighter attitude and see the funny side of everyday situations gives us the resilience we need to cope on the tough days.

Laughter is a holy thing, it is like mercy; it heals. When you can laugh at yourself, you are free. Learning to laugh is not merely a secular pleasure; it opens onto the sacred realm. Spiritual traditions from around the world teach us not to take ourselves too seriously. In fact, sober reverence for dogma and holy figures can stop us from experiencing our own awakening. Sometimes it is better to laugh than to pray; and laughter itself can become a kind of prayer.

Humour makes every message stick, whether it's that silly ad that you never forget or the joke that hammers home some important spiritual truth.

William Barry (spiritual director and author) wrote: "Without a sense of humour you would be missing out on a whole lot of life! You would be missing the way, for example, cats will jump on one another and play, the kind of playful humour that goes on between children and adults, and even some parts of the Bible. If you don't laugh at all that, you're missing something. Part of a healthy emotional life is being in touch with all reality — not just the difficult parts."

Noted theologians have also written about laughter. Karl Barth wrote, "Laughter is the closest thing to the grace of God;" and theologian, Reinhold Niebuhr, noted that, "humour is a prelude to faith, and laughter is the beginning of prayer."

A prayer on laughter

Loving Father,
Lord of clowns and smiling saints,
we rejoice that You are a God of laughter and tears.
Blessed are You, for You have rooted within us
the gifts of humor, lightheartedness and mirth.
With jokes and comedy,
You cause our hearts to sing as laughter flows out of us.
We are grateful that Your Son, Jesus, the Master, daily invites us to be Fools for Your sake,
to embrace the madness
of Your prophets, holy people and saints.
We delight in that Holy Madness
which becomes medicine to heal the chaos of the cosmos since it calls each of us
from the hum-drumness of daily life
into joy, adventure,
and most of all, into freedom.
With circus bands and organ grinders,
with fools, clowns, court jesters and comedians, with high spirited angels and saints,
we too join in the fun and foolishness of life,
so that Your holy laughter
may ring out to the edges of the universe.
Blessed are You, O Lord, our God,
Who invites us to be filled with holy laughter.
- Prayers for the Domestic Church, Ed Hays