The Myth of the Humorless Christian

Copyright by Shea Oakley

All rights reserved

Theologically conservative Christians have often been portrayed in popular Western culture as puritanically humorless, as individuals who have allegedly added laughter to the list of sins about which they are said to be obsessed. Frankly, this is another fallacy put forth by those who do not know what kind of people we really are and who are simply unwilling to put forth much effort in seeing past their own prejudices. (I ought to know; I used to be one of those unwilling people.)

The fact is that most Christians I have met love to both laugh, and laugh long and hard. The Biblical Church is an amalgam of every sort of human personality and we thankfully have our share of natural wits and comedians. The only people in our congregations who bear faces constantly bereft of laughter are perhaps the few sour legalists in our midst along with those who are simply going through a hard patch in life (as all human beings, including Christians, do) and are having a difficult time responding to humor. Other than that, any social time after a Sunday morning service usually echoes with laughter and a lot of it.

For those who think the Bible a humorless book it might be instructive to look at some of the words of Christ contained within. His teachings included illustrations, often metaphorical in nature, which would have caused more then a polite chuckle among his hearers. For instance when he calls religious hypocrites, in their pompous moralizing, people who would “stain out a gnat but swallow a camel” he is using hyperbolic humor that would put to laughter those who lived in a time when their was a need to strain ever-present insects out of food that was being eaten. The truth is both the Old and New Testaments are sprinkled with humor. It is true that the Bible is not brimming over with meaningless comedy, but then the message it is designed to impart is basically a serious one. Never, however, is human laughter put under some kind of anathema within its pages. In fact in the 21st chapter of the Book of Genesis Sarah, mother of Isaac, explicitly credits her Creator for giving her the gift of mirth at the time of the miraculous birth of her son. “God has brought me laughter” she declares.

One of the cardinal characteristics of the true Christian life is joy. Joy manifests itself in many wonderful ways and healthy, innocent humor happens to be one of them. If you ever walk into a church and solemnity is the only thing you sense, even when a service that requires some solemnity is over, I suggest you simply turn around and walk out the door. You probably were not in a truly Christian church at all. Real followers of Christ are, it is true, quietly reverent when the moment calls for it, but the rest of the time we like to laugh at least as much as the next person.