Radical Laughter in the Age of Trumpism By Kelle Brown
Take a deep, life-sustaining breath. Some of the circumstances of our recent days haven’t allowed many. Breathe in the breath of God and find some refreshment for your spirit. The American people and spectators across the globe have breathlessly watched as characters within our government play an odd and brutal game of life-altering table tennis. There are no winners, though many are truly losing. Many Americans are caught watching while others participate in profound tribalism under the guise of “fairness” and democracy, so stuck in the hoarding of power and competition that no one has stopped to acknowledge or assess who is most impacted. Even more heartbreaking is that perhaps those in power are aware of how many are suffering, and find the result of their actions a calculated risk as they sustain and grow empire. This is impacting our collective souls, and personally, I am furious and heart-sick.
Beyond the anger, I am weary. I am Fanny Lou Hamer tired. In fact, if the truth be told, I am not sure where hope lies in all of this. My faith—especially in God’s people—is dented and brutalized by the realities of our current political atmosphere. While I am writing and processing my anger and grief, however, I am distracted from my righteous indignation. As I type, my grandmother is upstairs in her room, joyous and laughing. How audacious!
Her boisterous laughter is rolling down the wooden stairs of our house, bouncing off of every hard surface, and slinking through walls and under the crack of the door. I can hear the loud roar of celebration from a sports event she’s watching, one that the whole neighborhood can enjoy, due to its volume. Though we are in different rooms, I can see her leaning back in her chair to give her laugh the best chance to come from deep in her belly.
My grandmother, Mrs. Dorothy M. Price, whom I call “Big”, knows what is going on. Her mind is very clear, and I often find her shaking her head as she murmurs that she thought we were beyond all this mess. Ultimately, she is annoyed and appalled, and sick that racism, sexism, and other forms of oppression have yet to die. Yet, she can enjoy her life on a day where I can barely make it out of bed.
My love for her is deep, so I resist accusing her of being tone-deaf and distracted, of not being empathetic when too much is happening. Of not being focused when children are locked in cages; when the sexually assaulted are taunted and dismissed, and fellow Americans laugh along; when Black lives have yet to matter; when the murders of trans women happen week after week without reaching the threshold of outrage; when Puerto Rico is still without resources; when the children of Flint still have unacceptable levels of lead.
I contend that her laughter in the midst of mystifying circumstances, disappointment and anger points to something revolutionary and deeply faithful. My grandmother will be 88 in a few days. She has seen much heartache and still her faith in God is as bold and as buoyant as ever. Big has walked with God as a child during the Depression. Never will you hear her complain about her circumstances. She didn’t know that she was experiencing poverty because her parents just kept on keeping on, making a way out of no way. God carried her through losing her only brother who was a prisoner of war in the Korean War. God was with her family as they drove through the night to avoid the Ku Klux Klan. She and many of her friends lived through redlining, through the Tuskegee Experiment and illegal sterilizations, through Jim and Jane Crow, through food deserts in neighborhoods of color, biased and discriminatory schooling, and skewed, oppressive and selective governmental leadership. Through dangers seen and unseen, she has trusted in God, who has never forsaken her…or her granddaughter.
My grandmother can smile in the midst of heartache not because she is deaf to the laments of the people, but because she has lived through times like this before. Big more than survived. She thrives! The God of the universe is absolutely on both ends of this spiral of time, and is able to see us through. There is no better, more courageous story than a life that sings, “My soul looks back and wonders, how I got over,” even while suffering, chaos and confusion is at play.
The best sense of religion and spirituality is born out of the need and desire to honor this fact, that we are all in this human experience, and in each life some rain will fall, and that there will be heartache, disappointment and grief. The things we never imagined would happen will happen. Yet, God is alive and we are as well. We can thrive despite and because of our current circumstances. Thriving is the radical prerequisite for doing the work our souls are called to do.
This is no request for rose-colored glasses. To thrive is not accepting everything as good. It is not continuing to apply life-sustaining measures to a dying experience. Every empire that ever existed died, and in many ways, our current challenge is our call to action, a call we may not have heard unless presented with the obvious and chronic nature of our circumstances. Thriving is more. It is saying come what may, there will be life. Come what may, God is going to see us through. Come what may, we will be committed to our faith, to truth telling; committed to authenticity and courage; committed to justice, to listening to those who have yet to be heard; committed to healthy interpersonal relationships, committed to the most vulnerable. Come what may.
Big’s life is a witness and testimony to the fact that with God, all things are possible. She is a reminder that we will get through this together. I know that right community and a world of justice, inclusion, and equity will not happen on its own. Our collective moral fabric has been torn, and the soul of the country is in turmoil. Together, we must be agents of change. We must repair the breach and struggle to create God’s vision of a world where all are free, fed, loved, seen, and whole. However, reframing our starting place will send us on a trajectory that will impact this nation and infuse the process with hope for our journey.
Dear friends, breathe in deeply the breath of God. Thrive, for our hope is built on nothing less than God in Jesus. Our lives are fulfilled in telling the truth, in vowing to be our best selves, and in our commitment to follow the way of Jesus. Let the revolution commence, and may it begin with laughter.
Kelle Brown is the current Lead Pastor of Plymouth Church United Church of Christ, Seattle, Washington. She is a recent graduate of San Francisco Theological Seminary, completing her D. Min, and is involved in justice work and reframing church as it pertains to systems of oppression and authentic welcome. She enjoys writing, singing and loving life with her daughter Indigo and grandmother Dorothy.