There’s a story on the internet that goes something like this: An Englishman, a Frenchman and a Russian are having a beer and talking about happiness. The Englishman says, “Happiness is coming home, sitting down by the fire and putting your feet into warm slippers.” Then the Frenchman chimes in: “You English have no romance. Happiness is a wonderful restaurant, with the whole evening ahead of you to share a fine bottle of wine, good food and deep conversation with the love of your life.” Then the Russian says, “You are both wrong. Happiness is when you are lying asleep at 4 a.m. and there is a knock on your door. It’s the secret police. They say, ‘Ivon Ivonovich’ and you breathe a sigh of relief and say ‘Ivon Ivonovich lives next door.’”
Our understandings of what makes for happiness depend on our circumstances and our personalities.
Yet I don’t know anyone who would come up with the list that Jesus does in the beatitudes. Some translators use the word “Happy.” Others use the word “Blessed.” But whichever word you use, Matthew, Chapter 5, offers a strange list of blessings or sources of happiness. Happy is when you are hopeless, grieving, humbled, hungry and thirsty, pure of heart, fighting for peace, and harassed by others for your beliefs.
Um, say what Jesus?
I’d prefer to be hopeful, joyful, confident, well fed. I guess pure of heart is OK, but I’d rather have peace surround me than have to work for it, and I’d definitely prefer not to be harassed for my beliefs.
Jesus’ list reminded me of a chapter in J.B MacKinnon’s book The Day the World Stops Shopping entitled, “We need a better word than happiness for where this ends up,” which begins with this surprising quote: “I get such a thrill out of walking to get my groceries.”
OK, so I can imagine some sense of satisfaction or even righteousness from walking to get groceries, but thrill? Hmm, is that not maybe a bit much?
MacKinnon goes on to write: “Most of us understand how deeply bad it can feel to be out of true with ourselves. Few of us, however, experience very often how deeply good it feels to be congruent, to be authentic. It is this that can make it a thrill to walk to the store to buy your groceries: it is a small enactment of who you know you want to be.”
Could it be that one of the keys to the kind of happiness that the beatitudes point towards is not more stuff, or more activities, or more status, but living a life that has integrity, authenticity and congruency? Is this perhaps what it might mean to be humble, pure of heart and hungering and thirsting for righteousness? What helps you to show up in the world as your real self in an authentic, life-giving way? When do you feel happiness?
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Beth Kerr serves as minister of Trinity and Atwood United churches.
