St. Teresa of Avila prayed, “From sour and sad-faced old saints, Good Lord deliver us!”
Teresa, who was known to dance around as she played her castanets, was born a few centuries too early to have met Bl. Piergiorgio Frassati (1901-1925), pictured above goofing around with his friends.
Hagiographies (lives of saints) aren’t known for their laughs, but I’ve unearthed some stories from the Ave Maria Press blog that show being virtuous doesn’t always mean being serious.
St. Bernard of Clairvaux (1090-1153)
St. Bernard, founder of the Cistercians, liked to laugh at his overly serious monks. One day, when opening a new abbey near Foigny, France, the monks found a swarm of pesky flies filling the church that was about to be dedicated. Bernard watched his monks swatting, shooing, coaxing—all with no success. Finally, he fixed his eyes on the swarming flies and loudly declared, “I hereby excommunicate all of you.” Bernard’s monks laughed with him but found hundreds of dead flies all over the floor the next morning.
St. Bernard was focused on God (instead of the flies!), which made him free to ease the anxiety of his brothers by making a joke. Sometimes we get upset over things that would be easier to handle if we looked for the humor in them.
St. John Bosco (1815-1888)
A young priest from a very poor background, John Bosco was a hero to Turin’s hordes of homeless boys. He charmed them with his juggling act, and with his magic tricks and acrobatics. As a boy, growing up without a father, John had learned circus skills to make more money for his mother and siblings. But Father John’s fellow priests thought he was unstable. He had to be. No one would seriously want to spend time with the “worthless” poor boys who had been abandoned and left to their own devices.
Two of Father John’s fellow priests planned to commit him to a local insane asylum. When Father John caught wind of their plot, he played along just long enough. When his fellow clerics stepped up into the carriage, expecting him to follow, he slammed the door, slapped the horses into motion and told the carriage driver—“Take them to the asylum! They’re expected.”
Think about it: how would you feel if your co-workers (priests, yet!) tried to commit you? Instead of reacting with vengeance or fear, St. John Bosco made a joke that made his point. (I can’t help wondering what happened after this incident….)
St. John XXIII (1881-1963)
In this short, round, and elderly Pope, the Church enjoyed one of its funniest holy men. When asked early in his papacy how many people worked in the Vatican, he said, “About half of them….”
One day, as he arrived for an outdoor audience, he overheard two women discussing his physique. Pope John was elected right after the papacy of Pope Pius XII, a slender, aristocratic man. “My God, he is fat!” whispered one woman to her friend. The pope turned on his heels, faced the women with a smile and said, “But, Madam, you must know that the conclave is not exactly a beauty contest!”
The jolly Pope’s reply came from humility and a willingness to laugh at himself. As more and more humor is targeted at belittling others, we can do our simple part to heal the culture by — just laughing at ourselves once in a while. I read once that the “proper matter for humor” is our own foibles. So, my fellow comedian, if you’re like me, you have lots of material to work with!
I’ll end with some choice quotes from someone who’s not a saint (yet!)
Mother Angelica (1923-2016)
“Try to laugh a lot, because life is funny and everybody today is too serious. The only tragedy in the world, my friend, is sin.”
“You have to enjoy life without resting in it. You have to have zest for life but a desire for heaven.”
“Even after healing and performing miracles, Jesus couldn’t get 12 friends to stick by him!”
And my favorite:
Love always (and laugh when possible),
Rose
Bonnie Goodrich
Thinks for the uplift. Brought smile to my face and heart.
Rose Folsom
Glad to hear it, Bonnie! May God continue to make your heart smile.
Rose
Rose Folsom
VIA EMAIL:
Wonderful thoughts!! Yes, most humans do take themselves too serious!
We have been helping our son move from his apt after the tenant above had a failed dishwasher that flooded his apt.
…we have used great music to help us keep our ‘spirits’ light!! Music has always lifted us up!!
Take care, have a wonderful day!!
Diane
Rose Folsom
VIA EMAIL:
Dear Rose,
Last Week’s selection (https://virtueconnection.com/how-to-avoid-snark-attack/) was so good I thought about it frequently; then I was listening on Audible to Reflections on the Psalms by C.S. Lewis, and he brought out that the person who was the victim ( of a snark remark) could turn around and be over sensitive making themselves out more than was true as if they were a great victim and hurting themselves.
Thank you much.
God bless you.
Sister Mary
Rose Folsom
VIA EMAIL:
You are truly a ‘sermon in shoes’ :)
Mary Beth
Sal
Hi Rose,
Yes. Humor is the best medicine and many of the Saints got this loud and clear as illustrated in your piece. I agree we do tend to take our selves too seriously. But this is not from God.
As a matter of fact, it’s from the Enemy as the face of pride the first of the seven Capital sins. Recall, that this is what led to the fall of Satan and his minions.
The most interesting thing about it is that we really have no control over so many things in our lives so offering them up to the Providence of our Lord and God of the universe should really set us free!
Now, that is something to be very happy about don’t you think?? The Saints understood this and so should we. We have great role models.
Be a Saint, what else is there!
God bless!
Rose Folsom
Sal,
Interesting thought that being too serious is pride — like we’re saving ourselves rather than letting God act.
Thanks for the insight,
Rose
Rose Folsom
VIA EMAIL:
Rose, this was so much fun!! Excommunicated flies!!
Julia
Tom Roberts
St. Teresa of Avila is my fave; tough on herself but cuts us all some slack. It’s important for people in leadership roles to have a sense of humor. One day in WWII Admiral “Bull” Halsey was standing with General Douglas MacArthur on the deck of his battleship. A coxswain was attempting to land his craft to transfer the General back to his ship. The seas were rough but, finally, the coxswain was able to tie up declaring “This ought to make the old ******* happy.” Halsey retorted “How dare you call me old!”
I joined the Catholic Church at age sixty and began to serve at Mass soon after. One day as we processed out I bent down to chock the chapel doors open and in doing so accidentally kicked Msgr Ken in the ankle. On the way back to the sacristy he said “YOU kicked your pastor?!” I replied “It’s going to cost me an extra week and a half in purgatory.” To this he said “YOU think your going to make it to purgatory?” There’s lots of laughter in the Catholic Church and the food is better too. At the church I came from we had spaghetti with tomato sauce on Melmac (remember Melmac?), Kool Aid and Wonderbread rolls.p