The Spiritual Journey, pt.6: The Holy Fool

 

When I started working on this article, my objective was to try to help you understand what it looks like to be a Holy Fool.  I have come to the conclusion that the only person who can accurately tell you what a Holy Fool looks like is a Holy Fool.  The dilemma with this insight is that I am not one.  The other problem is that a true Holy Fool would never see themselves that way and probably laugh at you if you asked them about it.  So here is my best shot on this at this point in my life and personal journey.

In Somewhere Fast, after his time with Father Flaherty in New Mexico, John Calvin continues his trip to LA on old Rt. 66.  He has just been introduced to the concept of the Crisis as a catalyst to becoming a “Holy Fool.”  Calvin isn’t sure he buys into any of this, and demonstrates it by making another really bad decision (you’ll have to read the book to find out what it was.)

In the model of spiritual formation outlined in Somewhere Fast, the route from the Crisis to becoming a Holy Fool is called both the “descent” and “the wisdom journey.”  Another term that was coined by my friend Bob Buford, in his book Half-time, is “second half.”  Buford sees this as a time when a man’s life must shift its priorities away from what he calls “security”; i.e, the time in our lives where we are shooting for upward mobility, financial or career success, and achievement based on the cultural norms.  Triggered by a horrible personal crisis, Bob began to look at his life and decided he needed to shift from this model of upward mobility and begin to focus on “significance” rather than “security.”  In the book, he uses the image of a box that represents the most important thing in your life.  “What’s in the box?” is the critical question for making the shift.  For Bob, the first half of his life was represented by a dollar sign inside the box.  The second half has a cross in place of the dollar sign.

The Holy Fool is a person who has made such a transition and knows exactly what is "in the box."  Going back to the Rohr model, used in Somewhere Fast, the transition out of Crisis is intended to launch a man or woman on a journey that lasts the rest of their life.  The goal: becoming a Holy Fool.  A Holy Fool is a man or woman that views life through the lens of significance or meaning instead of acquisition and false identity.  This is the man or woman who looks at the frantic pace of the world around them, where people are consumed with all the wrong things, and has to laugh (or maybe cry).  Fame, fortune, power, prestige, and position are no longer important to the Holy Fool.  The pursuit of God, and his Kingdom, has replaced the quest for cultural success.  The transition of the heart that seeks to love people and use things, instead of loving things and using people, has taken place.   The “getting there” takes place on the Wisdom Journey.

Remember that Flaherty told Rohr that he had never met a Holy Fool who was much younger than seventy!  Many people have never met one at all.  Holy Fools are rare in the recent West.  They are few and far between.  They don’t get a lot of press, and they are rarely in the spotlight.  I only know one.  But, I do know some men and women who are on the right trajectory to become one.  They tend to be found in situations where they are loving and caring for other people.  Often, they do it in ways that no one even knows about.  A few are in positions of power and prestige, but if you could see their hearts, you would see that the “dollar” is no longer in “the box.”  Position, power, and money have become tools that they view as entrusted to them for higher purposes.

So what happens on the Wisdom Journey that takes us from the emergence out of Crisis to the place where we are approaching the level of spiritual maturity of a Holy Fool?  I am convinced the specifics are different for each of us, but there are a few generalities that characterize the process for all of us.  Here are a few:

1-    God is at work in our lives.  We cannot transform ourselves.  We can certainly make decisions and take actions that facilitate transformation.  But only God can change a heart.  The Holy Spirit makes Holy Fools. 

2-    Our worldview is being reworked.   The Bible uses the phrase “transformed by the renewing of the mind” to speak of this process.  This is where the “means of grace” come into play.  Reading of the Bible, reflection on what it says, prayer  - these are the delights of the Holy Fool.  It is wonderful, though sometimes painful, when God shows you that some thought or value that is deeply ingrained in your thinking is wrong.  I am convinced that one of the biggest obstacles to authentic transformation is self-deception.  A Holy Fool has worked through the issue of self-deception and has a realistic view of themselves.  I have a little illustration I clipped out of the paper that I taped in plain sight on my desk.  It is called, “The Bob Principle.”  The illustration reads, “When BOB has a problem with everyone, BOB is usually the problem.”  It is supposed to be funny!  “Ouch!!!”

3-    Relationships become priority #1.  Beginning with their relationship with God, the Holy Fool is a relational animal.  That doesn’t mean a Holy Fool is the life of the party.  Introverts can be Holy Fools, too!  But it does mean that the welfare of and care for people are always on the heart of the Holy Fool. 

4-    Struggle becomes redemptive.  The path down is usually not easy.  Life is hard.  But difficulty can often be the very thing that moves us a little further down the path of authenticity.  St. John of the Cross used the word “purgation” to speak of the process.  The Bible uses images of fire and refining and testing as part of the process.  James even tells us to “consider it all joy when you encounter trials of various kinds.”  Why?  Out of the process of testing, he says we become “mature and complete, not lacking anything.” That could be another definition of what it means to be a Holy Fool, although I'm quite sure not even a Holy Fool would say they are "not lacking anything."

I’m sometimes asked where I see myself in this process.  I’m not old enough to be a Holy Fool.  I’m barely old enough to be what the Bible calls an “Elder.”  I think I am just down the line a touch from the end of the Crisis.  Too often, I think I have drifted back to the beginning of the Old Fool’s path.  What does a Holy Fool look like?  In Somewhere Fast, John meets two in the little town of St. Johns, Arizona, when his Harley breaks down.  Maybe we’ll take a look at Jack and Merle in our next article.