Living Into A Circus Theology

Recently I had a chance to go to the Grassroots Music and Dance Festival in Trumansburg, NY. My wife Lynne and I try to go every year because it is such a vibrant, joy-filled and very eclectic event. The festival itself is committed to working to “create joy in the midst of crisis” and strives to create a 4 day village of alternative art, culture and education. It attracts a wide variety of people of all ages who share similar commitments to imagining an alternative world for a few days. In addition to some great music and dance performances, there is quite a Bohemian and circus-like feel to the event.  And the reality that can emerge in the upside-down and fantastical world of the circus is one that leaves a deep impression.

This kind of reminds me of what church should be like.

My friend, Kate Foran, wrote a beautiful piece a few years back (2005) on “circus theology”[1] and focused on the written work of William Stringfellow, the poetry of Robert Lax as well as the paintings of John August Swanson (Note: some of Swanson’s paintings actually hang in the hallway between the main office and the Nielsen Room at Spiritus). These three figures offer us the image of the circus as a lens to reflect upon our discipleship.

In that piece, Kate notes that Robert Lax (a poet, Olean, NY native and good friend of Thomas Merton) saw the circus as “a creation story as well as a parable of Death and Resurrection” and drew deep inspiration for living from it.  William Stringfellow, who actually wrote quite a bit about the circus, viewed it “as a liturgy, a nomadic community, and a peaceable kingdom where lions are tamed and people of all sorts are gathered. It is a spectacle, but it invites participation.” And Swanson, for his part, painted some beautiful art related to the circus as “sacred circle.”

Stringfellow, in his essay Sojourn with the circus actually thought that the circus “is among the few coherent images of the eschatological realm to which people still have ready access.” In simple terms, Stringfellow felt that the circus points us towards a picture of what life in God’s kin-dom could actually be like and invited churches to be more like the circus than an institution.

That’s not the image of church I grew up with! I grew up in a church culture that uplifted propriety over the bawdy/body. I grew up in a church culture that uplifted order over adventure. I grew up in a church culture that uplifted predictability over uncertainty.

Stringfellow went on to say much more about the circus in his 1982 book, A Simplicity of Faith. Below are a few quotes:  

Biblical people, like circus folk, live typically as sojourners, interrupting time, with few possessions, and in tents, in this world. The church would likely be more faithful if the Church were similarly nomadic…

In the circus, humans are represented as freed from consignment to death. There one person walks a wire fifty feet above the ground, another stands upside down on a forefinger, another juggles a dozen incongruous objects simultaneously, another hangs in the air by the heels, one upholds twelve in a human pyramid, another is shot from a cannon. The circus performer is the image of the eschatological person—emancipated from frailty and inhibition, exhilarant, militant, transcendent over death—neither confined nor conformed by the fear of death anymore….

The service the circus does—more so, I regret to say, than the churches do—is to openly, dramatically, and humanly portray death in the midst of life. The circus is eschatological parable and social parody: it signals a transcendence of the power of death, which exposes this world as it truly is while it pioneers the Kingdom.[2]

What does this get you thinking about?

If we take some key words from these quotes and put them together, we might get this description of a discipleship community: Sojourners. Interrupting time. With few possessions. Freed from consignment to death. Emancipated from frailty and inhibition, exhilarant, militant, transcendent over death. [Embodying] Parable and social parody.

What is more is that under the big tent of the circus so many people who do not “fit” in the wider world – with their skills, with their lived experience, with their quirks and oddities – not only fit but are welcomed. For example, at Grassroots, the “skills” of the regular world may not mean much once you are at the festival.  When you’re at Grassroots, some of the prized skills sets include: dancing, hula-hooping, juggling, singing, playing instruments, face painting, etc. And what a different world this creates!

At this point, you might be wondering, “Ok, that’s all cool, but what does this mean for our faith walk?”

I would submit to you that Jesus’ idea of “church’ was more akin to a circus than anything else. It’s supposed to be a “big tent” in which everyone can find a home. And the skills and knowledges that are important in that circus are almost nothing like those that the world deems “valuable.”

We’re also told in today’s gospel that “[Jesus] spoke to the crowd in parables (Mt 13),” and parables were meant to be a form of “subversive speech.”[3] They toppled taken for granted assumptions about how the world worked and who or what is important.

That’s also what the circus does. It takes reality and bends it or turns it upside down. People take amazing risks. They do all kinds of marvels. Things that are not supposed to be “possible” seem to be done with ease. In faith terms this might look like: the good news is proclaimed to the poor, prisoners and the oppressed are freed, the blind will see and a year of jubilee (also known as reparation) will commence.

For this week, perhaps we play with the idea of circus in our lives. What would it mean to be a circus disciple? What would we now be free to do or try or embody? What skill sets would be important to cultivate? What would we no longer be afraid of?

As the great poet, Wendell Berry, says, “So, friends, every day do something

that won’t compute.”[4] That is circus theology!

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[1] http://www.wordandworld.org/2005-stringfellow.html

[2] Pp. 87-91

[3] Former Colgate Rochester Divinity School professor, William Herzog, wrote a very influential book called Parables as Subversive Speech (1994) that, in my opinion, makes this case quite compellingly!

[4] https://allpoetry.com/poem/12622463-Manifesto–The-Mad-Farmer-Liberation-Front-by-Wendell-Berry