A Most Shameful Session

Dispatches from Urbana 25

Sorry, the title is clickbait. My friend and colleague, Chris Flanders, is a missiologist who specializes in honor-shame and facework cultural dynamics. He taught a session at Urbana 25 titled “Rethinking Shame: Uncovering Its Redemptive Power in Global Discipleship.” I’ll share some reflections.

Unsurprisingly, this was an outstanding session. I’m sure there were many others, but of those I was able to attend, this one was especially rich in content. I’ll admit, I sat in more than one that was a bit thin. I mentioned in a previous post that there was a need to tailor the presentations for an introductory level. However, as a university instructor, I’m aware of the level of content that undergraduate students can process—and want! Chris is an old pro at this game, and he nailed it. We all walked away glad we learned a lot and challenged to learn more.

I’ll ask for Chris’s forgiveness in advance. I’m not an expert in honor-shame stuff, and I’ve learned a lot from him over the years. So I’m going to do my best to relate what I took from his session. Chris, have mercy! (The first time I emailed Chris, over a decade ago, I accidentally typed his name as “Christ.” So yeah, word play.)

First, the idea of honor-shame cultures is a myth. Every culture and all humans are steeped in honor-shame dynamics. They just look different in different cultures. And, yes, they are especially prominent in some cultures. But that prominence is actually an artifact of the myth. Western cultures in particular are guilty of telling themselves that they are more advanced, more “civilized,” and have, therefore, left behind honor-shame dynamics. That lie pushes honor-shame into the background, where it has the same power but not the same level of attention.

Second, recent Western social-psychology, most notably the work of Brené Brown, has been helpful. It identifies the power of shame even for us Westerners. But it does not recognize the “redemptive power” of shame from a Christian perspective. Analyzed through an anthropological lens, there is more than one kind of shame. Chris spelled out a handful, which I won’t detail. Maybe I can get him to write a guest post... But the big takeaway here is that there are “good” kinds of shame. Shame can do important work. And understanding that can help us do important work.

Third, understanding shame’s various facets helps us interpret Scripture (at this point, biblical scholars are well aware that honor-shame is critical for understanding biblical cultures and biblical theology). More, it helps us contextualize interpretation, which is pretty consequential for relationships steeped in honor-shame dynamics all the time, everywhere.

Because of the myth of honor-shame cultures, it’s easier to recognize how the gospel addresses these issues in some contexts. East Asia comes to mind. The classical Reformation doctrine of salvation that emphasizes forgiveness of sin (legal guilt) doesn’t land with the same power in cultures that recognize the importance of honor and shame. “The cross addresses your guilt” produces a kind of meh in such contexts. But “the cross restores your honor” is tremendously impactful when it lands.

So what about cultures like mine, where honor-shame has been forced into the background? If “the cross restores your honor” doesn’t resonate powerfully, then why bother? Maybe it’s good to be aware of these dynamics when the culture is aware of them, but what difference do they make when the myth prevails? Chris has convinced me that this is largely a translation problem. Honor and shame are just as important for US Americans as for Thai people, even if they don’t recognize it. Tapping into that power is the work of contextualization.

As I listened to the presentation, two examples came to mind. The first is a clip from an interview with Steve Harvey. It made the rounds (I don’t know what “viral” means anymore, but it got a lot of clicks), and it certainly resonated with me.

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The line I have in mind is, “When my daddy died, I didn’t have nobody to say they was proud of me. That fucked me up. ‘Cause you know my dad used to call me and say, ‘Man, I’m so proud of you.’ And when he died, man, nobody said that to me no more. Nobody.” A lot of people have others in their lives who say, “I love you,” and it feels good. Most of those people have no one in their lives who can say, “I’m proud of you.” The difference between the two is profound.

The second example is a mashup of two videos: the induction of Mr. Rogers into the TV Hall of Fame and an old clip of him singing to a disabled boy.

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This one is almost too good. It’s meta. The induction ceremony is one of the ways that honor still functions above the surface in Western society. We “honor” recipients of such awards. They say they are “honored.” But the mashup connects what Mr. Rogers did for that disabled boy with what was happening in that ceremonial moment: the lyrics “It’s you I like, it’s you yourself, it’s you” confer real honor. “On behalf of millions of children and grownups, it is you that I like.” What could honor someone more?

Together with Chris’s teaching, these clips made me rethink Jesus’s baptism. The Father says, “You are my beloved son; I am well pleased with you” (Mark 1:11).

I learned from Henri Nouwen, N. T. Wright, and my friend Tod Vogt at Mission Alive to understand these words as something God says to us at our baptism. This is an essential part of the good news. Adopted into God’s family in Christ, we are beloved of God. With us, God is well pleased. But neither of those words—beloved or well pleased—means much to Westerners. I concede there are ways to unpack their meaning that do connect to US Americans. I’ve tried to do so in the last decade, and I think sometimes it has landed. It has for me.

Still, the honor-shame lens adds something incredible. Why does the Steve Harvey clip touch so many people? Because, as important as “love” is, the word “beloved” is diluted in our culture in a multitude of ways, but a father’s “I’m proud of you” conveys honor uniquely. Why does Mr. Rogers’s song mean so much as it is reflected back to him? Because “well pleased” sounds modest by comparison with what we all want: to be genuinely liked, despite everything. Being liked is a fundamental kind of honor.

Chris’s session was about shame, not honor. The two are inextricable, but they are not the same topic. My examples have focused on honor, so let me highlight the inverse. What is Steve Harvey lamenting? What does it mean if God is not proud of you? What is Mr. Rogers healing when he tells a disabled boy, “I like you.” What does it mean if God doesn’t like you? What do you actually feel when you are unloved and unliked? Shame.

“The scripture says, ‘No one who believes in him will be put to shame’” (Rom 10:11). If that means nothing to you as a Christian, it’s time to consider what it means when God says, “I’m proud of my child, whom I like.”