Love to Laugh!

A Reflection on the First Reading for Sunday, December 31st, 2023:
The Feast of the Holy Family

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Genesis
15:1-6, 17:3b-5, 15-16; 21:1-7

The word of the Lord came to Abram in a vision, “Do not be afraid, Abram, I am your shield; your reward shall be very great.” But Abram said, “O Lord God, what will you give me, for I continue childless, and the heir of my house is Eliezer of Damascus?” And Abram said, “You have given me no offspring, and so a slave born in my house is to be my heir.” But the word of the Lord came to him, “This man shall not be your heir; no one but your very own issue shall be your heir.”

The Lord brought him outside and said, “Look toward heaven and count the stars, if you are able to count them.” Then he said to him, “So shall your descendants be.” And he believed the Lord; and the Lord reckoned it to him as righteousness.

God said to him, “As for me, this is my covenant with you: You shall be the father of a multitude of nations. No longer shall your name be Abram, but your name shall be Abraham; for I have made you the father of a multitude of nations.”

God said to Abraham, “As for Sarah your wife, you shall not call her Sarai, but Sarah shall be her name. I will bless her, and moreover I will give you a son by her. I will bless her, and she shall give rise to nations; kings of peoples shall come from her.”

The Lord dealt with Sarah as he had said, and the Lord did for Sarah as he had promised. Sarah conceived and bore Abraham a son in his old age, at the time of which God had spoken to him. Abraham gave the name Isaac to his son whom Sarah bore him. And Abraham circumcised his son Isaac when he was eight days old, as God had commanded him. Abraham was a hundred years old when his son Isaac was born to him. Now Sarah said, “God has brought laughter for me; everyone who hears will laugh with me.” And she said, “Who would ever have said to Abraham that Sarah would nurse children? Yet I have borne him a son in his old age.”

Pause. Pray. Reflect.

I love to laugh. Growing up in Newfoundland, I learned from an early age the importance of being able to laugh, particularly at oneself. In my experience, to describe someone as “good humoured” is very high praise indeed! Anyone who is up for a laugh is welcome wherever they go.

Recently, we invited a priest friend over for dinner and, taking advantage of having an ordained minister in the house, I asked him if he would bless the crucifix that I had just hung above our front entryway. “Father,” I said, “Would you like me to take that down off the wall for you to bless it?” “Yes,” he said. “I don’t think the blessing will reach all the way up there.” What a wiseacre! I still smile over that one.

One of the best laughs I ever had happened years ago when my mother won a prize at a raffle. We all had arrived at her house for Christmas dinner, and she was showing us the prize, which appeared to be a football helmet. My mother had recently taken up snowmobiling, and she was debating out loud whether or not this helmet would be good safety gear. “The only thing is,“ she said, “there doesn’t seem to be a way to fasten it.” She put it on her head, and we could all see that it was quite loose. “I suppose I could thread a lace underneath my chin and attach it to the helmet to keep it on,” she mused. As she lifted it off, the whole thing broke apart, and it became clear to us that it was not, in fact, a football helmet, but rather a chip and dip set in the shape of a helmet! Well, we started to laugh. Just the image of my mother skidooing the environs of St. John’s, wearing a chip and dip set on her head had us all in gales of laughter. Tears streamed down our faces and our stomachs hurt we laughed so much.


Laughter is certainly great medicine. I firmly believe that God has an excellent sense of humour. After all, if we are made in His image, and we enjoy a good laugh, then surely God does too.


In the first reading for this Sunday, we meet Sarah at a time of great joy in her life. She says, “God has brought laughter for me; everyone who hears will laugh with me.” I believe Sarah’s laughter comes from two things: first, her great joy at bearing a son in her greatly advanced age; and, second, a desire to laugh at herself. God had promised Sarah and Abraham a son but, as the years passed by with no child in sight, they began to believe that God could not fulfill his promise. How could people so old ever become first-time parents? But, our God is a God of surprises. Even old age did not prevent Him from making Sarah a mother. In doubting God and then seeing how wrong she was, Sarah must have laughed to herself, “Well, Lord, you did it. How wrong I was to put you in a box!"


There is plenty in this world that is sobering. So, when God blesses us with opportunities to laugh at ourselves, and to laugh with others, surely we can open our hands and welcome them as the God-given gifts they are.




Donna Davis

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