Shame Is Everywhere

What do North Carolina, Dennis Hastert, Abby Wambach, and Donald Trump have in common? Not much except that they have all been shamed in the media within the last week. There is a lot of good work on the topic of shame and the effect it has on people—Brene’ Brown’s stuff is quite good. You might say that we are learning something about shame as a culture, maybe we’re even maturing. But people who are celebs in a celebrity-driven culture are always at risk of being shamed. And, with the use of social media, which gives everyone a shot at celeb-status (51 percent of millennials purportedly want to be famous), shame is not limited to a few. The wrong photo posted or words tweeted can change your life forever.

The Problem with Shame

Shame is based on the idea that you “lose face” when you do something that culture calls shameful. You are then excluded from the land of looking down on others, and you are now being looked down on. At the very least, you have lost your coolness. Of course, some things, many things are shameful. When a 35-year-old man lures a 12-year-old girl into his desires, we, as a culture, identity shame then as appropriate. When someone does something that is not PC, they are shamed—choose for yourself whether this is good or not. Many people live in fear of shame and in love with whatever culture calls non-shame or honor, sometimes never thinking about whether the standards are goodness or evil. The main thing becomes not wanting to be left out of the group.

Shame on You, Shame on Me

My point is simply to get us to see how much shame surrounds us and how that massive volume shapes our lives. Sometimes, we may feel like saying, “to hell with shame.” The real problem, however, with shame is that it cuts people off from their community by giving the illusion that there are individuals who don’t do shameful things, as opposed to those who do. We’ve all done things that are shameful. In fact, from God’s perspective, our looking down on others is shameful, given our own stuff. For a culture that is big on being non-judgmental, it’s good to realize that when we shame people, we are judgmental. It is looking down on people, taking away their face, no longer counting them as good as we are. Let’s own up.

Is There Any Good News?

God loves the shamed. Remember, in spite of artists attempts to clothe Jesus on the cross, he was most likely totally naked. Just think of the pictures going out instantly today. Mocked, spit on, cut off from the cool, from the land of looking down on others—he did look down—in love and forgiveness for people who live in the land of shame. The naked One takes our shame and covers us so that we won’t be shamed. Good news.

—Pastor Mark, The Imperfect Pastor

 

Follow Me, and I will make you fishers of men. (Matthew 4:19 NKJV)