RELIGION : Greater Acceptance of Humor Makes for Merry Christians

When “Family Circus” cartoonist Bil Keane first began putting religion into his work in the 1960s, some religious conservatives took offense at the irreverence of mentioning God in the funny pages.

Today, when one of his young characters reinterprets a commandment as “Humor thy father and thy mother” or threatens to tell his mother that a sibling at prayer is “goin’ over her head,” he gets accolades from the same group.

“Even the strictest religious person from the strictest religious sect allows a little levity,” Keane said. “Today, they congratulate you for carrying the Christian message into the comics.”

While Keane says he has been doing the same thing all along--reflecting the reality of religion as a part of family life--there has been a noticeable change in the pews, say many religious humorists.

Christian comics are finding dates in church halls, where they may be greeted by portraits of a smiling Jesus. And clergy are discovering that a little humor from the pulpit is welcomed by congregations seeking more joy in their faith.

Celebrating this trend on its 10th anniversary is one of the strongest advocates for religious humor--the Fellowship of Merry Christians, based in Portage, Mich. The fellowship has edited the book “Holy Humor: The Best of the Joyful Noiseletter,” published by MasterMedia Limited of New York.

Some samples from the collection, which offers some of the best jokes and cartoons from the organization’s newsletters over the past decade, encourage churches and religious individuals to laugh at themselves a little:

* A paramedic said his most unusual 911 call came from a church, where an usher was concerned that an elderly man had passed out in a pew and appeared to be dead.

What was so unusual about that?

“Well,” the paramedic said, “we carried out four guys before we found the one who was dead.”

* A good sermon should have a good beginning and a good ending, and they should be as close together as possible.

* An inexperienced preacher was conducting his first funeral. He solemnly pointed to the body in the coffin and declared: “What we have here is only a shell. The nut is already gone.”

* Musings on a 950-year-old Noah: “Do you go through a series of midlife crises, or just the big one at 400? You know, wearing the gold chains and driving a sports chariot.”

Cal Samra, fellowship president, remembers borrowing $1,000 to produce the first four-page newsletter, distributed to 200 people in April 1986.

Today, more than 10,000 people subscribe to the Noiseletter and the association, which offers an array of services from sales of humor books to play shops in churches, has a mailing list of close to 40,000 names.

“We found so many people were searching for something more. Where is the joy? Where is the humor? Where is the celebration in Christianity?” Samra said.

Samra said what has fascinated him over the years is how so much religious humor crosses denominational lines, revealing “how really human we are, no matter what our denomination might be.”

The Rev. Dennis Daniel, a Southern Baptist pastor who draws the “Brother Blooper” cartoon, can attest to a change in attitude in his denomination, some members of which are among the most “strait-laced and straight-faced” of Christians.

“I think people are experiencing the joy, and want it expressed,” said Daniel, pastor of the First Baptist Church in Fountain Hills, Ariz.

Liz Curtis Higgs, a Christian comic and motivational speaker from Louisville, Ky., said she used to spend about 5% of her 100 speaking dates each year with church groups. Now, half of her engagements are sponsored by churches.

She said there is a place for humor alongside more serious worship practices and biblical reflection.

“We also desperately need to laugh. Our pews are filled with people in pain,” she said.

Or, as the English writer G.K. Chesterton once said, “Angels can fly because they take themselves lightly. Never forget that Satan fell by force of gravity.”