I was raised Catholic. Because of that, there are some stories I know really well.
Mostly because they got repeated year after year in Church.
Sometimes, the stories were even *about* stories. (Things can get a little meta in religions sometimes.)
After I left The Church to explore other faith options, I found a lot more stories, some with a bit of overlap and some that spoke more directly to my own experience of the world.
One thing became quite clear: Stories are important. Especially when it comes to the propagation of a faith.
Narrative Lessons to Learn
We’re at the time of year right now where I always return to one of the big-deal Christian stories from my youth: the Death and Resurrection of Jesus. You know: Easter.
It’s definitely one of the less fun stories connected with the religion. Most of it is what would be considered a bit of a downer: friends deny they know him, one of them sells him out, he’s taken prisoner, his own people choose a literal murder over him to be set free, he gets executed in one of the most gruesome ways the Romans did people in.
Definitely not a good few days.
But after a weekend of laying low, it’s all okay and he’s back. Kind of. It’s a big deal and the real foundation of the faith.
But those “not so good few days” are even more important when it comes to what that new faith was supposed to be all about.
See, in those days, Jesus was pretty explicit in laying down what he thought was important (and what his dad, you know: God, also thought was important) at the time.
And that’s why I return to those stories every year around this time. That narrative has a lot of good lessons in it. It’s all about service, sacrifice, and salvation. I’ve already talked a bit about those before, so I’m not going to rehash them here.
Stories Matter
Humans really dig narratives. We get drawn in by a story. And really good stories stick with us for a long time. (We don’t always remember them quite right–more often than not, we remember what we wanted them to be… but that gets into a whole ‘nother discussion.)
Really good stories get retold.
They also changed with time. At least they did for most of human history. Even in cultures where writing was a thing when certain stories were created, the modern perception of a story being immutable wasn’t exactly a big concern in a lot of places. This is one of the reasons history is kind of a mess of fact and fantasy.
Some stories, though, were set in stone (literally) so we can tell how they’ve changed. When we look at those changes, we can often see how they were altered to fit the needs of the time they were being retold within. Sometimes, they changes were so extreme, they were barely the same story at all and just had some of the same characters in them.
A good tale can change someone’s day–or their life. A good storyteller can move mountains–by convincing those listening that the mountain needs to move. Lives and kingdoms rise and fall because of stories told. They become stories themselves, sometimes… cautionary tales or aspirational messages of hope.
Stories matter. Which stories we choose to re-tell, and which versions of those stories we re-tell, are important choices.
Choose wisely.
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