By Peter W. Marty


Challenging conversations


Shame on you To come out of hiding and speak to shame is a powerful experience


Shame is a universal human experience. It is inescapable. Many of us are wizards at hiding different facets of our shame, stuffing some of its effects into the deeper recesses of our psychological closets. Yet, however much we may wish to ignore the impact of shame on our identity, it still burrows in for the long haul. Way back in the second chapter of Genesis we read that Adam and Eve were naked, but “were not ashamed.” By the next chapter, that all changed. Once the pair had eaten from the one tree they were not supposed to lay their hands on, they were full of shame. Putting needle and thread together they sewed a scratchy garment of fig leaves. When that didn’t sufficiently cover their shame, they sought the camouflage of a bush, as if a honeysuckle would confuse the searching eyes of God. We have been trying to hide our shame, or at least the scars of our shame, ever since. Maybe you are one who lives with the unfortunate memory of a middle


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school physical education class that didn’t exactly grow your self-esteem. The teacher picked two students to be captains of the two softball teams that day. As these captains stood beside each other choosing classmates in alternating fash- ion, you wondered when your name would be called. It didn’t happen until the very end. With only two students yet undrafted, guess who stood there sheep- ishly? The captains must have deemed you not athletic enough, agile enough or popular enough. Whatever their reasons, you endured the experience tense and perspiring, completely humiliated. You were not guilty of anything. You simply felt worthless. Vulnerable. Stripped bare. If there had been a bush in the vicinity, you would have scram- bled to crouch behind it. We often confuse guilt and shame. Yet as the PE class memory illustrates,


they’re not the same thing. Guilt is feeling bad about some action. Shame is feeling bad about yourself. Guilt is about doing something wrong. Shame is about not being good enough.


When the prodigal son in Luke 15 finds himself desperate, having squan- dered his inheritance and left with no place to dine but a hog pen, he returns home. “Father, I have sinned against you.” That’s his guilt. “I am not worthy to be a part of your family.” That’s his shame. Now, it’s possible to be guilty and never feel guilty. We see this scenario play out in our lives all the time. But you can never be ashamed and not feel ashamed. A certain amount of shame is normal. Even the most trivial activities in a day can induce shame. Who hasn’t, at one time or another, rung the wrong door- bell? Speed-dialed the wrong phone number? Accidentally left the fly on their slacks unzipped in an inopportune moment? Actually, unacknowledged shame presents a greater problem than the existence of shame. Unmasking it takes


ou may not have climbed out of bed this morning soaked with a lifetime of shame to weigh you down for yet another day. But don’t take this as a sign that you are shame-free.


some gutsi- ness. Facing it requires con- viction. Just ask anyone who has ever stood up at an AA meeting to declare that he or she is an alcoholic. To come out of hiding and speak to


shame is a powerful experience. Put- ting that shame into words with a trusted companion is balm for the soul. If shame often springs from situations of vulner- ability, strangely enough, we also con- quer it through vulnerability. For Christian believers, Jesus is part of our companionship circle. He not only pioneered and perfected faith, to borrow words from the writer of Hebrews, he also knew shame. His detractors worked hard to shame him. Various Scribes and Pharisees labored to humiliate and embarrass him, regularly angling to make him a fool. In the end, after endur- ing the ultimate shaming exercise of being strung up naked in a tree, Jesus somehow disregarded that shame. How? God had set a greater joy before him that he could not ignore (Hebrews 12:2). That joy is our joy as well, especially when reckoning with personal shame: “You are loved by God … and there is nothing you can do about it.” 


Marty is a pastor of St. Paul Lutheran Church, Davenport, Iowa, and a regular columnist for The Lutheran.


Guilt is about doing something wrong. Shame is about not being good enough.


October 2013 3 Sixth in a series


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