June 6, 2004

Rev. Henry Ticknor
Unitarian Universalist Church of the Shenandoah Valley

The Blessings of Imperfection

Many of us are familiar with the story of Job that I read earlier. Poor Job, he has no idea that he is the butt of some cosmic wager being played out between God and Satan. All he knows is that he has suffered one physical, emotional, and economic failure after another. His friends have turned against him and even his ever-helpful wife has counseled him to simply “Curse God, and die.” But Job refuses to admit that he has brought his troubles upon himself and he steadfastly defends himself. He pleads, “Have pity upon me, O you my friends…why do you pursue me, never satisfied with my flesh.”

The book of Job is classic story of suffering and perceived failure. Life had been good to Job. As far as he knew, he was playing by all the rules until suddenly everything went wrong, terribly, terribly wrong. He describes himself as being in what the Hebrews called Sheol—literally translated this means he describes his existence as being in the pits. He is seen as a failure, as an outcast rejected by those who love him. Even when God reverses Job’s fortunes and rewards him “twice over” for his suffering there is no apparent reconciliation between the two for when Job asks why all this has happened God’s basic reply is basically I am God, you are not, just be quiet and do as I say.

Now here is another more contemporary story:

Mighty Casey……….by Ernest Lawrence Thayer:

The outlook wasn't brilliant for the Mudville nine that day:
The score stood four to two, with but one inning more to play,
And then when Cooney died at first, and Barrows did the same,
A pall-like silence fell upon the patrons of the game.

A straggling few got up to go in deep despair. The rest
Clung to the hope which springs eternal in the human breast;
They thought, "If only Casey could but get a whack at that--
We'd put up even money now, with Casey at the bat."

But Flynn preceded Casey, as did also Jimmy Blake,
And the former was a hoodoo, while the latter was a cake;
So upon that stricken multitude grim melancholy sat,
For there seemed but little chance of Casey getting to the bat.

But Flynn let drive a single, to the wonderment of all,
And Blake, the much despisčd, tore the cover off the ball;
And when the dust had lifted, and men saw what had occurred,
There was Jimmy safe at second and Flynn a-hugging third.

Then from five thousand throats and more there rose a lusty yell;
It rumbled through the valley, it rattled in the dell;
It pounded on the mountain and recoiled upon the flat,
For Casey, mighty Casey, was advancing to the bat.

There was ease in Casey's manner as he stepped into his place;
There was pride in Casey's bearing and a smile lit Casey's face.
And when, responding to the cheers, he lightly doffed his hat,
No stranger in the crowd could doubt 'twas Casey at the bat.

Ten thousand eyes were on him as he rubbed his hands with dirt;
Five thousand tongues applauded when he wiped them on his shirt;
Then while the writhing pitcher ground the ball into his hip,
Defiance flashed in Casey's eye, a sneer curled Casey's lip.

And now the leather-covered sphere came hurtling through the air,
And Casey stood a-watching it in haughty grandeur there.
Close by the sturdy batsman the ball unheeded sped--
"That ain't my style," said Casey. "Strike one!" the umpire said.

From the benches, black with people, there went up a muffled roar,
Like the beating of the storm-waves on a stern and distant shore;
"Kill him! Kill the umpire!" shouted someone on the stand;
And it's likely they'd have killed him had not Casey raised his hand.

With a smile of Christian charity great Casey's visage shone;
He stilled the rising tumult; he bade the game go on;
He signaled to the pitcher, and once more the dun sphere flew;
But Casey still ignored it and the umpire said, "Strike two!"

"Fraud!" cried the maddened thousands, and echo answered "Fraud!"
But one scornful look from Casey and the audience was awed.
They saw his face grow stern and cold, they saw his muscles strain,
And they knew that Casey wouldn't let that ball go by again.

The sneer is gone from Casey's lip, his teeth are clenched in hate,
He pounds with cruel violence his bat upon the plate;
And now the pitcher holds the ball, and now he lets it go,
And now the air is shattered by the force of Casey's blow.

Oh, somewhere in this favored land the sun is shining bright,
The band is playing somewhere, and somewhere hearts are light;
And somewhere men are laughing, and somewhere children shout,
But there is no joy in Mudville--mighty Casey has struck out.

There are two things that I really enjoy about this story. First, is the absolute finality of the ending. “The mighty Casey had struck out.” Struck out. He didn’t hit a scorcher to the shortstop who managed to scoop it up and make the throw of his life to get the runner out at first. He didn’t hit a towering fly ball to the centerfield fence only to have the fielder reach over the wall and turn his homer into an out. No, there were no heroics, no miracle plays--Casey had struck out.

The second part of the poem that I enjoy is the abrupt ending. What happened to the mighty Casey? Did Casey leave baseball and move on to being a successful investment banker? Did he return for another season leading his team to the championship? Did he become a broken and dejected human being who lived in a world of what might have been? How did he react to his humiliation? What did Casey do after he struck out?

This story ends the same way that the story of Job ends. There are no assurances that either man lived happily ever after. Did both men live from day to day afraid that his ordeal might be repeated? Were they ever able to trust others? What happened to their sense of values and their sense of their place in the world?

I’m sure that many of us in this room have suffered significant setbacks and failures at some time in our lives. They may not have been as catastrophic as Job’s or as public as Casey’s, but we perceived them to be failures—personal setbacks that changed our sense of self and our sense of who we are in the world. Relationships that ended badly, jobs lost, dreams passed by. Failure isn’t a word that many of us are comfortable with. We are much more attuned to success stories and happy endings. But failure, like success is a part of life.

Think for a moment of these people we usually consider to be successful. Thomas Edison built 1000 light bulbs before he built the one that worked. Supposed he had given up after 999. Sixteen agents and thirty publishers rejected John Grisham before his first novel was published. Gandhi, who as a youth was painfully shy, transformed himself into the leader for Indian independence. Oprah Winfry who was demoted from an evening news anchor to host a daytime talk show turned that show into one of the most successful television shows ever. And Ty Cobb whose lifetime batting average was .366. He only got a hit every third trip to the plate. It’s not many jobs that would consider a success rate of 33% to be acceptable much less the stuff of legends.

What about each of us? Every one of us carries within our own psyches a sense of success and failure. Is failure merely an opportunity to keep striving toward a goal, an obstacle in the path of success or is failure something more devastating, and more humiliating?

In daily life we constantly encounter obstacles that we do not expect, that we cannot predict and cannot control. Chris Kraft the flight director for the early Apollo missions had a slogan that said, “Failure is not an option.” Wouldn’t it be nice if this was true in our own personal lives? Unfortunately we humans are not protected from failure by duplicate and even triplicate back-up systems. We are imperfect beings living imperfect lives.

So if experiences with failure are a part of the human condition and I think they are, how are we to live with our imperfection?

It seems to me that most failures—whether professional or personal, are defined by a sequence of emotions. First there is anger, followed by guilt, shame and even depression. At first we are angry with ourselves and at others for our perceived inability to do something well. It may be our job, it may be our role as a partner or spouse, it may be as a friend, a parent or a child. In our anger, we turn against those whom we perceive to be responsible for our failures.

But soon our anger is replaced by guilt—our thinking turns inward. Maybe I am the responsible party. Maybe my actions or behaviors really did lead to the end of a relationship, a botched assignment at work, or estrangement from those I love. As we experience this pervasive sense of guilt we become filled with shame and humiliation. We may ask ourselves “How can I be so stupid, so lazy, so incompetent?” And if allowed to go unchecked each of these reactions can lead to depression.

But it need not always be so. According to James and Evelyn Whitehead, writing in Shadows of the Heart, “ In our efforts to love and to work we can expect to stumble. We are brought down to earth from our lofty ideals as we meet the limits of our generosity and courage. We bend under our commitments and are brought low in exhaustion. All of this is humbling, but not necessarily humiliating. We can experience defeat without losing our worth. Humbled by our limits and brought back to earth we learn the crucial lessons that come as humility’s gift.”

And when we fall we have a choice. We can be defined by our failures or we can define our failures. We can live and learn from our failures or we can continue to repeat them. We can choose not to let our failure get in the way of a relationship or our vocational goals. We can “forgive and forget” or we can be burned down by our past mistakes. The important thing is that we always have this choice. We can accept our vulnerabilities, our shortcomings; in short our humanity, or we can be driven by shame and anger. Our worth is rooted in something more than what we do; it is rooted in who we are.

In my own life I had to learn this lesson the hard way. See, I grew up in a family that very much valued education and I didn’t. In elementary school I didn’t learn to read until I was in fourth grade and I hated math so much that I would just put down just any old numbers for answers to arithmetic problems. By junior high things had gotten really bad. One teacher wrote at the bottom of my report card, “Henry needs to reassess his entire academic outlook if he is to meet with any success.”

Now at about this time I learned about summer school. Summer school was different from regular school. The teachers seemed nicer and acted as if they wanted to be there. They smiled! I was able to do well enough in summer school to get promoted to the next grade.

Well this plan worked for a few years until in tenth grade someone had the brilliant idea that I shouldn’t be permitted to continue this happy tradition and I was retained. Retained in tenth grade. No one is retained in tenth grade. So guess what, by the next January it was obvious that I was flunking tenth grade for the second time!

Well, at this point my parents were totally frustrated by my apparent willingness to fail. So, we had a great conference and it was decided that I might do better in boarding school. During spring break we visited a number of small schools throughout New England. Finally, at the last school we visited, the headmaster asked to speak to me without my parents. I walked into his office just as he was closing my transcript file. Without skipping a beat he simply asked, “So, tell me the things you do well.” I don’t think any teacher; principal had ever asked me that question before and it was the beginning of a beautiful relationship. I did, in fact, graduate two years later, managed to get into a small college in upstate New York and never looked back.

But those early years were marred by a profound sense of failure. I didn’t, couldn’t measure up to the expectations that others set for me. I didn’t care about the things my teachers seemed to care about like spelling, punctuation or arithmetic. But I had a secret. All the time I was failing school I was reading wonderful books. The worlds of fiction and non-fiction were where I found myself, where I found success. Where I could put failure aside. I had learned this lesson: my worth is rooted in something more than what I do; it is rooted in who I am.

This is why the stories of Job and Casey at the Bat are so instructive. At their very essence they ask us this question: Should we receive only success, only what is good, and not experience failure? Do we not enjoy the beauty of a summer day more for having lived through the frigid days of January? Do we not enjoy the sun for experiencing the rain? Is love not more wondrous given the hate that also exists in the world? Is success not the sweeter for our failures? These stories teach us that we have a choice: We can either choose to love life in spite of its hardships and obstacles or we can choose to deny life and die.

In Tom Robbins book called Even Cowgirls Get the Blues, one of the characters makes this comment about failure:

So you think you’re a failure do you? Well, probably you are. What’s wrong with that? In the first place, if you have any sense at all you must have learned by now that we are paying just as dearly for our triumphs as we do for our defeats. Go ahead and fail. Embrace failure. Seek it out! Learn to love it! That may be the only way any of us will be free.”

Who among us gets to dictate the terms of his or her good fortune? We can’t live on earth for very long without confronting a fundamental truth: We’re not in charge here, at least not entirely so. For all our planning, for all our talk of goals, for all our strategy and vision and commitment, we learn that most important events cannot be predicted or controlled. One thing or another is continually upsetting all the plans we are in the business of making. Life throws things at us we cannot control and we cannot predict. What we can control is who we are along the way. We can control how much energy, compassion, and integrity we bring to our journey. We can choose to define ourselves by our failures or we can choose to define ourselves by our successes.

It’s a choice each person gets to make every day. Indeed, it may be the only way any of us will be free.

Amen