Relationships of laughter and healing

On June 10, Gabriella Neufeld, Sarah Pries, and I were put to work preparing supper for 100 people in Pauingassi First Nation (PFN). It marked the start of a three-day fishing derby put on by Child and Family Services (CFS), and to celebrate CFS was planning a supper at their community cabin.

The three of us arrived with boxes of pork chops and chicken for us to barbecue. There was only one minor problem: none of us had ever used a barbecue before—and neither had the other local women there. But we were determined to try, and to prove ourselves to the community. So we got to work barbecuing the pork chops first.

When we finished we went to show the fruits of our labour to one of the women in charge of the meal. She cut the pork chop in half and took one look at the inside (which was perfectly done) and started laughing. She cut a few more of our perfectly done pork chops and told us that no one would eat them like this, that they were raw.

So back to the barbecue we went to grill them all a second time, throwing our caution to the wind. Then we brought them back to the same woman. We lifted the lid of the pot and once again she laughed—this time at the blackened pork chops. When the derby fishers and their families began to arrive on the shore, we watched our pots of pork from a distance. Slowly but surely they lined up and helped themselves to the chops, and the women serving the food were sure to point to the three white girls standing by the barbecue who had spent the afternoon grilling all the meat for the meal.

The community laughed. We laughed. And we all enjoyed some burnt pork chops and good company. Turns out there’s nothing quite like burnt pork chops to build relationships.

Gabriella, Sarah and I found ourselves in Pauingassi for the summer through an initiative of Mennonite Church Manitoba called Partnership Circles. It brings together Mennonite congregations in southern Manitoba with Native communities in the north.

At a Partnership Circle meeting in the fall of 2010, Allan Owen, pastor at Pauingassi First Nation Apostolic Church, invited Grace Mennonite Church in Steinbach to partner with their community. The purpose is to build each other up and learn from one another.

This partnership began in the summer of 2011 with a week of Family Camp put on by the church and PFN, which continued this year, and is in the works for next summer. Our summer work was also funded by a grant through Southeast CFS. This program was meant to engage children ages 5-13 in structured and creative play, learning and practicing new skills, and preoccupying them throughout the long summer days when school is out.

As the story above illustrates, we experienced much foolishness and laughter during our summer in Pauingassi. There is a particular culture of humour in which relationships are built around laughing together at oneself and each other. When someone does something foolish, or makes a mistake, the immediate response of the community is laughter.

In western society this seems strange; in our striving for perfection we tend to hide our mistakes in embarrassment and shame. Or, if someone trips and falls we think we ought to make sure they are alright before we can joke about it—it is a response of concern and anxiety.

But what happens psychologically and emotionally when someone does something foolish and the immediate community responds with laughter? It is uplifting; the fool is compelled to laugh as well. The laughter at the mistakes of others and at ones own foolishness has a healing effect.

In his book, Seeking Mino-Pimatisiwin: An Aboriginal Approach to Helping, Michael Anthony Hart writes that humour is an “important factor in the helping process. . . . Humour supports the release of tension and energy. It supports knowledge development since much can be learned from the laughter stemming from particular situations.”

Acknowledging our imperfections, our brokenness as people, and learning to laugh with each other at ourselves, was one significant way we began to build relationships of trust, sharing, and love with people who live their lives radically different from us. Through experiences like this, we have seen how God is working in Pauingassi, and bringing healing to two different peoples, the local Anishinaabe and Mennonites living in Manitoba.

Melanie Kampen is enrolled in the Masters of Theological Studies program at Conrad Grebel University College. She is a member of Springfield Heights Mennonite Church in Winnipeg.

Gabriella Neufeld is finishing her degree in Education at the University of Winnipeg. She is a member of Grace Mennonite Church in Steinbach.

Sarah Pries recently finished a Bachelor of Science at the University of Waterloo and is taking the next year off to work. She is a member of Grace Mennonite Church in Steinbach.