"...and the winner is...."

As I watch my youngest daughter read The Canterbury Tales I am amazed that she is able to read the works of Chaucer and grasp the human condition: Our inability to reconcile with that which we know our true selves to be, to that which we aspire to but shall never attain (my layman’s definition). This medieval novel chronicles the stories told by fellow travelers who are competing with one another for the favor of their host. So, the story telling begins.

“The Knight’s Tale” is about wars won and lost over love, with death being the final equalizer. The Miller, Cook and Reeve’s stories are about foolish choices driven by pride and fear, all of them ending in acts of unfaithfulness and loss. Then there are the stories of how pride comes before a fall and how most people are self-centered, therefore believing they are exempt from the danger or sin or foolishness that is in the world. Then all too quickly they find their self-perception wrong as they become blindsided victims. There are stories about those who are virtuous; whose unfailing devotion to their faith, or their spouses, or their king, told along the way. Yet sadly, these stories seem to be few in comparison and almost always told with an air of superiority.

I think we are not unlike the pilgrims in Chaucer’s story. I can see these same stories unfolding in front of me as I travel the road of life with my friends and family. And I find myself wondering why is it we have not learned from these stories the morals and absolutes that have been proven time and time again throughout history?

If, as a literary genius once observed, there are only 7 plot lines throughout all of human history, how can we be so afraid of our own stories? The story I tell today may not be one of betrayal or deceit or murder, but I have known and lived the realities of all of these. I am hopefully not making any foolish choices at the moment, choices that could lead me to sell my birthright or allow an innocent to pay for my debts or losses. But these also are stories of my life. And if not this day, certainly on others I have allowed pride to keep me from seeing truth, giving life, love or forgiveness, and in doing so have lost what I claimed was most dear. Making me, I believe a hypocrite.

Most of the stories I have to tell have in them one if not more of the seven deadly sins; Lust, greed, gluttony, pride, anger, avarice and sadness. (Could these be the 7 plot lines?) But also within each of my stories lies the hope of redemption. If not through the presence of a gift of the spirit; love, joy, peace, longsuffering, goodness, faith or meekness/temperance (which may have been manifested through that situation), then it is only one world away and will come through One who does redeem all things unto Himself.

Here’s the goofiest part. I want to learn from these pilgrims telling their tales on the way to Canterbury and back…with the greatest hope being I will not have any more foolish stories of my own to tell. Yet, I can see that I am exactly the same as each one of them. I am the Friar. I am the Monk. I am the Nun’s priest. I am all who react in defensiveness and all who retort in a pride-filled self. If by chance one of my stories starts with a virtuous act, it is but a chapter or two later I will find myself selling out and back to being one who needs redemption. If I hear a story that makes me feel inferior, uncovered or just plain stupid, I am driven to tell a story that might elevate me or at very least try and remove those around me from their “high horse”. You know, so that none may appear to be the winner of the competition for the best story.

Even though we are not characters in this book…we all appear to be living like them.

You’d think this would make us laugh, or be just a bit more secure in ourselves, when we see these pilgrims reflecting our behavior and (pre)telling our stories. Shouldn’t this bring us peace, remove fear and draw us closer to one another when the fear of our stories being singled out and seen as; the worst, the saddest, the least hopeful, the least virtuous the one that has no moral teaching or true absolute, is wiped away because we can find hope in knowing ours is not the only story that ends with the need for redemption.

“For all have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God.”
“If I say I have no sin, I deceive myself and the Truth is not in me.”