Clueless in Galilee. Mac Barron

       Preface

      Hi.

      My name is Mac, and I’m a joke-aholic.

       Hi, Mac.

      (If you’re Catholic, you just read the bold part out loud. If not, no worries. There’s nothing intrinsically Catholic about this book.)

      I’ve spent my adult life (I’m a convert) sitting in Mass, listening to solemn readings and snickering, leaning over to my wife and pointing out the absurd turn of phrase or two. I’ve sort of infected her over the years, so that more times than not she’ll lean back over and come up with something even funnier. I’d be jealous of that, but she had to birth our children.

      My point is that I finally have an outlet through which to pour twenty years’ worth of silly inner monologue out into the public. To Our Sunday Visitor, I thank you for this opportunity … and I am not responsible for any legal fees incurred.

      Before I get knee-deep into a book, I like to know a bit about the author, so here goes: I’m from South Georgia — like, way down South Georgia … like, the deep South. I grew up Protestant and became very active in my faith in my teens. I knew one Catholic family. The oldest son in that family has been my best friend since our first day of kindergarten. So whatever damage I do to the Faith with this book can be traced directly to Dr. Jay and Nancy Dallas of Arlington, Georgia. Their oldest son, Ben, is now Father Ben Dallas and is a fantastic priest serving in an undisclosed parish within the Diocese of Savannah.

      I met my wife at church camp when we were both fourteen. We converted together right after we got married. I became an educator (high school Social Studies), and we’re raising four boys. To pay the bills now, I work as a high school media specialist … and write books!

      This book is full of skewed takes on Gospel readings (and a few from other parts of the Bible), but hopefully these will help you see the disciples — and, really, anyone who sets out to live their life for God — in a new light.

      We have a concept of the disciples as men who were laser-focused on Christ and his mission on earth — and to an extent, they were. But if you look closely, the Scriptures actually tell us that they could often be a bunch of clueless knuckleheads.

      The disciples were a bit like teenage boys: they were sometimes overly concerned with food and who would get to go first. They would try to take things too far (“shall we call down fire from heaven, Lord?” [see Lk 9:54]). They couldn’t stay awake during prayer time. And apparently one of them wasn’t wearing any underwear (just look up Mk 14:51-52).

      This book doesn’t seek to denigrate the fathers of our Church. Instead, it seeks to make them more accessible, more approachable. They were human. They had many of the same problems as the rest of us, but they were blessed to walk alongside Our Lord for three years during his ministry in Galilee. Somehow, that proximity didn’t necessarily make them smarter. But their frequent bouts of cluelessness are a great reminder for us not to take ourselves too seriously. Jesus knows we just don’t get it … most of the time.

      For the most part, this book stays in the Gospels. Two of the traditionally recognized authors of the Gospels were actually disciples: Matthew and John. (Church historians have disagreed sharply over who was funnier.) Seriously, most of the passages I used for this book are from these two guys who were actually there with Jesus. These were the authors who heard the real words spoken, who saw the expressions on the faces, and who nervously argued among themselves about who was supposed to have brought snacks for the boat ride (see Mt 16:6).

      At times we will peek outside the Gospels and explore the deep truths that lie in the Old Testament. But mostly we’ll look at these passages because there’s some funny junk in there too! I mean, if we’re honest, we can admit that dudes have been clueless knuckleheads for a long time (see: that whole fall of man thing in Genesis). That didn’t start with the disciples. Occasionally, we’ll also look at stories in the New Testament that fall in line with the general vibe of this book.

      We’ll look at the odd turn of phrase in the Scriptures that make us scratch our heads. At times this book seeks to poke gentle fun at the foibles of humanity that never seem to change. At other times it tries to offer some insight into how we can better understand our place in the kingdom of God despite those shortcomings. I wouldn’t say this book is irreverent, but it’s not quite reverent either. If you can’t handle jokes about Jesus being cranky when he gets hungry, you may want to turn back now.

      There’s no clear rhyme or reason to the layout of the stories herein (except that my editor said we couldn’t start with a story about children getting eaten by a bear … thanks, Mary Beth, #stickinthemud). You can read it from cover to cover or you can jump around. Just a bit of warning: if you put this book in a particular place where one often sits down to “take care of business,” people will wonder why there’s so much giggling coming from in there.

      It might be helpful to know that I did impose a little structure in order to keep myself from rambling too much. You’ll notice that nearly each section is broken up into “The Setup,” “What Went Down,” and “The Takeaway.” In “The Setup,” I try to place the story in the overall context of the Scriptures and sum up as briefly as possible what happens from a “just the facts, ma’am” point of view. In “What Went Down,” I pick apart the incident for funny stuff. “The Takeaway” is where I actually try to bring some food for thought to bear and justify a respected Catholic publisher printing my book.

      So get a snack, try not to doze off, and make sure you’re wearing a sturdy pair of underpants! My sincere prayer is that this little work helps you laugh and think about Our Lord … (and maybe it will help send my children to college too).