wonder four

(as far as i know) no one has seen me naked in the last fifteen years. no lovers, no surgeries, no spicy beaches. still, nakedness has been on my mind in the last while.

i share life with men and women who have developmental disabilities. while some of them are quite independent, others need to be verbally instructed as they bathe or use the bathroom. still others are utterly dependent on the support of their assistants. as i began taking on a few of these routines, i was struck by how uneventful nudity seemed to be. there might be shyness, but there wasn't shame. it was ordinary.

reflecting on these experiences, my mind was flooded with scraps of ideas: kids have to be taught about modesty and privacy. people i care about resent their sexuality. miranda stone pin-points the beginning of social struggles in her life to the advent of puberty ("7 deadly sins"). i hate porn. donald miller dedicated a chapter of "searching for God knows what" to adam and eve ("naked"). some guy confessed to cosmo that leaving the lights on took everything to a deeper level. the Church has historically been dualistic. Christ died naked.

nudity is a very big deal for me. in fact, about six months ago i considered it a major personal break-through when i managed to change in the locker room rather than hiding in a bathroom stall. it's not that i'm a prude, i don't think. it's that i can't divorce nudity from... well, nakedness. i mean, from intimacy.

miller hints that life with God is a return to nakedness, but i doubt he'd support Christian nudist colonies just yet. i think the reason nakedness was the fashion in eden was that adam and eve were first of all innocent, but also intimate - with one another and with God. that's hardly the default anymore.

so, there's an innocence requisite to default nakedness. young children and core members aren't always ignorant of the vulnerability implicit in nakedness, but they are far less likely to associate their bodies with sin. those of us who do make that connection can't return to the philosophical innocence of eden without the moral innocence that accompanied it... and that will only come in its fullness when all is finally and eternally renewed and restored.

but we can have real intimacy. we can choose to believe the best about one another, fully aware of the risks we face. i think that's part of what God offers us in the interim: intimacy with Himself, first of all. and the potential of intimacy with one another.

donald miller makes much of the distinction between truth and meaning, which got me thinking that, absent of context, neither nudity nor figurative nakedness expresses anything. it is truth (when it isn't airbrushed), but it has no meaning. in relationship, though, it is hard to exaggerate its significance.

"in a world where innocence and intimacy are mocked and abused, i invite you to know me, as i really am. i trust that i am safe with you. more than that, i believe that our mutual nakedness is a foundation for fruitfulness and goodness and beauty in this relationship and in our lives."

one of my hopes is that my time at l'arche will help me to narrow in on what it means to be human. away from many of the trappings of "real life," some beautiful - and meaningful! - truths are coming the surface. not least among them is this: to be human is to be naked... in every sense of the word.

she parks her car outside my house and
takes her clothes off
says she's close to understanding Jesus
~ counting crows, "round here"