Reading Clown Alley by Bill Ballantine, I expected to learn about greasepaint and slapstick, banana peels and pratfalls. And I did. But what surprised me—what stuck with me—is how deeply human the clown world is. Clowns, like pastors, are students of vulnerability. They train themselves to fall well, to fail big, to get back up with dignity and ridiculous grace.
Ballantine’s stories from inside the ring—his portraits of veteran clowns eating canned beans behind the big top or coaching the next generation on how to take a pie to the face—read, to me, like parables. These are not just funny people. These are people who know what it means to be seen. Who dare to be fools. Who understand the power of presence.
In the church, we talk a lot about incarnation—about how God became flesh and dwelled among us. In clowning, there’s something similarly incarnational: the holy risk of showing up with your whole, absurd, too-much self. Clowns don't hide their humanity; they exaggerate it, exposing our shared silliness and sorrow. They are both mirror and mercy.
Ballantine reminded me that ministry, like clowning, isn’t about being impressive. It’s about being available. It's about stumbling into grace, over and over, in front of a crowd. It’s about walking into sacred spaces (a.k.a. everywhere) with oversized shoes and open hearts, trusting that the Spirit might just be speaking through the laughter.
Reading Clown Alley, I remembered that the church is a kind of circus—holy, unpredictable, beautifully imperfect. And maybe, just maybe, that’s exactly how God likes it.
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