Here’s a story about memes.
A meme is a little like a gene. It contains information, it is transmitted from host to host, and it survives according to its success or failure in a given environment. The difference is that a gene contains biological information; a meme contains cultural information.
If this is already making your head hurt, you’re not alone. This stuff can get very complicated very fast. But to meme theorists, the complex notion of memes can account for developments and trends in beliefs and practices. It explains how concepts are passed from person to person, and why people in San Francisco and Baton Rouge might have a similar new idea at the same time, even if they had not read the same book or participated in the same conversation.
A meme theorist studying Christian culture these days would have a heyday with the prevalent meme concept of story. Everywhere you turn, a minister or writer or Christian personality is talking about how God is the ultimate storyteller, Jesus spoke in story form and all of our lives, really, are just part of One Big Story. We are encouraged to tell stories, to discover our own story and to remember that whatever we have to say about God can probably best be told as a story.
No doubt there’s a good story about how story became such a dominant concept. My version would begin with contemporary theologians like Richard Hays and N.T. Wright, who have emphasized how important narrative was to the first Christians. Popular voices like Eugene Peterson and Brian McLaren have helped the trend along. However it has happened, the story meme is a trend with benefits. All cultures share the motivation to tell stories. Thus stories are a form of speech that can break down barriers, advance communication and foster maturity. Sometimes it’s more effective to tell a story than to outline a point-by-point argument, because stories are flexible, adaptable and easy to remember.
But, as with genes, just because a meme thrives doesn’t mean it’s good for us in every way. The problem with all the talk of story is it motivates us to use stories rather than create them. Our excitement over the power of storytelling too often results in functional stories — stories that are constructed to serve particular purposes — rather than stories that are created to challenge and transform.
For stories to do all they can do, they have to be good stories. And — here’s the rub — good stories don’t always do what we expect them to do. They don’t deliver answers. Often, they do just the opposite: conceal rather than reveal. Their lessons are slow boils. They percolate. They resonate. They don’t lead with the answer, and they don’t always make us feel better. But they draw us to truths that we can’t quite articulate — without the help of a good story.
Why does Hollywood make an endless series of movies based on, for instance, Shakespeare and Austen? Because the stories work. These stories aren’t functional. They are creational. They worked when they were written, and they will work a thousand years from now.
Jesus — as you may have heard — often spoke in story form, but his stories weren’t always immediately illuminating. Check out Mark 4 for just one example of Jesus telling stories that inhibit comprehension rather than foster it. Why would he do this? Eugene Peterson has said that it’s part of the very function of parables to shock and reorient the listener.
Indirection is not a problem in good storytelling; indeed, it can draw readers in and invite them to participate. We don’t have to be Shakespeare, Austen, or (thankfully) Jesus to take advantage of the powerful meme of story. But as we excitedly embrace stories and all their power to communicate, we need to be sure that we’re creating them, not just using them.
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Patton Dodd is an editor for beliefnet.com and the author of the acclaimed spiritual memoir My Faith So Far (Jossey-Bass, 2004).
