Shoes as Metaphor But Also Shoes as Literal Shoes

As shoes for your feet 

put on whatever will make you ready 

to proclaim the gospel of peace. (Eph 6.15)

We’ve heard it said that before one judges another person one ought to walk a mile in her shoes.

Is it just me, or do we sometimes easily gloss over the more literal reading of metaphors? Like, would we ever actually dare to take someone else’s shoes and put them on our own feet and actually walk around in them? And if we did, would we learn anything about that person? I thought about talking about mindfulness and renting shoes at the bowling alley, but it seemed a little...visceral.

Well, we would probably never do this because firstly, social norms generally don’t allow for this sort of interaction. Then there’s the whole sizing issue. It would be complicated. We might say that we can tell a lot about a person from her shoes. And while I’m sure that the statement has some truth to it, we could easily turn it into: If you want to judge someone by their appearance, shoes aren’t a bad place to start. Shoes can tell you a lot about what a person does for a living, where he is from in the world, her income bracket (or maybe the level of income she wants to portray), his class, things about his culture or her lifestyle, or maybe even what he values. I confess that I do tend to take notice of what people are wearing on their feet. I also confess that I have, on occasion, made some sort of judgment about a person based on his shoes. God, forgive me.

Maybe there are too many shoe-based assumptions in life. I get it, it’s a slightly absurd claim. But I've committed to blogging about a slightly half-baked Lenten discipline, so let's just go with it. I’ve had enough experiences where someone has seemed a little too concerned about my footwear. And don’t let’s act like the church is immune.

Which pair is the most liturgically appropriate for Lent...?

Some of us cringe when we see sneakers poking out of an acolyte robe. And nothing ruins liturgy more than irregular footwear! I remember as well as anyone that part of the gospel where Jesus is all like, "So help me, if anyone dares wear their Converse All Stars on the Sabbath! Arrrggghh!" I once worked as an associate rector in a church where my boss admonished me one Sunday because I wore brown leather shoes instead of black. Later that day I also used my dessert fork to eat my salad at brunch, but whatever. The exchange included some sort of illustrative anecdote about how as a teenager he wore hush puppies or something to church one Sunday when he was supposed to acolyte and the verger or altar guild queen reamed him out and he was forbidden to serve that morning and he was scarred for life and then he became a priest. I’m not exactly sure what the deeper message in that encounter was. I have a few guesses, but I will omit them here. But I don’t think I’m overstating things when I say it was just one more moment where it seemed like my outward appearance in ministry mattered more than, well, anything else. Nor was that the last time that my clothes and appearance were questioned in my ministry.

I also remember a clergy colleague once describing the rector of another church as being the sort of person "who wore Birkenstock sandals." As in, not just regular sandals or flip flops, but Bir.Ken.Stocks. I’m not sure if the rector in question actually wore Birkenstock sandals, but I got that the statement was meant to imply something about not only him as a person and priest but also even his parish. I mean, what sort of parish hires a guy who wears expensive sandals. A hippie parish, that’s what. And everybody knows how upsetting hippies are.

Like I said earlier, I may have some shoe issues to work out.

They look fine as is, why ruin them by wearing them?

But picking out my clothes for this journey, I had some decisions to make. And the question was: does it really matter what shoes I wear? Notably I own (and wear regularly) more pairs of shoes than there are days of the week. But more than any other article of clothing I packed, I think I had to consider what circumstances would dictate what shoes I brought. Comfort, weather, activity, exercise, formality. Most days I like to wear simple canvas lace up (If they’re black, do they count?). I once refereed a debate between several high schoolers about whether or not Fred Rogers sported Keds or Vans. Normally on rainy days I wear water-resistant hiking boots, but how much does it really rain in central Texas? Well, having not packed my boots, my canvas sneakers are awash with irony. I also neglected to take into account that I would be spending a week in the piney woods of Texas and my Vans ain’t exactly good for hiking. I mean, they are lousy for hiking. I already mentioned that my wife had to talk me into packing dress shoes, which I dislike mostly because they are the least comfortable shoes I own, and I only wear them when I feel circumstances dictate. And even then only to avoid commentary or suspicious glances.

It’s hard to deny that western culture has some issues with shoes and feet in general. Ask any Episcopal congregation about their Maundy Thursday Foot-washing service and see how many people can maintain reasonable eye-contact with you. But if our shoes can communicate so much about us, and if we can assume so much (too much?) about a person just from their shoes, what then can shoes or our feet say about our spiritual journey?

I refrained from looking up every verse in the Bible that had something to do with shoes or feet. But moments that came to mind were: That it was a bold claim for John to say that he was not worthy even to do something so degrading as untie Jesus’ sandal. That is was scandalous for Jesus to have his feet touched by anyone, most of all a woman of notoriety. Or that Jesus, perhaps because words were not sufficient to supply the message, as one of his final acts, washed the feet of his closest friends at the end of their journey because where he was going the could not follow; and he would be going on ahead alone.