When the sabbath came he began to teach in the synagogue, and many who heard him were astonished. (Mk. 6:2)
Most Americans born before the twenty-first century would recognize the name “Mr. Rogers”—of the famous PBS children’s television show. We all remember how he started each episode hanging his sports jacket in the closet, switching to a colorful, zip-up sweater, then taking off and tossing his shoes from one hand to the other, replacing them with his red or blue canvas sneakers. Mr. Rogers was now in his play clothes: it was time for all of us to relax and have fun. Mister Rogers’ Neighborhood may not have been as entertaining or as exciting a show as “Sesame Street;” still, Fred Rogers’ slow, methodical way of speaking and his self-composed songs about every emotion under the sun somehow kept children mesmerized and calm. Mr. Rogers had a way of bringing children peace. It was rather “astonishing.”
They said, “Where did this man get all this? What kind of wisdom has been given him? What mighty deeds are wrought by his hands!” (Mk. 6:2)
The thing is, there is a fact about Fred Rogers that relatively few people know about him unless they are familiar with his biography: Mr. Rogers was an ordained Presbyterian minister. He was a man of the cloth. In other words, without speaking the words “God,” “Jesus,” or “Holy Spirit” on his program, Mr. Rogers’ mission was the same as the one commissioned to the Apostles by Jesus Christ Himself:
Go out to all the world and tell the Good News. (Mk. 16:15)
Fred Rogers’ job was to evangelize through this revolutionary new model of children’s television programming.
Is he not the carpenter, the son of Mary? (Mk. 6:3)
There was definitely nothing spectacular about Mr. Rogers on the surface. One might even say he was a little . . . boring. Ordinary. Which makes what Mr. Rogers accomplished all the more astonishing.
In 1968, when Mister Rogers’ Neighborhood first aired, the only kind of programming available for children essentially consisted of slapstick, pie-in-your-face humor; it was Fred’s distaste for the quality of programming that was shaping young minds that precipitated him to make a change. With himself as the primary actor, the sole voice for ten different puppets, and a low budget set, Mr. Rogers touched countless children through television sets in millions of homes across America. With almost nothing to speak of, but with everything he had, Fred Rogers was doing his part to carry out Christ’s Great Commission to evangelize the world.
And they took offense at him. (Mk. 6:3)
In 1969, public broadcasting was yet to be funded. Before leaving office, President Lyndon Johnson proposed a twenty-million-dollar bill for the creation of PBS, but his successor, Richard Nixon, wanted that funding cut. Fred Rogers, though not yet nationally renowned, was asked to testify before the U.S. Senate Subcommittee on Communications, chaired by Senator John Pastore. The videoclip of Rogers’ testimony is fascinating (well worth watching on YouTube). In the clip, a nervous Rogers begins his speech, rudely and sarcastically interrupted by the impatient Pastore, who is clearly the bigwig on campus. One can tell by the look on his face that he has no intention of granting this nobody of a man twenty cents, let alone twenty million dollars. One almost cringes while listening to Mr. Rogers go on about children’s feelings, despite his being essentially dismissed by this “important” senator. Why on earth should a high-powered political figure care about children’s feelings? Then, Mr. Rogers does something truly astonishing. He begins to recite the lyrics of a song he wrote, What Do You Do with the Mad that You Feel? The man had now humiliated himself on national television.
Whoever humbles himself like this child is the greatest in the Kingdom of heaven. And whoever receives one child such as this in my name receives me. (Mt. 18:4-5)
Something even more astonishing happens next. Democratic Senator John Pastore, Chair of the U.S. Senate Subcommittee on Communications, has been brought to tears. He is visibly moved. At the end of Rogers’ testimony, Senator Pastore responds with a happy smile on his face:
“I think it’s wonderful. I think it’s wonderful. Looks like you just earned the twenty million dollars.”
And the audience explodes in applause.
Do not worry about how you are to speak or what you are to say. You will be given at that moment what you are to say. For it will not be you who speak but the Spirit of your Father speaking through you.” (Mt. 10:19-20)
Fred Rogers won over the U.S. Senate Subcommittee on Communications not because his speech was the most well-rehearsed, well-written, and fine-turned oratory known to man; it was because he allowed the Spirit of the Father to speak through him. It was the work of the Father that he was carrying out; that is what gave him the courage to speak before the senate subcommittee, willing to make a fool of himself for Christ. Though he certainly would have hoped for a particular outcome—the funding of public broadcasting—Fred did not base his words and actions on outcomes. He based them on doing “whatever” the Spirit told him to do. So much so that a nervous and shy Rogers began his testimony to the Senator with these words regarding his prepared speech:
“This is a philosophical statement and will take about ten minutes to read, so I’ll not do that.”
And away he went, off script, securing the funding that would found an institution that has lasted to this very day. Mister Rogers Neighborhood ran from 1968 until 2001, just two years before Fred Rogers died of stomach cancer.
Mr. Rogers taught us by his example in front of the senate subcommittee that we cannot base our motivations on outcomes, nor judge our actions by how things have turned out. This is not the measure by which we discern God’s will for us.
It is a terribly difficult lesson for us to learn because while we can imagine such trust in theory, in practice, not looking at how things have turned out to determine our discernment makes no sense to us. After all, is that not how we learn to do better the next time—from the experience of our mistakes? Well, obedience to God’s will regardless of outcomes is entirely different from learning from our mistakes. Why? Because our obedience to God is driven not by self-motivation, but by love of God alone. The outcome has no bearing on our judgment of whether we have discerned properly because the outcome we see presently is not necessarily the end of the story.
There is an eternal perspective that we do not see right now, one that is to be revealed later—at a time when everything will all make sense. After all, Jesus Himself was rejected by His own community in His own hometown, but it was that very rejection that led Him to the towns where His disciples would grow by leaps and bounds, eventually spreading the Good News that would go out throughout the rest of the world.
Author’s Note: Excerpt from The Safe Haven: Scriptural Reflections for the Heart and Home, Ordinary Time (Weeks 1-7). To purchase, visit Amazon or The Catholic Company, where all other volumes currently in print are also available.
Photo from Wikimedia Commons
