I saw an advert a few times recently for a perfume called “Perfect”. It has a lot of people one after another where people say “I’m perfect”.
It’s an interesting thought. What they are saying is that we value diversity. But there is a subtext that I am not sure is always healthy.
I remember a Larry Norman concert where he talked about Father Christmas. It stuck with me. The idea of the naughty and nice list. But the story of Christmas is about tearing up the naughty list – binning it – it isn’t important. Over the centuries Christians have focused on the wrong – monks have whipped themselves to make themselves pure – people have paid money because of their wrong. We are wrong we are nasty we all deserve to be punished until we can make ourselves perfect.
There is a little quoted phrase in the bible where Jesus says “I bet you are going to say to me doctor make yourself better”. Why? What would he heal himself from? The suggestion of some is that he had an obvious physical impairment. What, you mean he was not a blonde beautiful man?
This takes me back to the subtext in the advert. That we should all be perfect. I am not sure it is healthy for us to consider ourselves perfect, because that is the walk toward a fear of the naughty list. To me accepting imperfection is a healthier approach to life. So I am not, and never will be, perfect. Deal with it.