I love the Peanut’s adventure It’s the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown, and look forward to revisiting the tale every year at Halloween. Linus believes in and faithfully seeks contact with the benevolent Great Pumpkin, believing that his pumpkin patch must be the most sincere one around. “Not a sign of hypocrisy. There is nothing but sincerity as far as the eye can see.” But is there really a Great Pumpkin? Linus believes that if people can believe in Santa Claus, then they can believe in the Great Pumpkin too! Oh Great Pumpkin, where are you?
We are relational creatures. Relationships in my understanding fall into the category of the spiritual or social dimension of humanness. We seek and thrive on relationships of advocacy, yet live in a world of adversarial relationships. It is said that, over the course of history, man’s most feared predator has not been any kind of scary animal, but has rather been other men. So when we seek true friends, friends that are sincere, what will we find?
If you believe you have no friends, then the loneliness you feel is what I call spiritual starvation. As relational creatures, humans require a sense of belonging, which when achieved is what I call spiritual food. Like Linus, it seems we find hope in life knowing that there is someone with a sincerely benevolent attitude toward us. For sure, Linus suffers the wrath and/or ridicule of his sister, friends, and ultimately Sally, as he persistently hangs on to his belief in something special. Hypocrisy is an act we put on to appear benevolent to someone else, when the reality is that we are seeking our own interests. Hypocrisy can also be an act to appear politically correct, so as to be accepted by others, when inside us we believe something different and perhaps radical.
Throughout the story, Lucy mocks her brother. Lucy no doubt is a leader among her peers, with many activities going her way. Even so, Lucy is not perfect; she is made fun of as well, as when Snoopy bests her at apple bobbing. But for all the mocking, who is it that comes through for Linus as he persists in waiting for the Great Pumpkin late into the night? It is truly a touching scene when Lucy gets up in the middle of the night to check on her brother. Finding he is not in his bed, Lucy goes to the pumpkin patch and escorts a shivering Linus back to the comfort of his warm bed. It is a sincerely benevolent Lucy who has appeared in the pumpkin patch and bestowed love to her brother. Lucy is truly a friend to Linus, and the pumpkin patch has proven to be sincere indeed. We have witnessed an act of love. It is possible to love others as well as ourselves. Lucy in her sincere act of benevolence represents the Great Pumpkin to me. Happy Halloween!
P.S. Remember never to jump in a pile of leaves with a wet sucker!