Dietrich Bonhoeffer begins his investigation of theological ethics with shame, an unusual topic for theological ethical inquiry. Bonhoeffer writes that shame arises out of the first experience of human sin, which occurs after the first humans ate the fruit of the knowledge of good and evil, an act that stripped away their innocence and made them aware of their nudity and vulnerability. According to Bonhoeffer, “Shame is man’s ineffaceable recollection of his estrangement from the origin; it is grief for this estrangement, and the powerless longing to return to unity with the origin” (Bonhoeffer, 1955, p. 24). Similar to many shame theorists, Bonhoeffer draws an understanding of shame from its linguistic roots— “shame” in English, and Scham or Schande in German—in order to lift up cultural associations that shame has with exposure and the need to cover one’s nakedness or vulnerability. Bonhoeffer complexifies this experience of shame, linking it to feelings of loss and isolation that are fundamental to the fallen human condition as well as to the fellowship and connection that these feelings of shame can bring about. This loss and disconnection, with humans and the Creator, can only be restored through the shameless exposure of shame, which takes the form of “confession before God and before other men” (Bonhoeffer, 1955, p. 27).
What is unusual about Bonhoeffer’s move into shame is that the act of confession is typically used as a method to alleviate guilt. Guilt has been a central theme in Christian theology and ethics, especially in classical atonement theologies in which sin is related to debt-bondage or legal wrongdoing as part of humanity’s relationship with the divine. However, the shame that Bonhoeffer describes, not only in Ethics but in his writings throughout his life, cannot be relieved through confession, at least as contemporary scholars of guilt and shame describe it. The distinction between guilt and shame is often distilled to a single, popular sentence: “Guilt is about doing, while shame is about being.” As Kelly Oliver writes regarding shame and guilt, “We can apologize or ask forgiveness for bad acts, but what does it mean to apologize or ask forgiveness for being bad?” (Oliver, 2004, p. 90). According to Stephen Pattison, while Bonhoeffer makes shame a fundamental part of human ontology and addresses the spiritual pain of that fallenness, his theology “hardly engages with the painful reality and specificity of contemporary human alienation and defilement represented by chronic, dysfunctional shame” (Pattison, 2000, p. 193). To be fair to Bonhoeffer, he wrote his reflections on shame at least three decades before psychoanalytic study of shame began in earnest, and so his analysis of shame cannot invoke understandings that later developed through vast interdisciplinary work over the past several decades. The majority of texts on shame have been produced since the 1970s, largely in the fields of psychoanalysis and literary theory that focus on shame as an affective, personal experience of flawed or inappropriate identity or being, and his turn toward shame as an essential part of discipleship, and the confession of shame as practice of building that discipleship, is one that shame theorists today likely would question.
However, throughout his life, Bonhoeffer repeatedly returned to shame as a central concern of Christian life, not only as a sin for Christians to overcome, but a vehicle through which Christian discipleship would flourish. Repeatedly throughout his writings, Bonhoeffer moves between the pain of shame that human beings experience in their separation from God and one another, to gently encouraging his partners in the Confessing Church to recalibrate their senses of shame so that they live into their call to act for justice in the world (Bonhoeffer, 2013, p. 397; Green and DeJonge, Eds.). Rather than bifurcating between acts that are related to guilt and being that is related to shame, Bonhoeffer centers on shame and solidarity with the shamed, as essential aspects of his theology. While he was organizing and working in the Confessing Church, Bonhoeffer wrote:
The merciful give their own honor to those who have fallen into shame and take that shame unto themselves. They may be found in the company of tax collectors and sinners and willingly bear the shame of their fellowship. Disciples give away anyone’s greatest possession, their own dignity and honor, and show mercy. They know only one dignity and honor, the mercy of their Lord, which is their only source of life. He was not ashamed of his disciples. He became a brother to the people; he bore their shame all the way to death on the cross. This is the mercy of Jesus, from which those who follow him wish to live, the mercy of the crucified one. This mercy lets them all forget their own honor and dignity and seek only the company of sinners. If shame now falls on them, they still are blessed. For they shall receive mercy. Some day God will bend down low to them and take on their sin and shame. God will give them God’s own honor and take away their dishonor. It will be God’s honor to bear the shame of the sinners and to clothe them with God’s honor ( Bonhoeffer, 2013, p. 494; Green and DeJonge, Eds).
This paper examines Bonhoeffer’s theology of shame, and the practice of confession as a means through which shame becomes a basis for community solidarity, and resistance against an unjust system. Unlike contemporary shame theorists who narrowly define shame as a toxic experience that erodes individual and community esteem, or a primitive state that must be overcome, Bonhoeffer describes shame as a complex and relational affect, both as the sense of estrangement from God and fellow creatures, but also as a goad meant to push the Confessing Church and German Christians toward resistance against the Reich. It examines how Bonhoeffer developed this theology of shame, in the context of political oppression and genocide, in order to better understand how the Christian practice of confession through shame builds the solidarity necessary for resisting oppressive orders.
This paper examines Bonhoeffer’s theology of shame, and the practice of confession as a means through which shame becomes a basis for community solidarity, and resistance against an unjust system. Unlike contemporary shame theorists who narrowly define shame as a toxic experience that erodes individual and community esteem, or a primitive state that must be overcome, Bonhoeffer describes shame as a complex and relational affect, both as the sense of estrangement from God and fellow creatures, but also as a goad meant to push the Confessing Church and German Christians toward resistance against the Reich. It examines how Bonhoeffer developed this theology of shame, in the context of political oppression and genocide, in order to better understand how the Christian practice of confession through shame builds the solidarity necessary for resisting oppressive orders.