Are we whom we say we are?

This picture shows quite the cake.  It was the wedding cake at a wedding reception I happily attended last Saturday.  Last weekend, I actually went to two weddings.  One I went as the guest and it was some reception as you can tell by the cake.  For the other, I was a priest at the marriage ceremony where I was joined by three other priests, no less.  At this wedding, I could not believe what I was watching.  On walking down the aisle, the bride nearly fell over.  Why? 

It was her dress which was so cumbersome that it disabled her from walking independently.  So to her rescue came two women who held the bottom of her dress at either side as she walked down the rest of the aisle.  I wanted to laugh but couldn't.  I wondered to myself if the woman realised how ridiculous this made her look. In trying to look stylish, fashionable, rich, she achieved the exact opposite.  I ask why do people do this to themselves?  I ask if people at weddings really appreciate what this is all about?  Or is it all show, all bubbly, all sweet and nice?  'Wedding world' does lose the plot. 

In my office at Caritas Thailand, we work for foreigners.  I sometimes, as I did this week, see the ridiculousness of our position as many Thais, even amongst those working for migrant populations, find it hard within themselves to deal with and accept foreigners.  I am not picking on them.  It is just the way it is and it is a reality I have to deal with as a foreigner myself in Thailand. 

When facing the ridiculousness arising in our realities, whether at work or in the street or at church, we can face the dilemma of our lives.  The question we are faced with is this: What is the real meaning of who we are and what we are about?  Then how do we live it? 

We present a public face about who we are and what we choose to do in life, while in our private sphere another set of even opposing factors may come into play.  This may happen unknowingly or be forced upon us as ones enter the pressure cooker that is 'wedding world'.  The dilemmas, the paradoxes, the misunderstandings, even the ridiculous of life arise.  How do we put it together?  How do we be whom we say we are or whom we want to to be or try to be?   Not easy.