In
Tattoos on the Heart, Greg Boyle
weaves both tough and tender anecdotes with timeless truths about God. In fact,
Boyle admits in the introduction, this whole book is about God. Thank God for
Gregory Boyle, better known among the gangs of Los Angeles as Father G! A
Jesuit priest, G has dedicated his life to treasuring folks whom society has
discarded as useless and troublesome. He treats them as Jesus would. When
people fear God must look at them and think “disappointment,” Father G shows
that God is actually thinking “delight.” Left-out, self-destructive gang
members renew hope at Homeboy Industries, where many excel at gainful
employment.
Homeboy
Industries hires many gang members for neighborhood cleanup, graffiti removal,
landscaping, construction of a child-care center, running a bakery, to name a
few of their projects. When a gang member gains enough confidence to seek
employment, as a symbol of his heart change, he often wants some of his bitter-outburst
tattoos removed, so Homeboy includes a tattoo-removal service. The Tattoos on the Heart title of this book
is based on a homie Sharkey’s response to G’s complimenting his courage. G
tells him he is a giant among men. Sharkey responds, “Damn, G, I’m gonna tattoo
that on my heart.”
Reading
this book both warms and breaks my heart. In anecdote upon anecdote, I meet
Luis, Lencho, Rigo, Lula, Elias, Jason, Lorenzo, Moreno, Freddy … and I feel
their shame, joy, despair, and hope. They walk in the ways of their violent
neighborhoods until they see they can walk toward a productive life. Often G’s
showing them God’s unconditional, nonjudgmental love is their pivotal point.
Sometimes they don’t make it out alive. Sometimes they do. Some stories are
tragic. Others are funny. So often though, G’s anecdotes expand my horizons
along with those of his homies.
Greg
Boyle’s stories in Tattoos on the Heart illustrate
the power of Jesus Christ’s love to change lives. I was changed to hear about a
father who just can’t take his eyes off his kid, who in his eyes could not be
one bit better. Boyle quotes Anthony De
Mello: “Behold the One beholding you, and smiling.” God does not love us with a
disapproving love. That’s a huge truth to grasp. As homie Scrappy enters
through the narrow gate, he finds expansiveness on the other side. Boyle
writes: “No part of our hardwiring or our messy selves is to be disparaged.
Where we stand, in all our mistakes and imperfection, is holy ground. It is
where God has chosen to be intimate with us and not in any way but this.
Scrappy’s moment of truth was not in recognizing what a disappointment he’s
been all these years. It came in realizing that God had been beholding him and
smiling for all this time, unable to look anywhere else.” [page 35]
Carmen
wanders in to G’s office and tells him, “I … am … a … disgrace.” Boyle admits,
“Suddenly her shame meets mine, for when Carmen walked through that door, I had
mistaken her for an interruption.” [page 42] Boyle then reflects on shame and
its central role in life-destroying addictions. He notes, “There is a palpable
sense of disgrace strapped like an oxygen tank onto the back of every homie I
know.” What a perfect metaphor; I can relate to breathing in shame as the only
thing I knew to breathe. Boyle includes here a beautiful quote from Beldon
Lane, a theologian: “Divine love is incessantly restless until it turns all
woundedness into health, all deformity into beauty and all embarrassment into
laughter.” That gives me hope.
Father
G’s incomprehensibly large compassion for other humans inspires me. Boyle’s
teaching style in Tattoos on the Heart
combines personal stories with his own observations with insightful quotations
of others. I find this style both effective and entertaining. I had many Hmmm and Wow moments while reading this book. I will finish here with just
one more quote. On the subject of fearing your kindness will be perceived as
weakness, Boyle writes, “Sooner or later, we all discover that kindness is the
only strength there is.” [page 124]