“Won’t You Be My Neighbor?”

I’ve been thinking a bit about Fred Rogers for the past few days (you know, the Presbyterian minister in the red sweater with the children’s TV program that had the puppets and the little trolley). Why? Because I watched A Beautiful Day in the Neighborhood the other night with my parents.

The 2019 film, starring Tom Hanks, tells the story of a jaded, cynical journalist named Lloyd Vogel, who is assigned to write a profile of Mr. Rogers. Over the course of the film, Rogers helps Lloyd confront some of his own personal wounds, particularly his complicated relationship with his father.

What stayed with me the most was the way Mr. Rogers was with Lloyd. As I watched, I found myself thinking: Mr. Rogers feels like an artistic ancestor to Witness Theater Lab.

He was extremely intentional about noticing Lloyd simply because Lloyd was there. In fact, he seemed to treat every human being as inherently worthy of care and attention. One of my favorite moments in the movie comes when Rogers and Vogel are talking on the phone. Rogers tells him, “Do you know what the most important thing in the world is to me right now?... Talking on the phone to Lloyd Vogel.” So sweet! He wasn’t simply “nice” to Lloyd. He was attentive. And he didn’t rush to fix Lloyd’s anger, grief, or distrust. He didn’t hurry him toward forgiveness or try to force any outcome. He wasn’t even concerned about what Lloyd would write about him, even though he was familiar with his edgy reputation. He just stayed present, soft, patient, and wholly hospitable towards him.

There is a phrase from my own theatrical vocabulary that kept coming to mind as I watched him: a big target. A big target is someone who can receive another person’s story as a soft and permeable listener—someone willing to be affected, to learn something, to receive with an open, trustworthy posture and not react in a way that would break their sense of safety.

Mr. Rogers also knew the power of prayer. He was an intercessor. That reminded me of Jim Young, the founder of Wheaton College’s Arena Theater Workout. I heard stories about how Jim would walk the same route every day, assigning specific people or families to each house he passed. Whenever he passed that house, he would pray for them.

I loved hearing about how Jim interacted with his students and how he cared about their families and all the little things that mattered to them. He made people feel special by giving them nicknames and remembering specific things he had learned about them. He checked in on those going through something emotionally difficult. He sent care packages to those who were sick. I want to be that kind of leader and friend (and neighbor ;)). How good it is to make people feel seen and valued.

Fred Rogers and Jim Young lived their lives believing that ordinary stories are worthy of attention, and they didn’t shy away from the difficult things we all encounter—fear, grief, loneliness, anger, death, and change. And although they were both deeply grounded in their Christian faith, they didn’t set out simply to produce explicitly Christian content. They understood the power of art and storytelling to shape people and, ultimately, to affect culture. Yet for both of them, shaping culture began with the mindset that there was always a particular person in front of them. Mr. Rogers always looked into the camera as if he was making eye contact with a particular child with a particular story. He loved humanity through his creativity. He, like Jim, loved people by receiving them, caring for them, remembering them, and acknowledging them like Jesus would.

And because of that, I wanted to share an exercise (which began in a space created by Jim Young) that feels, to me, very much in the spirit of Fred Rogers.

It’s called “And Then She Said.”

Set up two chairs facing the group seated on the floor. One person stands and puts a hand out to invite another person to join them, has them sit down, and says, “And then [name] said…” Then they tell the group something that person once said that stayed with them. Maybe it was funny. Maybe it was profound. Maybe it was something the person themselves has completely forgotten saying.

Then they usually get up, hug one another, and sit back down. And someone else chooses another person.

This exercise says: I heard you. I remember you. Something you said mattered to me. You didn’t have to do anything sensational for me to see you and love you.

That’s it! I’m excited to build our little neighborhood where we learn to pay attention to one another's stories, to receive them, and to carry them with us.