promises, promises

We all make promises, don't we? "All" is extreme. Let's say that many of us have made a promise or two at some time or another. In some Christian traditions, we make a promise of faithfulness as infants. The promises are made on our behalf since even in that tradition it is acknowledged that a newborn, an infant, or a toddler is incapable of making any sort of valid promise. When I became an Episcopalian, arising from the birth of my third child ("just bring the baby; we'll baptize it"), I came enamored of a bit of wiggle room in the Rite of Baptism. The presider, such as a priest, asks the baby a series of questions as part of the baptismal covenant, the agreement that incorporates a series of faith-related promises. The congregation answers for the child, saying: "I will, with God's help." Granted, many readers will find the whole enactment surreal, even Monty Python-ish. For others, they proceed with a voluntary dollop of suspended disbelief. (Did you know the phrase comes from Samuel Taylor Coleridge, he of The Rime of the Ancient Mariner? He was writing in 1817, advocating for fantastic elements in poetry: "willing suspension of disbelief.") As for our congregants making promises for a child, we might describe their surrogate promises as willing affirmations of belief in an aura of suspended disbelief. Something like that. "I will, with God's help." To me, the vow was refreshingly human. Maybe I'm the only one who heard it this way, but I felt it served as an asterisk that pleaded: "I will, but God, help me, because this is a tall order; I may not be able to keep this vow; in fact, on my own I know I can't. So help me out."

Promises.

The most notable and common promises are the ones that people make when they get married. Traditional marriage vows in Western societies tend to be just that: vows. Promises. We publicly promise to love and cherish each other, whether rich or poor, sick or well, "till death do us part." Civil ceremonies are light on promises and heavy on legal practicality declaring that each party is not still married to someone else and is free to marry.

The divorce rate serves as its own comment regarding marital promises. As time goes on, some of us revisit, revise, or reconsider those promises in the light of living history. The broken promises spectrum can run from violence and abuse to unfaithfulness to mental illness to simple incompatibility. A skeptic or a critic might say a promise is a promise; breaking it comes from making an excuse. Being twice divorced, I recuse myself from further comment. No judgment here.

But you have to wonder: Does a promise carry any weight in this day and age? Has the notion of a promise lost all gravitas?

We assume that politicians of all stripes break their promises. We accept it as a given.

"I promise I'll call you or text you when I get there." Do you believe it?

"I promise I'll be on time." Depending on personal history and personality, you recalculate. I, for one, tend to run late. It's another topic for another time. I'm working on it. I've explored the reasons for it. I'm getting better about it, or think I am. Other people are the judge of that. Knowing this about myself, I don't promise on-time-ness without some seriousness. I don't want to erode the fragile credibility I have, if any, in this arena.

"I'll call you or text you. I promise."

After a first date, any promise from either party is fraught with doubt and healthy skepticism. If "promise" is invoked, it becomes a test.

Promissory notes legally bind one to a promise. You have no choice but to keep the promise, or else you face unavoidable consequences.

"I promise I'll pay you back on Tuesday."

"The check is in the mail. I promise."

"I promise you, this won't hurt."

"I promise not to . . . "

"On my way." "OMW." Please. That's a promise to promise to promise to walk out the door, maybe, sort of, pretty soon.

The etymology of the word "promise" offers some wiggle room of its own. If you go back deeply enough to its Latin origins, to its neuter past participle and beyond, the word, more or less, means: to release, let go, send, or throw in front of or before. 

See? Even the word "promise" throws some doubt on its own fulfillment or expectation. It lets go and releases even as it binds.

And yet I can't promise you this isn't a richly embroidered rationalization.