54 pages • 1-hour read
How We Learn to Be Brave: Decisive Moments in Life and Faith
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Themes
Bravery as a Historical Throughline
Throughout How We Learn to Be Brave, Budde relies heavily on examples of bravery from her life, the Bible, and history. In doing so, she frames courage as a historical throughline connecting any individual’s life in the present day to traditions stretching back to antiquity. As a religious official, the Bible plays a heavy role in her cultivation of courageous examples, ranging from Abraham in the Old Testament, to the Apostles of the New Testament, to Jesus Christ himself. Budde works to illustrate the influence that these ancient examples have in a modern world, writing, “The Bible tells stories of imperfect human beings and their encounters with God through sweeps of history that are as messy as our own time. As each generation reads the ancient texts through a new lens, they reveal fresh insights that provide meaning, challenge, consolation, and guidance” (123). Budde applies these ancient, biblical examples of bravery, pushing through difficulties, and learning from failure to a modern context, illustrating the lasting impact of faith-based examples on both Budde herself and her readers.
The historical analysis present within How We Learn to Be Brave adds nuance and complexity to the text, as Budde looks outside both herself and her religion to further illustrate her claims. Since Budde begins the text with an example centered around the Black Lives Matter protest movement, she threads through numerous examples from the civil rights movement. Budde honors both the current movement and the historical movement with her careful and empathetic depiction of key figures who contributed greatly to the movements’ successes, including judicial officials and scholars like Thurgood Marshall and Dr. Pauli Murray, church officials like Dr. Kelly Brown Douglas and Bishop Michael Curry, and advocates like Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. and Jonathan Daniels. Budde’s historical analysis both lends credence to her authority and knowledge on the subject of bravery and adds texture to her argument, enriching the book’s discussion of bravery, faith, and perseverance. In almost every chapter of the text, she offers an example of someone who either strived or continues to strive for racial justice. These examples are significant to Budde because, as she states, she is “captivated by the struggle for racial justice and civil rights in this country […] because the historical narrative ties together so many of those courageous moments, as individuals make possible what has long seemed beyond reach and inspire future generations to carry forward the dream” (128). The civil rights movement serves as an example of the importance of continued bravery. Budde herself is influenced by the bravery of civil rights advocates, and she carries this bravery forward in her own life and in her guidance of others.
This inspiration also influences Budde to share her own moments of bravery through personal narrative and examples. She candidly shares her own struggles with academics, illustrating that even though she earned her doctorate, it did not come easily, and neither did the perseverance necessary for her to finish her educational journey. She writes, “Some people have a natural gift for perseverance. I know for certain that I do not, because I’ve had to learn it. As a child, I would watch my peers do what seemed to come easily to them, and when I couldn’t do the same, I quit trying” (162). Budde is honest about her own shortcomings and about the steps she has taken to grow. Despite lacking an inherent gift for perseverance, she cultivates the necessary skills to persevere and then guides her readers to do the same. She does not preach from a place of superiority, instead using her own moments of struggle and failure as teachable examples for her readers, just as she uses the biblical and historical examples throughout the text.
The Courage to Accept What Cannot Be Controlled
Though she devotes much of the book to a discussion of the pivotal choices through which people shape their own destinies, Budde also notes that much of what happens in our lives is beyond our control: “There are forces in life and in our world that stall and prevent forward movement, failures from which we cannot recover, and circumstances beyond our control and beyond our power to change that call for a different order of courage, its own new start” (70). Budde frames these uncontrollable circumstances as a categorically different kind of challenge, calling for “a different order of courage.” In addressing these challenges, she draws heavily on lessons from religion.
Acceptance is a key component of courage, and Budde argues that accepting what one cannot change is among the bravest things a person can do, as it
involves a leap of faith that God is present and at work in ways that we cannot comprehend. […] This kind of acceptance is not passive or fatalistic, but rather a courageous choice at a decisive moment to embrace the places we are broken as an integral part of a courageous life (103).
Budde directly connects ideas of courage and faith, as practicing faith in God requires courage to let go of control, even in times of great difficulty or suffering. Accepting what one cannot control opens the door to faith-based bravery, something that Budde highlights as an example of God’s “sheer grace,” which gives life meaning even when people feel “least worthy of it” (123). Faith is what allows people to continue forward even when they feel uncertain of where God is leading them.
Budde goes on to connect the difficulties of life to the example of Jesus’ disciples and their perseverance through moments of immense difficulty, writing, “Like Jesus’ first disciples, we’re bound to feel discouraged, and perseverance is what enables us to keep going until we find our footing again, so that we might connect to our heart energy and draw strength from it” (174). Budde encourages people to lean on their faith when they feel discouraged in their lives until they can reconnect with their courage and purpose. Faith is the bridge between moments of challenge and the act of cultivating bravery, a place that offers both solace and opportunities for growth.
The Impact of Leadership in Cultivating Courage
As a leader in the Episcopal Church, Budde carries an immense responsibility to guide her parishioners in faith and in courage. Budde draws on her personal narrative to show the importance of leadership. While living in Colorado as a teenager, she struggled with church leadership at the evangelical church that she attended. She found the church’s doctrine excessively authoritarian, with undue emphasis on what church leadership viewed as correct or incorrect expressions of faith.
This experience caused her to question her faith, and she includes rhetorical questions about faith and leadership in the text: “What convinces any of us to stay within our faith tradition when new insights and personal maturation cause us to question what we had once accepted as true, or when spiritual leaders or entire communities fail us?” (31). Budde felt let down by her church leadership in Colorado, who did not understand her spiritual needs nor help her cultivate the courage to dive deeper into her own life and faith. In her own journey into church leadership, Budde aimed never to let down her congregations in the same way, but she often confronted obstacles in the form of higher-ranking leaders and structural problems. Her first role was as assistant rector under a rector who treated her poorly. Her second role was as rector at a church that she had idealized in her mind, but when she assumed the role, she realized that it was not what she thought: “My leadership would not be defined by the bold, prophetic ministry I had imagined, but rather the largely invisible task of tending to a small and struggling institution” (164). Budde found the courage to lead in a different way and to burdens without the public applause she had initially hoped for. Budde uses this episode to explain how she learned a new way of thinking about leadership—recognizing that leadership means providing stability and support as well as shaping ideas.
As much as she criticizes ineffective leaders, Budde lauds positive examples of leadership throughout her book, highlighting church and community leaders who give her hope and inspire her to continue to cultivate the courage necessary to lead effectively. One such example is Bishop Michael Curry, who delivered a homily during Meghan Markle and Prince Harry’s wedding about joining together to make a better world. Budde notes, “As he spoke, we all wanted that kind of world, and to be the kind of people to usher that world into being. That’s Bishop Curry’s gift” (113). Similarly, she cites civil rights leaders including Martin Luther King, Jr., as examples of the kind of inspirational leadership that churches and communities need. Like Jesus, King upheld his duty as a leader even when he knew that it was likely to cost him his life. As a result, his courage galvanized the movement even long after his death. Budde is critical of her own ability to preach and craft meaningful homilies, noting that she always feels as though her homilies are somewhat incomplete, but she uses Curry as a positive example of how good leaders inspire courage in their followers. She praises Curry’s ability to draw his audience into community with one another and to encourage them to make the brave choice to build a world based on love and mercy.
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