Godly Play Lecture Sheffield Cathedral May 13 th 2017

COME DANCE WITH ME –How might the world of dancing address the theory, theology and practice of Godly Play?

Peter Privett.

Come dance with me.

Why! I’m shy I’m British I’m reserved and I can’t dance..

Come dance with me.

I won’t dance. Don’t ask me. My heart won’t let my feet do the things that they should do.

{Oscar Hammerstein and Jerome Kern 1935) Come dance with me.

The invitation comes from a C14th Persian, a celebrated poet, (Ca 1320 – 1389) a contemporary with Geoffrey Chaucer.He was born Shams-ud-din Muhammmad in Shiraz and spent most of his life in this city in the south of Persia He chose the name Hafiz (memorizer) when he became a poet.The youngest of three sons, his father died when Hafiz was in his teens.He worked as a baker’s assistant by day and attended school during the evenings using part of his salary for the tuition.His teacher was Muhammed Attar a poet who wrote about the harmony of life and the processes of love.Hafiz was encouraged to write a poem each day, to collect them and study them as a process of spiritual unfolding.Before long his skills were noticed and he was appointed court poet. Over his lifetime people from every walk of life sang his poems.

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Hafiz was a disciple of Sufism and during periods of fanatical fundamentalism the Sufi connections went underground. As a result symbolic language became important during these times of extreme orthodoxy.Images of wine and the tavern came to represent love and the Sufi school.Spiritual students were depicted as clowns, beggars, scoundrels, rogues, courtesans, or intoxicated wayfarers.Hafiz is sometimes called the Tongue of the Invisible, as many of his poems explore the themes God love to a beloved world. So here in C21st Sheffield Hafiz, (using rhythms of the ghazel - a popular love song) offers us this incredible seductive invitation from C14th century Persia:

Every child has known God, Not the God of names, Not the God of don’ts,

Not the God who ever does anything weird But the God who only knows four words

And keeps repeating them, saying:“Come Dance with Me.

I am happy before I have a reason.I am full of light even before the sky

Can greet the sun or the moon.Dear companions,

We have been in love with God For so very, very long.

What can Hafiz now do but Forever Dance!

(Daniel Ladinsky translator: 1999: The Gift - Poems by Hafiz: Penguin Compass Daniel Ladinsky translator: 1996, 2006: I heard God Laughing –Poems of Hope and Joy: Penguin)

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So I invite you to this dance of divine love and to wonder what on earth this has to do with the theory, theology and practice of Godly Play.Dance, of all the art forms, is the one that is the most fleeting the most ephemeral. the most transitory because it operates in time and space. Unlike a painting it lasts for only that amount time that it takes for the movement to happen and then it is gone.It calls us to live in this moment. Perhaps of all the art forms it is the one that reminds us of our ‘temporayness’ (if there is such a word) of our own mortality. This was a conversation I had with Bill, who was talking about his ballroom and Latin dancing lessons he’s having wife his wife, as I was photocopying the handouts for this lecture.So Come Dance With Me is an invitation to cross the threshold into the world of dancers to see if their story their wondering, their response, their feasting has any wisdom for us. In what ways might these dancers bless us?

At one point at our last lecture and conference in Putney, Jerome Berryman reminded us that much of the time our work with children and their spirituality is often ignored and held in low regard. We often work on the margins and the edges of the church.So perhaps the clowns, rogues, scoundrels, beggars and intoxicated wayfarers of Hafiz might be our dancing companions this morning.

Stewart Headlam (1847- 1924) was a controversial Church of England priest working in many of the poorest parts of London and was constantly dismissed by the Bishop of London for preaching, Christian Socialism. Headlam was never given a parish and spent all his life championing the poor, campaigning for education, housing and political reform. It didn’t help his ecclesiastical career when he contributed a large sum of money to cover Oscar Wilde’s bail. For him it was a matter of artistic freedom and when Wilde came out of prison, Headlam was there at 6 o clock in the morning with offers of hospitality before Wilde left for the continent.A large part of his ministry was with the dancers and actors of the music halls and at the radical Commonwealth Club he gave a lecture defending

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actors dancers and music halls, which inflamed his opponents and led to his dismissal by the Bishop He wrote a book about ballet techniques and proclaimed that liturgy should not be deprived of dancing. Dancing was sacramental:“To take the illustration from the art of dancing, which perhaps more than all other arts is an outward and invisible sign of an inward invisible grace,ordained by the Word of God Himself, as a means whereby we receive the same and a pledge to assure us thereof: and which has suffered even more than the other arts from the utter anti sacramentalism of British philistines.Your Manichean Protestant and your superfine rationalist reject the dance as worldly frivolous sensual and so forth; and your dull stupid sensualist sees legs and grunts with some satisfaction:but your sacramentalist knows something worth more than both of these. He knows what the dancer perhaps herself may be partially unconscious of, that we live now by faith and not by sight, and that the poetry of the dancer is the expression of unseen spiritual grace.”He then quotes the poet T Gordon Hake and his poem Maiden Ecstasy:“ She all her being flings into the danceNone dare interpret all her limbs express.”He then concludesThese are the words of a true sacramentalist(Steward Headlam Church Reformer October 1884 issue)(See also Frank Kermode: 2015: Puzzles and Epiphanies Routledge Revivals: essays and reviews 1958-1961: Routledge)

Headlam raises many issues in this quote, but perhaps two might be of interest to us now as we think about children and their spirituality and the theory and practice of Godly Play 1.The strong criticism of the “Manichean Protestant” and the “superfine rationalist” identifies the age-old arguments about mind over matter, body verses spirit. There is a strong Christian tradition that has negative attitudes towards flesh with a rigid split between body and spirit. Spirit is perceived as virtuous, a higher nature, whilst things of the body are

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profane, secular. Therefore the embodied nature of dance must belong to the lower nature and to the realms of vice and depravity.

Doug Adams (1945 -2007) a professor of Christianity and the Arts, has written extensively on dance and liturgy. He comments and reflects on the connections between dance, sacraments and worship and that this reminds us of the ‘bodily base of all life’ The dancing and eating in worship makes us aware of our material nature and hence our solidarity with and commitment to the world. By recognising our dependence upon matter, common matter including people, we realise our solidarity with its fate and our commitment to its preservation. By recognising our own dependence, we see similar dependence of others and our communion with them.(Doug Adams: Communal Dance Forms and Consequences in: Doug Adams and Diane Apostolos-Cappadona editors: 1993, 2001: Dance as Religious Studies: Wipf and Stock publishers)Godly Play’s really supports the positive use of the body with its emphasis on the importance of body language and gesture, of observing and reading the whole of the child’s body as they interact with the Godly Play process We are often pleased when children verbally express wonderful ‘spiritual’ thoughts or express some deep insight but: How do we give affirmation to the child who says nothing? How do we affirm the bodily presence of the children? 2.Headlam’s comments about the fact that the dancer might be unconscious of the implications of her dance and the “None dare interpret all her limbs express”, raises the difficulties and complications of being openly aware and sensitive to what occurs in our Godly Play sessions and of being tentative and cautious to make quick conclusions and interpret the event.Headlam reminds us that a sacramental approach lives with the mystery and ambiguity of the event. We reside on the threshold of known unknowing.So when do we make judgements about children and their spiritual lives? When and how do we speak and interpret?

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When and how are we silent? How do we express the truth of spirituality and keep the integrity of mystery and unknowing?How do we distinguish between our interpretation and the real experience of the child?

In the early church during C 2nd 3rd 4th there is a real ambiguity of feeling towards dance. On the one hand it is linked with drunkenness and immorality and on the other it is the work of angels. The numerous references in the writings of the early church fathers to the dangers and frivolity of dancing and their condemnation of dance suggests that people carried on dancing despite preaching and pronouncement against it. Indeed, it would have been very difficult for the early Church to turn against dance with any hope of success, since this was an integral part of private and public ceremonies and feasts. Margaret Fisk Taylor, (1908 -2004) a pioneer in the field of sacred dance, identifies numerous positive references to dance in the early church. (see Margaret Taylor : A History of Symbolic Movement in Worship: in Doug Adams and Diane Apostolos-Cappadona editors: 1993 2001 : Dance as Religious Studies: Wipf and Stock publishers)

The Greek word ‘choros’ involved not just singing but also dancing. The Greeks believed that dancing was the art that most influenced the soul and was the means of expressing that which cannot be expressed with words. Clement of Alexandria says the chorus was a worthy form for religious feeling.“Those who have not been initiated in the mysteries or have no taste for dance and song were “dissonant, un rhythmical and material.” Gregory of Nyssa had an inclusive, universal view of human salvation. ‘No human being will remain outside the number to be saved….. no being created by God will fall outside the kingdom of God’

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His commentary on Psalm 50 gives us a vision of humanity in harmony, which is active in the dancing. Jesus the choreographer inspires and leads dancers both on earth and in the church.Once there was a time when the whole rational creation formed a single dancing chorus looking upward to the one leader of this dance. And the harmony of motion that was imparted to them by reason of his law found its way into their dancing(St Gregory’s commentary on Psalm 50)His contemporary, Gregory Nazianzus extolled its use in worship. David dancing before the ark (2 Samuel 6:14) was a sign of intense joy. ‘By the rhythmic motions of his body he thus showed in public his inner state of soul.”Gregory Nazianzus advised the emperor Julian, who had reintroduced pagan dances, to take David’s example instead.“Dance to the honour of God. Such exercises of peace and piety are worthy of an emperor and a Christian.”

Gregory of Nyssa’s image of the dancing Christ has inspired the building of a modern church in one of the poorer parts of San Francisco, which I had the privilege of visiting a few years ago. The artist Mark Dukes, with the people of St. Gregory’s, has created a wonderful icon that wraps around the inside walls of the church surrounding the altar showing ninety larger-than life saints, four animals, stars, moons, suns and a twelve- foot tall dancing Christ.The saints range from traditional figures like King David, Teresa of Avila and Frances of Assisi to people like Gandhi, Anne Frank, and Margaret Mead. They represent musicians, artists, mathematicians, martyrs, scholars, mystics, lovers, prophets and sinners from all times, from many faiths and backgrounds.A key part of the worship, whilst I was there, took place during the offertory. We danced a simple processional line dance made up of about 60 – 70 children, women, men and a dog, moving from one part of the building to circle the altar for the Eucharistic prayer. As we danced around the altar, Christ and the saints danced above us, with us and around us. It was an embodied proclamation of St Gregory’s theology.

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Richard Fabian the co-founder of St Gregory’s writes:All humanity shares God’s image, and shows it to the universe, so all people can move toward God together. This universal view made Gregory an extraordinary theologian in his day and draws fresh interest today, as people of many world faiths find more and more they share.For an icon portraying St. Gregory’s vision, the dancers must be diverse, and exemplify traits that Gregory’s teaching emphasizes and our congregation’s life upholds…..Christian or not, these saints each show us some of God’s image, as Christ makes that image fully plain to us. Our list includes people who crossed boundaries in ways that unified humanity, often at their own cost. Some proved lifelong models of virtue; others changed direction dramatically from evil to good, even near the end of life. Some were on the frontier of Christian thought and living, and had gifts that were unrecognized or disparaged in their time; yet their gifts matter for what we do today. Others have been long revered throughout the world’s churches. Some overcame difficult circumstances; others moved toward God despite the distractions of worldly comfort and power. Musicians, artists, writers, poets, dancers, workers, organizers, missionaries, martyrs, spiritual teachers, protesters, prophets, reformers, judges, builders, liberators, scholars, healers, soldiers, monastics, couples straight and gay, diplomats, planners, governors, and wild and domestic beasts. Christian, Jew, Muslim, Confucian, Buddhist, Hindu, Shinto, Pagan; of many continents, races, classes and eras. These saints lead us in our dancing, as all look upward to Jesus, the perfecter of human faith, drawing new harmony from his example as Gregory teaches us to do.(St Gregory Nyssa Church San Francisco website)

The early Byzantine church dances seem to be similar to the one I danced in San Francisco, a simple ring or circle dance that included large numbers of people which were often performed at festivals such as Easter and Christmas and the feast days of martyrs and saints.Ambrose tried to clarify and spiritualise the values and dangers of dancing.‘The Lord bids us dance, not merely with the circling movements of the body, but with pious faith in him”

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John Chrysostom also used David as the example but cautioned against unseemly movements like those of the pagan dances. Christians should keep their dances sacred as God has given them feet so that they dance like the angelsGeorge Robert Mead (1863 – 1933) was a historian, writer and scholar of ancient Gnostic manuscripts.In 1926 he wrote three articles on the topic of the circle dance recounted in the ancient manuscript of the Acts of St John probably dating to C2nd. (See Mead, G.R.S. "The Sacred Dance of Jesus." The Quest II 1926: 1-67.)

Mentioned by several C4th church fathers in lists of apocryphal texts, this ancient Christian text only now survives in fragments. The Acts of John has strong connections with the fourth gospel and is a mixture of narrative, sermon and liturgical practice. It includes a hymn; The Circle Dance of the Cross. This hymn has a dancing Jesus surrounded by his dancing disciples on the night before the crucifixion. (See appendix for full text.)The hymn begins with a doxology Christ then pronounces eight statements about himself to which his disciples respond with AMEN.The next part suggests that Christ is grace dancing in the circle and it then follows with other statements based on scripture.I will pipe dance all of you AMENI will mourn Beat you all your breasts AMENThere are mysterious reference to the cosmos dancing:The One Ogdoad sings praises with us AMEN (Ogdoad - eight mythical deities)The twelve number dance on high AMEN (The twelve signs of the zodiac)To the All it belongs to dance in the height AMENHe who does not dance does not know what happens

The final statement indicates that in dancing some knowledge is attained.To dance is to know and in order to know you must dance. After this there are explanatory chapters that describe the arrest of Jesus and recounts the vision of the cross, which is a vision of light. A great

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crowd encircles the cross and Christ is above the cross. Christ explains that for the sake of human kind the cross is called many names – Christ Logos Grace. The Cross makes all things stable and firmly fixed. The suffering of Christ is and will be the suffering of the disciples. A final statement declares that by dancing, in some way this reveals the mysteries of Christ’s suffering.

Dancing is seen as a means of meditation, of connection. Dancing is the process whereby the mystery of the cross is experienced.(See Melody Gabrielle Beard –Shouse 2010:The Circle Dance of the Cross in the Acts of John An early Christian Ritual: MA thesis submitted to University of Kansashttps://kuscholarworks.ku.edu/.../BeardShouse_ku_0099M_10717_DATA_1. pdf?...)

The Acts of John remained outside the canon of orthodoxy and some would put it into the realms of heresy The C2nd author of the hymn of the circle dance of Jesus stands in company with this voice.

I did not think the churches would like it at all.   I thought many people would find it pretty far flown, probably heretical and anyway dubiously Christian.  But in fact people did sing it and, unknown to me, it touched a chord. . . . Anyway, it’s the sort of Christianity I believe in.

This is Sidney Carter commenting on his hymn The Lord of Dance.

I see Christ as the incarnation of the piper who is calling us.  He dances that shape and pattern which is at the heart of our reality.  By Christ I mean not only Jesus; in other times and places, other planets, there may be other Lords of the Dance.  But Jesus is the one I know of first and best. I sing of the dancing pattern in the life and words of Jesus.

I’ll live in you if you’ll live in me I am the Lord of the Dance said he.

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The theme of dance as corporate, participatory and congregational seems to be key. The circle is importantThe dances are expressions of joy and celebration and adoration in movement. Movement rather than words is the language.Dance is a reflection of the heavenly cosmic realm. The dance on earth is the same as that of the angels in heaven.

In Godly Play we sometimes put stories alongside one another, to let them speak to each other, to let the connections dance alongside.

So I wonder what dances of connection we see as we put these dances of the C4th alongside our C21st dances of Godly Play?

The continuing growth of the church as a large authoritarian institution, with a more legalistic outlook to the regulation of liturgy began to create a growing gulf between the ecclesiastical professional and the lay person.Formal choirs began to take over the sung parts of the mass and dance if it happened in church it tended to become about performance rather than active participation.There are examples of monastic orders dancing In the C12th and C13th. Cistercian monks danced for the salvation of the universe and Franciscan monks sang and danced calling themselves the ‘singing servants of Christ.’ In the C16th Teresa of Avila danced with holy joy. Ordinary folk obviously danced in their villages at festivals, carnivals and key life moments but liturgical dancing if it happened gradually became the activity of an exclusive, often clerical group.

Records and accounts from C14th France describes playful dances and rituals performed by the dean and canons of cathedrals in the labyrinths of Auxerre and Sens. It is also presumed that nearby Chartres also had similar rituals, though we don’t have any written records.The decrees and petitions either allowed or forbade such rituals.

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In 1413, a petition from the lesser clergy to the canons of Sens, requested that on Easter Sunday, “according to custom...they be allowed to ...play freely the game on the labyrinth during the ceremony.”This was rather like an Easter carol dance, which took part in the cloister on Easter eve.The archbishop assisted by the clergy, moved around first two by two and then danced from the cloister into the church around the choir and into the nave. (See Margaret Fisk Taylor: a history of Symbolic movement.)In nearby Auxerre the canons and chaplains of the cathedral would gather around the labyrinth early in the afternoon every Easter Sunday. They danced a ring-dance while singing an Easter hymn. The account describes the Dean standing in the centre of the labyrinth throwing a leather ball back and forwards to the clergy as they danced around the outside. As the ball was passed backward and forward all the dancers spun around on his own axis. This was thought to illustrate the cosmic dance of the Sun with other heavenly bodies, a symbol of the resurrected Christ dancing with the universe. Afterwards dancers, other clergy and local dignitaries gathered in the chapter house for a feast and sermons. The details are logged in late C15th and early C16th legal documents attempting to outlaw the practice as unsuitable for a Christian place of worship. Despite early success in upholding the tradition, it was eventually stopped in 1538. Similarly, the ceremony at Sens continued until 1517, when it was also outlawed, although by that time the dance was no longer held on the labyrinth.I now have a rather subversive wondering going through my head at the moment. What would it be like if our all our UK cathedral Deans and canons, even those of this cathedral here in Sheffield in the C21st met together to engage in similar physically, playful, spinning, cosmic mysterious dancing! What would happen?Perhaps they do! Right here where we are sitting!Perhaps they do it after the lights have gone out when we’ve gone home!Um! Perhaps we should dance on!

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In C7th Spain at the Council of `Toledo, Isidore, the Archbishop of Seville, was commissioned to present a ritual that would be rich in scared choreography. This ritual became incorporated into a mass known as Mozarabe. (The word comes from being influenced by Arab culture and refers to the Christians living under Islamic rule in Andalusia). This liturgy which included dances of los mozos de core - the choristers, appears in a C15th account which describes how six boy choristers, los seises, who are dressed as angels, (I’m not sure whether this is metaphorical or literal) dance before the altar. Some would place this tradition well into Spanish folklore where there is a story that is set in the time when the Moors were attacking Toledo. As a diversion, young boys were commanded by the priests to dance before the altar playing castanets as a means of delaying the attack. Meanwhile this allowed the priests to hide the treasures of the church.The dance of los seises continued regularly until the end of C17th when the Archbishop of Seville tried to stop their performance. The people of Seville and the cathedral chapter, standing out for their privileges, were so outraged at this decision that they raised money to transport ten choristers to Rome to dance before the Pope. (By this time the numbers of los seise had increased from six) After the performance of the dance with the accompaniment of clicking castanets the pope was reported saying“I see nothing in this children’s dance which is offensive to God.”However, it took seventeen years before the judgment was finally pronounced. The dance might continue as long as the boys' clothes lasted, when they wore out, then the dance must cease. Unsurprisingly, the costumes never wore out as they were repaired again and again but never all at once. The dance is still performed today in Seville cathedral at various major festivals, the feast of Corpus Christi, and the feast of the Immaculate Conception.The boys are dressed like C17th court pages, with red and yellow striped doublets and white knee-breeches. A white sash is worn over the right shoulder with a red and yellow tassel at the end. Red and yellow, are the Spanish colours, but these change to blue and gold, colours of Mary, for the feast of the Immaculate Conception. They carry plumed hats and hold

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ribboned castanets. Before the dance begins the boys enter, line up and kneel before the altar. Permission from the Chapter is given for the dance to begin. Hats are then put on and the dance begins accompanied by the boys playing their castanets. The dance has all the qualities of folk dance with lines meeting and retreating, circles etc. and is still performed today. If you Google you tube you can see contemporary examples at Seville CathedralEarly C17th documents of los seises show that the boys were fully educated and supported at church expense. The detailed accounts of their curriculum, provision for their daily support, their diet their spiritual and moral welfare show the amount of investment that the cathedral had in these children. Their contributions as child choristers and dancers were seen to enhance the worship and the reputation of the cathedral. Even after their voices changed the cathedral looked after them and found them employment either as future musicians, priests or administrators. (See Lynn Matluck Brooks: 1988: The Dances of the Procession of Seville in Spain’s Golden Age: Reichenberger)What examples do you have where children are seen as enhancing the life of the church?Where do you see signs of investment in children.

Havelock Ellis, (1859- 1939) the physician, essayist, and psychologist, was a pioneer in establishing a modern, scientific approach to the study of sex. Throughout his life, Ellis wanted to bring science & mysticism closer together. His major work and also his best-selling book, was The Dance of Life. (First published1923)(Havelock Ellis: 1973 The Dance of Life: Greenwood Press)

For Ellis the arts, and above all dance, were an important means of developing a sense of self identityDancing is the loftiest, the most moving, the most beautiful of the arts, because it is no mere translation or abstraction from life; it is life itself.

He reminds us that if today we might go to church to pray for the needs of individuals, to pray for rain, to pray for the return of health for friends and

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family, in the past our ancestors would have danced for them.

He would have loved the idea of C14th French clergy dancing on Easter Sunday as a mysterious reminder that the sun itself danced in celebration of the resurrection.To dance is to take place part in the cosmic control of the world. Every sacred dionyasian dance is an imitation of the divine dance.

Dance is seen as a divine act, for the very nature of the divine is dance and to dance is to be in communion. To dance is a means of grace and that grace, as Jerome Berryman reminds us, has connections with movements of smoothness, effortlessness and loveliness.

(See Havelock Ellis: The Dance of Life essays in Roger Copeland and Marshall Cohen editors : 1983: What is Dance:: Oxford University Press New York)(Jerome Berryman: 2009: Children and the Theologians Clearing the Way for Grace: Morehouse Publishing)

On Monday 27th February this year Richard Rohr in his daily meditations, develops this idea even further where he suggests that God is not the dancer but the dance itself. God is a dynamic verb rather than a static noun. God is constant flow.

Susanne Langer, (1895 –1985) was an American philosopher, writer, and educator and was recognized as the first women philosopher of the USA. There is a direct link from her to Godly Play. Howard Gardiner was highly influenced by her thinking, as was Jerome Berryman highly influenced by Howard Gardiner’s thinking and ideas.

She was well known for her theories on the influences of art on the mind. They are complex and intricate and to do them justice we would need a whole series of lectures. (See Susanne Langer: 1953: Feeling and Form: Charles Scribners Sons)

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We can only begin a small journey into her thinking this morning but some preliminary observations about dance is of particular interest as we look at the theory and practice of Godly Play.

To begin simply, compared to all the other art forms, music painting etc., dance is about gesture.She highlights two aspects when commenting on the nature of gesture. One is obvious.

1. For the dancer the communication system is kinetic. It is action.2. For the viewer it is about something else, sight and interpretation.

So both subjectivity and objectivity are involved, personal and public.When words fail us it is often our gestures that have the power to communicate and her thinking about the power of symbolic language is now part of our mainstream thinking.Langer also makes a distinction between actual gestures and what she calls virtual gestures.To take an example from our practice of Godly Play, the death of Sarah in the Great Family story, there is a distinction between the instructions that are written in the left column of a script, ‘Hold Sarah reverently in your open hand… etc.’ , and the reality of actually doing it. One is the actual gesture, the other is the virtual reality of the gestures, the doing of it that enables the mystery of the experience.

She suggests that dance, in one way, can be described as lot of people just jumping about, a description of the actual gestures, but virtual reality happens when those natural gestures are deliberately chosen to express, emotions ideas, tensions etc. Something mysterious happens in the action of the jumping.

Rebecca and I often joke about driving hundreds of miles to push wood across the floor and stroke felt. But during the course as we stroke felt and move these bits of wood about something happens that engenders laughter, tears, deep thoughts and real experiences. A virtual space is created.

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For Langer this space is just not a matter of consciousness but is created intentionally and exists materially. The material aspects that contribute to the quality of this virtual space are fundamental. This physical space is significant in itself and is not just part of the surroundings. The meaning making in this space is a combination and interrelation of dialogue, communication and conversation. It is a mysterious interchange between the community and the individual. It doesn’t just rely on logic but sensory aspects are key.

So in Godly Play terms how much attention do we give to the emotional space in which Godly Play happens? Do we, like Montessori, see the actual environment as a teacher, crucial in the process of meaning making ? What are the unspoken lessons? How does it feel in a Godly Play space? What is the quality of discourse, the relational dance between community and individual?(See Susanne Langer: Virtual Powers extract from feeling and Formin Roger Copeland and Marshall Cohen editors: 1983 : What is Dance: Oxford University Press New York)

Along with Havelock Ellis and Richard Rohr primitive sacred dance is seen as a religious expression of the divine. The divine and the dance are inseparable. She uses the term ’The Powers’ to describe the in-dissolvable connection between divine and human life

The dance creates an image of nameless and even bodiless Powers filling a complete autonomous realm, a ‘world’. It is the first presentation of the world as a realm of mystic forces…Dance is in fact the most serious intellectual business of savage life: it is the envisagement of a world beyond the spot and the moment of one’s animal existence, the first conception of life as a whole – continuous, super personal life, punctuated by birth and death, surrounded and fed by the rest of nature.

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It is the very process of religious thinking, which begets the conception of Powers as it symbolizes them.(See Susanne Langer: The Magic Circle extract from Feeling and Formin Roger Copeland and Marshall Cohen editors: 1983 : What is Dance: Oxford University Press New York) With the secularization of society dance moves from the realm of the sacred into the realm of performance, into the world of active dancer and watching audience.When dance becomes a spectacle, a performance, then the universal power is broken.To create a virtual realm the dancer has to transform the stage for themselves and the audience. There is need now for intentional work to create a virtual realm where actions and motions enable space and time to disappear.Langer talks about the need for all the separate elements of dance, movement, gesture, story, music, light, colour etc. to merge and become one. The creation of illusion, not delusion is fundamentally important. The whole environment is to be radically transformative and the dancer is called to incarnate this experience. The task is to lose oneself in the process.But there is a danger here of delusion rather than illusion, of getting too lost or immersed in the experience so that the emotions take over and swamp the experience. Langer uses the image of a director saying to a dancer trying to express sadness… “Imagine what it would be like if your boyfriend dumped you.” This is very different to him saying just before the dance “Your boyfriend just told me that he hates you and doesn’t want to see you any more…”Instead of enabling the emotions and gestures the very opposite is likely to happen in that everything becomes about distraction. (Although we could get diverted here into a discussion about method acting with Marlon Brando and Daniel Day Lewis arguing the opposite)Langer says that it takes ‘precision of thought’ to separate imagined feelings represented by symbolic gestures from those experienced in response to real events. She understands that it is perhaps hardest for the

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dancer, the artist whose world of creativity is perhaps more real than the actual world.This for me this has a direct connection to those of us who LOVE Godly Play.We gush with statements about how it has changed our lives. “I just love those stories they mean so much to me.” “Godly Play has changed my life.” Langer warns me about getting too emotional. Of it being about what I need rather what children might need. I get can get so lost in the process that it becomes about my needs and emotions rather than being a process that supports and enhances the other person. Langer warns of the need for distance and boundaries

In the primitive past the experience of the divine Powers, the illusive world of virtual reality was created intuitively, but with the development of philosophical and scientific thought, that power is now broken, inevitably and properly. So in Godly Play story language, the second Creation Story, the falling apart: …we are no longer in the garden of togetherness, we cannot go back, all we can do is go forwards….

Langer invites us to go forwards, with precision of thought, now using our analytical processes to help us be aware of our artistic intent, motivation and the forces of illusion and delusion. The Montessori influence of Godly Play reminds us that we do things intentionally. Langer also calls us to examine those intentions carefully cautiously and sensitively.What is it that helps us create a virtual realm in Godly Play? What Powers are at Play? What is it that contributes to the artistic intent? What hinders this? What processes help to transform the stage where Godly Play transcends performance and spectator?

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How do we incarnate the experience? How much do I get in the wayYvonne Rainer, now in her late eighties (1934- ) is an experimental dancer, choreographer and film-maker whose work is sometimes classified as minimalist art. In an essay written in 1966 she explores the issue of how energy is used in dance.(See Yvonne Rainer: A Quasi Survey of Some Minimalist Tendencies in the Quantitatively Minimal Dance Activity Midst the Plethora, or an Analysis of Trio A) Don’t you just love that title!What makes one movement different to another? She distinguishes between real energy and apparent energy.She recalls her dance teacher making the comment that, ‘You can use too much energy… or ‘That movement doesn’t need so much energy.’

She highlights the economy of energy, especially seen in the dances of Martha Graham where rest and silence and stillness were as important as the movement. Martha Graham’s dances were less impulsive; the climaxes were further apart and not so dramatically framed.

Yvonne Rainer talks about her 1966 choreography for Trio A, often quoted as her most famous dance.No one part of the dance is thought to be more important than the other. The four and half minutes is about variety of equal weight, equal emphasis. Each movement is devised as a series of unhurried control. Each movement is geared to the actual weight of the body to go through the prescribed action.Dancers should not confront the audience with their eyes; the gaze is averted to subvert the idea of performance.Repetition of movement is there to serve discreteness of movement, to order it in an alternative way and literally make the material easier to see. So in our Godly Play practice, and I don’t just mean story telling,

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I mean the whole process: What movements contribute / what hinders? How do we know? How do we decide? How much do we give each part of the process equal weight? Do we really believe in unhurried control?

Isadora Duncan 1877-1927 was controversial in all aspects of her life, her dance forms challenged and defied the constricting convention of ballet and formal dance.Ballet was condemned as sterile because the movements were un-natural. She saw it is delusional as it works against the laws of gravity. Under the beautiful tutu muscles and bones were deformed. It is seen as a living death.‘A deformed skeleton is dancing before you’Her feminist outlook saw the ballet dancer on points as an idealized version of womanhood, and ballet condemns itself by enforcing the deformation of a woman’s body. (However when in Russia she couldn’t get enough of watching Anna Pavlova!)At the heart of her dancing was a return to the free movement of birds and animals, a removal of false restrictions that might enable this free movement. Movement must be in harmony with nature.She formed schools of dancing throughout the world with her students being known as ‘Isadorables’. Don’t you just love the name!The philosophy sounds remarkable similar to some of the things we might say that are important to the development of children’s, and in fact everyone’s, spiritual life.

I shall not teach the children to imitate my movements, but to make their own. I shall not force them to study certain definite movements; I shall help them to develop those movements which are natural to them. Whosever sees the movements of an untaught little child cannot deny that its movements are beautiful. They are beautiful because they are natural to the child. Even so the movements of the human body may be beautiful in every stage of development so long as they are in harmony with that

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stage and degree of maturity which the body has attained. There will always be movements which are the perfect expression of that individual body and that individual soul; so we must not force it to make movements which are not natural to it but which belong to a school. 19002/3(See - Isadora Duncan: The Dance of the Future: in : Roger Copeland and Marshall Cohen editors: 1983 : What is Dance : Oxford University Press New York)

For her it wasn’t just about dance. Dance for her raised questions of art, the politics of race and female identity, and of how we define health and beauty.

She of all our dancers provoked an opposing and intense reaction to her dancing, her ideas and life. Her private life was indeed chaotic but Rodin said that she was the greatest woman the world has ever known.Her critics were scathing and condemned her dancing as a mass stimulation of private fantasies. She and her followers might claim that they were enjoying a spiritual experience but in the end it was all a delusion. Her dancing ultimately was grossly self-indulgent.(See Rayner Heppenstall:1936: Apology for Dancing : in Roger Copeland and Marshall Cohen editors: 1983 : What is Dance: Oxford University Press New York)

Isadora her way of dancing and the comments of her critics stimulate me to wonder about our practice of Godly Play.What and who might deform a child’s spirit? What might it mean to work with nature against nature? How do we view mature spirituality? What might be delusional? In what ways are we grossly self - indulgent?What are the political dimensions of Godly Play? What might Godly Play have to say to our definitions of health and beauty?

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I said at the very beginning that Hafiz used the examples of scoundrels, rogues, clowns, vagabonds and drunkards as symbols of the world of the spirit. It is a reminder that each of us is an ambiguous, flawed and damaged character in some way and that the dance into perfection might after all, continue eternally.

The scoundrel roguish dancers remind me that we dance our Godly Play dance so often on the edge of the circle, on the margins of church life. The Powers do not recognize us but we dance anyway. How do we survive? How are these tired dancing bodies sustained? Blessed are you when men hate you, and when they exclude you and revile, and cast out your name as evil, on account of the Son of Man! Rejoice on that day and leap (actually the word is skirtao –to skip) for joy.– Luke 6:23So we skirtao dance skip for joy!!!!!!

Sometimes we whirl, dance and skip with King David, Sometimes with Miriam and her women Sometimes with the horrifying consequences of Jephthah’s daughter, who danced to her death (see Judges 11:29 onwards)

We circle dance with the company of the saints, the rogues who lived before us and inspired us, We carol with the company of scoundrels who sing with us and hold our bodies and spirits in movement and in rest.

We leap with the unborn John the Baptist who skipped in Elizabeth’s womb. (There’s that skirteo word again)

We swing and sway with and alongside the children of the market places of our lives who pipe and sing for us. Woe betides us if we refuse that invitation!

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In all and through all, in our lameness and our potency, The Lord of the Dance bounds and hobbles alongside us,Limping and Gamboling us into divinity.

So let Hafiz have the last wordsOnce In a while

God cuts loose His purse stringsGives a big wink to my orchestra.

Hafiz Does not requireAny more prompting than that

To let every instrument Go

Berserk

Out of a great needWe are all holding hands

And climbing.Not loving is a letting go.

Listen, the terrain around hereIs far too dangerous

for that

Peter Privett May 2017

Complete Text of the Hymn in Acts of John John ―... he assembled us all and said, ̳Before I am delivered to them, let us sing a hymn to the Father .... So he told us to form a circle, holding one another‘s hands, and himself stood in the middle and said, ̳Answer Amen to me.‘ So he began to sing a hymn and to say,‖Glory be to thee, Father, And we circled round him and answered him, ―Amen‖Glory be to thee, Logos: Glory be to thee, Grace. –Amen Glory be to thee, Spirit: Glory be to thee, Holy One: Glory be to thy Glory. -Amen We praise thee, Father: We thank thee, Light: In whom darkness dwelleth not. –AmenAnd why we give thanks, I tell you: I will be saved, and I will save. –Amen I will be loosed, and I will loose. –Amen I will be wounded, and I will wound. –Amen I will be born, and I will bear. –Amen I will eat, and I will be eaten. –Amen I will hear, and I will be heard. –Amen I will be thought, Being wholly thought.–Amen Iwill be washed, and I will wash. –Amen

Grace dances. I will pipe, Dance, all of you. – Amen. I will mourn, Beat you all your breasts –Amen. (The) one Ogdoad sings praises with us. –Amen The twelfth number dances on high. –Amen To the All it belongs to dance in the height (?) –Amen. He who does not dance does not know what happens. -Amen.

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I will flee, and I will remain. –Amen I will adorn, and I will be adorned. –Amen I will be united, and I will unite. –Amen I have no houses, and I have houses. –Amen I have no place, and I have places. –Amen I have no temple, and I have temples. –Amen I am a lamp to you (sing.), who see me. –Amen I am mirror to you who know me. –Amen I am a door to you (who) knock on me. –Amen I am way to you (the) traveler. –Amen

Now if you follow my dance, see yourself in me who am speaking, and when you have seen what I do, keep silent about my mysteries. You who dance, consider what I do, for yours is this passion of man which I am to suffer. For you could by no means have understood what you sufferunless to you as Logos I had been sent by the Father. You who saw what I do saw (me) as suffering, and seeing it you did not stay but where wholly moved. Being moved toward wisdom (?) you have me as a support; rest in me. Who I am, you shall know when I go forth.What I now am seem to be, that I am not; what I am you shall see when you come.If you knew how to suffer you would be able not to suffer. Learn how to suffer and you shall be able to not suffer. What you do not know I myself will teach you.I am your God, not (the God) of the traitor. I will that holy souls be made in harmony with me. Understand the word of wisdom! Say again to me, Glory be to thee, Father, Glory be to thee, Logos, Glory be to thee, Spirit, -Amen

(Schaferdiek, Knut. "Acts of John." In New Testament Apocrypha, ed. Wilhelm Schneemelcher, II, 152-209. Louisville, Kentucky: Westminister

AN ALMOST DANCER

Once, on a hill in Wales, one summer’s dayI almost danced for what I thought was joy.

An hour or more I’d lain there on my backWatching the clouds as I gazed dreaming up.

As I lay there I heard a skylark singA song so sweet it touched the edge of pain.

I dreamt my hair was one with all the leavesAnd that my legs sent shoots into the earth.

Laughing awake, I lay there in the sunAnd knew that there was nothing to be known.

Small wonder then that when I stood uprightI felt like dancing. Oh, I almost danced,

I almost danced for joy, I almost did.But some do not, and there’s an end of it.

One night no doubt I shall lie down for goodAnd when I do perhaps I’ll dance at last.

Meanwhile I keep this memory of that day

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I was an almost dancer, once, in Wales.

ROBERT NYE 2012 An Almost Dancer: Poems 2005-2011: Greenwich Exchange

HARES DANCING

Once, once I stoodBy a green woodAnd watched hares in the snow.Against the lightThey reared uprightAs they danced there to and fro.And the sun stood stillOn a silver hillAnd the wind forgot to blow.

Those hares ran wild.I was a childAnd tears ran down my faceTo see them danceAs in a tranceIn that white and holy place.And the dark night fell But I knew quite wellI was in a state of grace.

Long, long agoIt was, I knowAnd I have other cares.I lie and weep And cannot sleep As pain at my heart’s core tears.I will close my eyesAnd see no more liesBut dance with the dancing hares

ROBERT NYE 2004: The Rain and the Glass:Greenwich Exchange

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