Attention Liturgical Dancers

The front page of the December 30 Anchorage Daily News featured an article extolling the virtues of the hula hoop. Written by Debra McKinney, the article quotes hooper Megan Turner, “I feel like I finally have a tool and an art form I can use to fully express and challenge myself. It’s my meditation, my exercise and my play.” For those of you into liturgical dance, and those of you who can’t discern between Luther’s Meditatio and Eastern forms of “prayer,” this hoop’s for you. Imagine the possibilities. Nothing says “Gospel” like a well planned and expressive hoop move.

Turner uses her hula hoop “to do a little hooping and get herself centered” according to McKinney. Who knows? This might add to the expressive nature of the processional as liturgical dancers leap and hoopsters gyrate – all the while proudly demonstrating their freedom in Christ. Or, we could stick to our previous agreement:

…The Mass is held among us and celebrated with the highest reverence. Nearly all the usual ceremonies are also preserved, except that the parts sung in Latin are interspersed here and there with German hymns. These have been added to teach the people. For ceremonies are needed for this reason alone, that the uneducated be taught ‹what they need to know about Christ›. AC XXIV, 1-3

Some ceremonies and Church practices are neither commanded nor forbidden in God’s Word, but are introduced into the Church with good intention, for the sake of good order and proper custom, or otherwise to maintain Christian discipline. FC SD, X, 1

Likewise, when there are useless, foolish displays that are not profitable for good order, Christian discipline, or evangelical practice in the Church, these also are not genuine adiaphora, or matters of indifference. FC SD, X, 7

photo credit: Daquella manera