I Hope You Dance

Alison Faison • June 9, 2022

Hear the words of the song “I Hope You Dance” by Lee Ann Womack and Sons of the Desert.

I hope you never lose your sense of wonder, 
You get your fill to eat but always keep that hunger,
May you never take one single breath for granted,
God forbid love ever leave you empty handed,
I hope you still feel small when you stand beside the ocean,
Whenever one door closes I hope one more opens,
Promise me that you’ll give faith a fighting chance,
And when you get the choice to sit it out or dance.

I hope you dance… I hope you dance…

Toddlers, preschoolers, and elementary school children often have access to creative movement, dance, and theater classes. As children become teens, the academic and athletic demands on their weekly schedule can squeeze out time to express themselves through dance. This year, my daughter returned to in-person high school as a sophomore. She took the last required P.E. class in the form of a year-long yoga program. I was thrilled that she could learn sun salutations, practice resting poses, experience meditation, and teach poses with her peers. She took this time to exhale from the daily academic load and smoothly reenter a high school social life, one she had only experienced online as a freshman. Her exposure to yoga brought us closer as we could share our curiosity about yoga.

 

I have been teaching and practicing yoga in San Francisco for twenty-three years. When my daughter was young, she attended a few of the prenatal yoga, postnatal yoga, and general yoga classes that I taught in studios or on retreats. I taught one-off yoga classes for her preschool and elementary school friends and parents. She observed people doing self-care as they stretched and relaxed in calm environments. How does this relate to church or raising a family in the Christian faith? Taking time to honor your body, breath, and mind is prayer. We are made in God’s image, so caring for our earthly bodies is giving thanks to God. When we are sensitized to how we breathe, think, and move during the day, we can make better choices about using the energy we have.

 

Last Sunday, Andrea Polites and I danced for the Calvary Chancel Choir Spring Concert entitled “With a Spring in Your Step.” The program was a “highly-varied selection of dance-infused music from all over the world.”  When I found out that this concert would feature dance melodies, I asked if any pieces could be danced on the chancel. Michael Conley, Calvary Director of Music, replied that “A Glad New Song” by Gwyneth Walker would work as it was the “only piece on the program that isn’t about dance and rhythm or in the form of a dance.” Andrea, a long-time professional dancer and teacher, worked with me to choreograph the piece. We look forward to dancing it one more time this coming Sunday, June 12.

 

The special part about dancing on June 6 was that the concert fell on the Day of Pentecost. In the past, I danced at Calvary on Pentecost at the request of then Director of Music, Alden Gilchrist. Over the years, I choreographed solo pieces for the Bach “B Minor Mass: Gloria,” “i thank you god” by E.E. Cummings, and another New Orleans style medley. I wonder why many churches only feature dance on The Day of Pentecost? The Holy Spirit is with us every day and we are called to breathe and move. Why is liturgical dance usually performed only by one or two people and not modified for the congregation to move as they are able in the aisles? Dance is ancient and generated by community. I experienced much about group and solo dance/storytelling/art through the InterPlay Leadership Program founded by Cynthia Winton-Henry and Phil Porter. We connected deeply by witnessing each other’s stories, movements, and stillness. I have transferred that approach to the classroom, camp, and outdoor programs.  

 

During Calvary Sunday Studio, we have mini-dance parties, walk/run the labyrinth, or use scarves and bells. Children naturally want to move around and dance. They love making their own shapes during freeze dance. They imagine being bigger than the room or smaller than a seed. Children are invited to see how they have control over their bodies and that they can safely try and explore new movements. I remember working with Calvary youth and teaching them dance movements to “King of Kings and Lord of Lords” which we performed in a circle in Calvin Hall. Dr. Laird Stuart was there and commented after we were done, “That is an example of why youth leaders are working with youth and I’m not.” It was a funny moment. It also made me think that in the past pastors were not trained to focus on movement and dance to encourage fellowship or foster community.

 

I remember dancing at San Francisco Theological Seminary arts workshop week with Carla DeSola, liturgical dancer and founder of Omega West. She taught us to ground ourselves with our bare feet on the sacred ground, trace the physical space, and truly feel what the music was conveying. We created a candle dance in the SFTS Chapel which was such a moving experience. I wanted more of that.

 

Barbara Richard and I used to host Dance Meditation in the Calvary Lower Level over the years. People would come to the Calvary space and explore the 5Rhythms developed by Gabrielle Roth. They are: flowing, staccato, chaos, lyrical, and stillness. I found so much complexity as well as joy through this approach. I also attended Erin King’s Pilates classes for many years in the Calvary Lounge. We shared in a weekly community. At one point we created a weekend retreat to do more Pilates together. One can attend Bible study, Pilates, or a volunteer opportunity outside of the church and do the holy job of witnessing oneself and others doing God’s work.


I invite you to find a physical practice that helps you feel some sense of liberation or freedom. Jesus calls us to be free from things that hold us back from connecting directly with God who is always there. Dancing helps us celebrate, release, prepare us for rest and let go, so that we can connect more fully with the divine. We can engage our freedom to advocate for the safety and autonomy of others. Breath, prayer, connection with others, and movement requires our physical presence and gives us life abundantly. Dance on!

A rainbow stained glass image with the text
By Rev. Marci Glass July 13, 2025
In today's passage, Jesus is getting caught up on his correspondence, writing letters to the churches in Asia Minor, giving them both praise and correction. What do we think Jesus would say to Christians in the United States today, if he wrote us a letter?
Rainbow stained glass that reads
By Rev. Marci Glass July 6, 2025
As we continue reading the Book of Revelation as a book of resistance, we encounter a story of a woman who gives birth in space, while a dragon waits to eat the baby. Hopefully, none of our own birth stories are that dramatic. But there are days, and sometimes years, when life comes at you in ways other than you predi
A rainbow stained glass image with the text 'un-scrolling doom' on it
By Rev. Victor Floyd June 29, 2025
"Why dost thou doom scrolleth even now?"(Victor 3:16) On this Queer Pride Sunday, we worship the One who shows us how to live with integrity and profound joy. That which is against God shall not stand! As the world unravels, celebration reveals our power to resist.
A rainbow stained glass window that reads 'unveiling the empire'
By Rev. Joann Lee June 22, 2025
The book of Revelation includes scary beasts with horns and special marks with numbers revealing who they are. But rather than foretelling future events, what if they were unveiling current rulers and empires who preyed on their people? Let us slay the beasts of oppression and injustice as we resist the empire and embr
Colorful stained glass image with the text 'revelation as resistance' on it.
By Rev. Marci Glass June 15, 2025
This week we will begin a sermon series on the Book of Revelation. It is often used by Christians to predict future events, but it wasn't written for that purpose. The Book of Revelation was written to call people to resist the Roman Empire. It carries on the tradition of 'apocalypse' which is Greek for 'revelation'. In apocalyptic literature, God reveals, or makes clear, how to respond to the world in which we find ourselves. But it is written in a way that obscures the message from the people who it critiques.
Holy Spirit Coming by He Qi - 3 colorful people with flames praying
By Rev. Marci Glass June 8, 2025
The story of Pentecost is a story of adoption. God takes strangers and makes them family. And while adoption is good news for those of us who experience it, that good news doesn't make it easy. God brings strangers together and makes them family, but God doesn't make us all the same. We are adopted into God's family with all of our differences and our disagreements. How can we celebrate the differences between us, rather than using them as wedges to divide us?
Priscilla - by Silvia Dimitrova (2003) - a woman in adorned gown holding a dove with 3 men around
By Rev. Marci Glass June 1, 2025
This week's story from the Book of Acts speaks of the importance of hospitality when life is difficult and dangerous. Where does God call the church to be when people are facing exile, persecution, and danger?
A group of diverse people surrounding a table, a recreation of the Last Supper with disabled folks
By Rev. Bruce Reyes-Chow May 25, 2025
Rev. Bruce Reyes-Chow's sermon for May 25, 2025
Lot and family leaving Sodom, Woodcut from the Nuremberg Chronicle, 1493
By Rev. Victor Floyd May 18, 2025
A queer preacher takes on a notorious “clobber passage” and its history of pain and death. The sin of Sodom has nothing to do with same-sex marriage or trans children—and everything to do with willfully ignoring God's command to welcome strangers and practice hospitality. Let them know we are Christians by our love.
Keith Haring's Best Buddies - 2 human shapes that are yellow and orange embracing each other
May 11, 2025
When I have offered hospitality, often I thought I was doing something kind for someone else. And I sometimes have tried to figure out how to get out of it, because it is work to welcome people in to your life. But it has almost always ended up being a much bigger gift to me than it might have been to the person I thought I was helping. God uses the people we meet and encounter in our lives to call us deeper into God's mystery of grace.
More Posts