Contra Dancing
I aspire to be a confident contra dancer. I'm not there yet but I think it is a completely cool style of dance and incredibly fun. I was first introduced to contra dancing at the Lake Eden Arts festival in Black Mountain. Twice a year hundreds of people from this region and beyond flock to the festival, in part, to dance. As a beginner, I'm hesitant to get out on the dance floor, but that's okay because it is plenty enjoyable and energizing to watch. At these dances it's great fun to climb to the top of the bleachers and look down on the dancing, to enjoy watching from this high perspective. Imagine hundreds of people enthusiastically spinning, stomping, sliding, and kicking to up-tempo, full-throttle Celtic and folk rhythms.
A dance floor is a good metaphor for the Church. A parish such as ours can look like melodic activity on a dance floor. Some members are dancing in groups or in twos or threes, or even solo. Some are adding their own flair of fancy footwork and spins. Some sit on the sidelines watching as contented or discontented observers. Together we are attempting, sometimes successfully, to dance to the same tune. This metaphor is theologically suggestive. Only the Divine Music makes the dancing possible. Through our ministries, liturgy, committees, gatherings, and outreach efforts we dancers seek through movement to respond to and embody God's love in this place and time.
Each January we gather for our annual meeting to pause, reflect, report, and assess our mission and ministry. An important action taken at this meeting is the election of new Vestry members. Vestry members who have served for three years rotate off and new members take on the responsibility. Serving on the Vestry, like many other ministries, is a quiet and humble service to and for the Church. The leadership ministry of the Vestry is vital for the health and wellbeing of our church family.
A critical role of Vestry members is to be part of the dance and movement here at Church of the Holy Spirit. But an added responsibility for its members is to climb to the top of the bleachers and look down on the dance floor to see the big picture. From the high bleachers they are able to gain perspective, notice patterns, detect direction, sense discordance, and observe movement. We give thanks for our Vestry leaders who lead us on the dance floor and who are willing to climb to the top of the bleachers so they may to gain the broader perspective and insight necessary to lead the Church of the Holy Spirit to more fully, freely, inclusively and confidently engage in the dance to the Divine Music.
The idea for this article comes from Rev. Mahan Siler's blog entitled "Getting to the Balcony" on his blog entitled Mahan Siler/Anam Cara, July 2010 found on the web at http://mahansiler.wordpress.com.