My favorite memories of childhood start early because I have great parents. There's the memory of seeing dad in the tub for the last time. The conversation they had about me acknowledged me as a thinking person for the first time. Then, there's earnestly inquiring about the proper way to butter pancakes which seemed to me a very solemn rite. But I think my very best baby memories are about dancing.
Everything made me want to dance, Dancing Bear on Captain Kangaroo, rain showers, tulips, sunshine, butterflies, and Sunshine Lane. People who think of fundamentalists as dour, despairing people who need a personal Easter in the worst way are, roughly speaking, right, but smoothly speaking they couldn't be more mistaken. Fundamentalists insist on happiness at all costs and their art reflects this demand. The happiest and most comforting portions of Christian theology are the nearly exclusive creative sources. Fundamentalist artists may paint a picture that is impossibly grim, but there's never any real cause for worry. Good is guaranteed to triumph in the end. I love that about fundamentalism.
You may be thinking that a little sprite who loves to dance was somewhat misplaced in a fundamentalist environment. Well, roughly speaking, you're right, smoothly speaking, you couldn't, you just couldn't be more mistaken. My first dances took place in our living room. Mother loves music so something was always spinning on the stereo. Doug Oldham was huge at that time and my daddy sings in the same register; so Doug Oldham provided a lot of our background music. My all-time favorite, then and now, is "Bathing in the Sunlight of God's Love." My baby dancing was wildly improvisational. I'd prance down "Sunshine Lane." I'd roll up into and out of my security blanket when "King Jesus rolled my burdens away." I'd trickle down like a lazy rain drop during "Ever Gentle, Ever Sweet." There was the pleasure of new dances and the comfort of the same old songs.
My dancing days didn't last very long. We were watching Partridge Family reruns, and I got happy. I started bending my knees, bouncing like the girl with the tamborine. I wanted a tamborine. I wanted to sing and bounce while lots of people smiled at me. "What are you doing?" Mom asked. I explained the obvious. "We aren't allowed to do that. It's wrong." she said. I was puzzled. "I can't bend my knees?" It was Mother's turn to be perplexed, finally she just said I'd understand when I was older. I don't think either of us ever really did. We just gave up dancing for what was the longest Lent of my life.
In my teen years I decided that though I could not justify the categorical ban on dancing I'd give it up for the sake of the "weaker brother." Since the "weaker brothers" were my elders and teachers this seemed paradoxical, but life is paradoxical. In college I took it back up, but in secret when the dorm was empty. After graduation I called it Aerobics. Bathing in the Sunlight was endangered through overuse, so I set it aside for emergencies. In those days I boogied to The Newsboys, D.C. Talk and Michael Card. Sure, I could have gone Top 40, but the horribly amusing thing about all of this is that for me dancing is an act of worship. There is no fuller way of expressing pleasure in the sacred than to kick about the womb in which we live and move and have our being. I abandoned all caution when my babies started dancing. We boogied. We jived. We balleted. I didn't abandon fundamentalism though, fundamentalism abandoned me.
I smile now when I remember that our church's mission was to "rechurch America." There were five Baptist churches of the same species within ten minutes of our congregation. I use the word congregation with an imaginative generosity. There were perhaps thirty of us, total. I was living the idyllic picture I was raised to worship--Wholesome Young Family Laboring for the Lord. We were a third of the deacon board, two-thirds of the Sunday School staff, the entire youth department, a tenth of the choir and a tenth of the budget. Nothing seemed powerful enough to daunt my ardent optimism--not even gross sin by any human measure. There are procedures for correcting such problems in fundamentalism and all we had to do was follow them. I thought all fundamentalists were as charmed as I. I was mistaken. When angry ignorance reached for my children, it finally over-reached. The trap was sprung. While my body went right on dancing, my heart was still.
Grief and death are the same. We can make a pretense of distinguishing between them, but that's all it is, a pretense. We all face Good Fridays in our lives, but we enter the tomb for the Hebrew's indeterminate forty days. Dead always feels like forever.
I missed my Easter. I didn't see it until it was reflected back to me in the other's eyes. One pair forgave me everything. Others found comfort in my despairing prayers. A blue pair noticed I was unbalanced and tried to right things. A dark pair mistrusted my faith in him. A twinkly pair dismissed my thanks. A sharp pair of guniea pig eyes taught me where the burden lies. Five young pairs began to laugh at my jokes. I looked in His eyes, and that majestic pair sang "You make me feel like dancing, dancing the night away." When I finally looked in the mirror I surprised myself with Easter.
I haven't felt this happy since I was told I wasn't allowed to bend my knees. It seems impossible that my life should be so long in shadow. It is amazing that after despair should come such joy and faith. I guess it is right to insist on happiness at all costs. Fundamentally joy and hope do trump remorse and despair even when they are on the losing side, roughly speaking. Smoothly speaking, I could just say, "You can take the girl out of fundamentalism, but you can't take the fundamentals out of the girl." I wasn't wrong to dance along with Doug then and I'm not wrong to sing with him now.
Oh what a friend we have in Jesus
He leaves nothing to desire.
No more wandering, no more searching ever,
He completely satisfies.
And now it's so amazing, deep within my heart is endless pleasure
Bathing in the Sunlight of God's Love.
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It was a few years back. My daughter at Baptist High School had been invited by her friends to join a troup called Truth or Proof (i forget), that would mime out some kind of moral type message. I inquired further and figured it was one of those liturgical dance things.
OK, my daughter wanted to join some kind of dance troup. I consulted with High Command and she felt the same way I did about it.
First off, I pointed out there's a difference between the culture of Bible Times and the culture I grew up in. The Bible doesn't say anything against dancing, but the way I was raised deems it verbotten. (Like the way I was raised makes a big deal about drinking and smoking.) I said I wasn't comfortable about her joining the dance thang, but I didn't have any kind of biblical leg to stand on. I gave her the space to join the dance thang if she wanted, but I'd appreciate it if she humored my discomfort. It was a small enough thing to her that she declined the invitation. I have a very understanding daughter.
Fast forward a few years, we changed churches from one where the song service was All Gaither All The Time (yes, in the 21st century!), to Blythefield Hills Baptist Church. Blythefield reflects the opposite end of the spectrum. We have little dramas most weeks and there we have Dancing Girls! (well, they're pre-teen girls doing the liturgical dance thing, but Dancing Girls sounds racier. i'd someday like to see some big old guy like me prancing up their on the stage. sure, that'd be a big draw.)
I happen to despise both Gaither Music and Liturgical Dance, but that's just me. That's not normative. Those aren't issues of fellowship. They're things that I dislike that are perfectly compatible with the biblical ethic and completely acceptable to 21st century Blythefield mores.
The church I left, I left for reasons that weren't Gaither Music. The Dancing Girls do not suffice to make me want to leave Blythefield.
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