The energy in the sanctuary last Sunday was unmistakable. I felt it in the lobby where flowers we had all brought were being arranged in the baskets for our flower communion. I felt it in the spontaneous response to our graduating seniors and the celebration of Betsy Riddell as Unitarian Universalist of the year. I could feel it in our singing and in the buzz as the congregation came down to take a flower and share a blessing…

There was even dancing in the aisles.

The Spirit was moving. So many of you have complimented me on delivering such a joyous service, but I know that it was the spirit moving as much as our careful planning that made that worship so satisfying for so many of us. The service was intergenerational…we were all there in the sanctuary…and it seemed that we all felt the spirit.

Unitarian Universalists are not known for celebration and joy. We are known for our justice commitments and the openness of our theology. We are known for welcoming science and learning. We are known for our progressive values and our willingness to witness to them. We are known as a pretty serious religious people.

Celebration and joy? Not the first things most folks think about when they think of us.

Perhaps last Sunday’s worship was a sign and a signal that we may be ready to welcome more joy into our religious life. There is so much damage to repair in our world and so much yearning for wholeness in our individual lives. Perhaps part of what we need to sustain ourselves is that experience of affirmation and joy. Perhaps celebration can be an antidote to burnout and even to despair.

Dr. Takiyah Nur Amin, in the most recent issue of UUWORLD magazine, writing of her experience as a Black UU:

“We go where we get to feel free, full, and whole. That desire for deep connection and wholeness means having a worship and liturgical context that can hold us in our complexity and make space for the many ways we experience and express our encounter with that which is holy or transcendent. … We Unitarian Universalists would do well to make time—take the time—to dance.”

 To dance. To move. To feel the spirit moving and move with it.

An embodied faith. Religion not just from the neck up.

To paraphrase that primer on liturgical dance, The Hokey Pokey, “you put your whole self in…”

Should we make space for more of that in our sanctuary? Shouldn’t we?

You often hear me ask the Spirit of Life to move within us and among us. “Come unto us.” It is a call for presence but it is also a call for movement, opening the possibility of joy.

I will be in the pulpit this Sunday as we celebrate both Father’s Day and Pride, then travelling to the UUA’s General Assembly in Spokane, WA. I will return to the pulpit (and to blogging) in August after some time for rest and renewal.

May you all find the rest and renewal you need in the warmth of this season as well.

Blessings,

Bill