Washington National Cathedral

The Sunday Forum: Critical Issues in the Light of Faith

The Very Rev. Samuel T. Lloyd III, host

Cathedral Dean Samuel T. Lloyd III talks with choreographer and dancer Liz Lerman about “A Time to Dance: Building Community.”

Lerman works in sacred and secular settings, with young and old, with congregations from several religions, with shipyard workers, physicists, attorneys. (“Imagine a hundred lawyers learning to dance,” Lloyd marvels.) A major Lerman project, “Hallelujah,” grew out of a panel discussion in which an audience member said that she was tired of holding her breath and waiting for things to get better. “I want to start celebrating now,” the woman said. The resulting work draws from fifteen different communities’ ideas about what is worthy of praise.

“One of the most powerful reasons that people dance is to understand,” Lerman comments. “It’s a kind of knowing.” Societies throughout the ages have used dance for many purposes, such as healing children and preparing for war.

In the United States today, some congregations incorporate praise dance into worship. Lerman describes the artist’s role in a congregation as “asking the questions, and helping people find ways to bring more of themselves to what we are committed to be together for.”

Of course, not everyone is open to using dance as a part of worship. “There’s often a lot of resistance. But to me, resistance is information,” Lerman says. “It just means people can’t go too fast, and we want to lay down lots of little stepping stones so, over time, people can come along.”

She adds, “I don’t need everybody to participate. It’s actually quite beautiful when some people don’t. They’re just sitting.” Lerman does ask non-participants to pay attention to their own breathing, note how amazing their bodies are, and keep pleasant expressions on their faces.

In the 1990s, Lerman visited Temple Micah in Washington, D.C., with the Washington Performing Arts Society to perform a work in progress called “The Good Jew?” Afterward, in a question-and-answer session, an audience member suggested adding “somebody in a chair, and lifting the chair up”—a familiar image of Jewish weddings.

“No more Eastern European imagery!” another audience member protested. “Please drag us into the next century. Give us some new images.” That speaker was the congregation’s rabbi. Lerman, who describes herself as “kind of a restless Jew,” promptly joined Temple Micah.

About Liz Lerman

Liz Lerman is a choreographer, performer, writer, educator, and founding artistic director of the Liz Lerman Dance Exchange. Her transformative work has been commissioned by the Lincoln Center, the American Dance Festival, BalletMet, and the Kennedy Center, among many other organizations. Individual dance projects, such as the “Shipyard Project” (1994–1996), “Hallelujah” (1999–2002), and “613 Radical Acts of Prayer” (2007) have established her as a leading force in artistic engagement with civic and social values. Among Ms. Lerman’s many awards and recognitions is a 2002 MacArthur “Genius” Grant Fellowship.