The Body, Storytelling, and the Kingdom Come

Come join in the fun as we explore improvisational movement and theatre forms as tools for healing and community transformation.  Grounded in methods primarily from Contact Improvisation and Playback Theatre, we will delve into several key forms that will help us tell our personal stories and explore our common stories.  At the heart of this practice is a physical kind of exegesis, literally rolling our bodies into common sacred text to uncover new understandings of how the Spirit is speaking to us here and now.  Participants will leave with specific techniques for generating material in dance, theatre, workshops and wild worship services!  Expect the time to be part practice, part therapy and part revolution - the act of embodying and sharing our sacred stories being nothing less than "the kingdom come!"

Date: Saturday, November 15, 2008
Time: 9:30am-2:30pm
Place: Wesley Seminary (dining hall), www.wesleyseminary.edu

4500 Massachusetts Ave, NW, Washington, DC  20016 (free parking)
Cost: $35; $25 (students and Sacred Dance Guild members);
Wesley students/staff - FREE
Bring a lunch!  Drinks and fruit provided
 
Please pre-register by NOVEMBER 8, 2008 
For information or to register, contact Kathryn Sparks at (202) 244-5280 or dancingsparks@yahoo.com .
 
Our leader, Chris Fitz (from Marietta, PA), has worked with improvisational movement and theatre forms intensively since 2004, when he founded the Jubilee Troupe, a traveling Anabaptist-based performing ensemble which focused on "the missing body" in Christian peacemaking and spirituality.  With an academic background in conflict resolution, he trained in contact improvisation in Amherst, DC, and Munich and has recently been part of Playback Theatre troups in DC, Germany, and now York, PA.  He is currently directing the Healing York Playback ensemble that uses Playback Theatre to move through the stories of York's painful racism and other community divisions.  He is also working to bring these and other powerful improvisational forms together through a community networking website: www.jubileearts.net.
 
The Henry Luce III Center for the Arts and Religion, at Wesley Seminary, seeks to build bridges with the wider dance community by bringing dance artists to campus to lead day workshops, one in the fall and one in the spring, each year.  Since 2002, the Seminary has hosted choreographers diverse in style and approach and has broadened its understanding of what it means to be dance for the church.  Our leaders, too, feel a mutual exchange in participating in a conversation that is as relevant today as it was 2000 years ago - how we bring body and soul together and live from that unity.  We are grateful to the Sacred Dance Guild for partnering with us in hosting these events.