Prelude — Trois Gymnopédies
Erik Satie (1888) · piano
Erik Satie composed the Gymnopédies in 1888. The title derives from the gymnopaedia, an ancient Spartan festival of ritual dance — though why Satie chose this reference for music of such radical tenderness remains beautifully unclear. The music is a study in restraint: a gently rocking bass, unresolved seventh chords that drift without arriving, and a melody that floats above it all with the tenderness of an outstretched hand that never quite closes.
Let the space between the notes hold whatever you are not yet ready to grasp.
Introit — I Will Arise
Tony Alonso & John L. Bell · choir & organ
This hymn is a retelling of the Parable of the Prodigal Son (Luke 15:11–32). Today’s Ecclesiastes pair — “a time to mourn and a time to dance” — lives at the heart of this parable. A father mourns his estranged son, but when the young man returns home, the father doesn’t hesitate — he runs out, throws his arms around the child, and turns his mourning into a feast. The elder brother approaches and hears music and dancing, yet refuses to join the celebration.
Which side will you choose?
Hymn of Praise — Be Still My Soul
Katharina von Schlegel (1752), tune: FINLANDIA (Sibelius) · HPP #389, vv. 1 & 3
To “be still” is to stop the body — to pause the dance and allow the mourner to rest in the midst of sorrow. Verse 3 carries us to the far side of that rest, where “disappointment, grief, and fear are gone, sorrow forgot, love’s purest joys restored.” Let the hymn’s broad, unhurried phrases slow your breathing.
The dance will resume. But first, be still.
Anthem — There Is a Season
Alfred V. Fedak · choir & organ
For the third week in our Lenten series, Fedak’s setting of Ecclesiastes 3 returns as our liturgical anchor. The poetry has not changed, but we have. Today, listen for the couplet that is perhaps the most physical of them all: “a time to mourn and a time to dance.” Where the other pairs could remain interior — thoughts, feelings, convictions — this one demands the body. Mourning bows the head; dancing lifts the feet. Fedak’s musical setting does not resolve the tension between these opposites — it holds them in the same harmonic breath, asking us to receive the paradox rather than solve it.
Interlude for Reflection — Libertango
Astor Piazzolla (1974) · organ
Piazzolla composed “Libertango” in 1974, and the title says it all: libertad (freedom) + tango. This is the piece that broke tango free from the salon and into the street — driving, rhythmic, unapologetic. Let this be the moment the dance first breaks through with the full force of a body that has mourned long enough and is ready to move.
The feet are stirring.
Response — Simple Gifts
Elder Joseph Brackett (1848) · organ
This familiar Shaker tune was written in 1848 at the Shaker community in Alfred, Maine, and is classified in manuscripts as a song for dancing. The Shakers believed that dance was worship — that the body in motion was prayer made visible. Let it turn your thoughts toward your own contributions, no matter how simple they may feel.
Offertory — Hallelujah
Leonard Cohen (1984) · organ
Leonard Cohen famously labored over this song for years, reportedly drafting some eighty verses before arriving at the final text. The result is a hymn of meditation on what praise costs. Its verses are populated by figures undone by desire — David seeing Bathsheba in the moonlight, Samson broken by Delilah’s touch — each one illustrating how joy and sorrow, worship and ruin, can inhabit the same moment.
As you consider your offering, let this be your prayer: that even our most broken praise is a kind of dancing.
Closing Hymn — We Will Walk with God (Sizohamba naye)
Swaziland traditional · taught by choir
This Swaziland traditional hymn is rhythmic, catchy, and designed to be learned in the moment: the choir will lead, and you are invited to add your voice as it comes to you. We do not dance alone, and we do not mourn alone.
We will walk with God, my brothers, we will walk with God. We will walk with God, my sisters, we will walk with God. We will go rejoicing, till the kingdom has come!
Sizohamba naye — we will walk with God!
Postlude — Down by the Riverside
African American spiritual · piano, choir & congregation
This African American spiritual became one of the most recognized protest songs of the twentieth century, adopted powerfully during the civil rights and Vietnam-era anti-war movements. It’s a song of burdens being laid down: the sword, the shield, the weight of grief itself, all set at the water’s edge so the body can finally move freely.
After a service that began in Satie’s suspended, ritual dance, we end here — in full, jubilant, unapologetic movement. The mourning has done its sacred work. Now lay it down by the riverside, and let your feet remember what joy feels like.
I’m gonna lay down my burden, down by the riverside, down by the riverside…
I’m gonna lay down my sword and shield… I’m gonna lay down my travelin’ shoes… Ain’t gonna study war no more!