I sometimes miss that sway. The sway that comes when you know the songs so well that you don't need the hymnals. I miss the men in their dapper Sunday go to meeting clothes and the women in their colorful dresses and wide, flamboyant hats. I miss my child's view, looking down on that sea of motion. Looking down on that sea of emotion.
Culture is important.
In life and in religious expression. Certainly, we can not be. Should we dabble culturally, here and there, skimming the surface of one tradition after another. No, of course not. Nor should we lose sight of what makes us a unique religious movement, of what makes us different from all those traditions we left when we individually chose to be U-Us.