church drama

A two-person drama I've written has been given the green light for a performance this Sunday at church.

It's not a tremendously original piece, but it does deal with the subject of tuning into God during prayer without becoming a how-to manual. Rules for how to pray successfully always irritate me because they turn something sacred into a a barren technique, and that fault becomes even more annoying when the lessons masquerades as art. Art stirs the soul. It does not give you five simple rules to master a spiritual discipline that grows out of a relationship with the divine.

Anyway, the chief selling point for "The Muse," as far as I'm concerned, is that it shouldn't be obvious right away that the drama is about prayer, in part because God is depicted as a woman the pray-er is having lunch with.

I wrote it with this casting in mind. The pray-er is identified as "Neil," and God in the script is called "Calliope," primarily because none of the nine Greek muses has dominion over the area designated, but Neil Gaiman wrote an excellent story about Calliope for "Sandman." The dialogue and reactions are written for man-to-woman interplay, such as the time Neil tells Calliope "You have always been my muse" and calls her "the most beautiful person I've ever known."

This line will take on a whole new humorous element when we perform it Sunday, because Tim, the fellow in charge of creative arts ministry, was only able to find a guy in his early forties to play the part.

Yes, on Sunday, I (in the role of Neil) will be professing my undying love to a man perhaps eight years my senior, telling him that he has inspired all my work, and that I can't imagine life without him.

They're going to run me out of town on a rail.