Quote:
Originally Posted by pelathais
I'm glad that your wife was blessed to be a part of something that helped to lead others into worship and the presence of God. However, I would quibble with you a bit when you say it wasn't "choreographed."
I'm certain that the ladies practiced and that they even agreed upon which "sign" to use in cases where a there might be a couple of different ways to express something in American Sign language. Further, the fact that they were signing in the first place would serve as a kind of "filter" or even a "choreography" of their movements.
Was the audience deaf? Did the majority of people in the audiences even understand the ASL that they were observing? If not, then the whole thing really does fall into the category of a "performance," and a "choreographed" performance at that.
I'm not saying this to knock you down. As I've said before, I have enjoyed these types of performances in church. I'm just keen to observe the similarities between the things that OP people do and what "The World" or "Charismatics" do in their services. When you get right down to it, there is usually very little difference in what's going in the two realms.
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Apologies for responding out of order (and, again, for derailing from the original post), but I found a recording of the sign team my wife was part of...
http://www.godtube.com/watch/?v=DPY6GNNX
Watching the video still brings tears to my (and my wife's) eyes. Given this particular vid was recorded at a public event, imagine it during a 6 pm service on a Sunday night -- it was quite noisy for a long period of time during and after the song.
