"Faith Affirming" Theatre

I believe that theatre can be faith affirming. Whole heartedly!

However, I have dislike the idea of creating theatre for the purpose of being faith affirming.

There is a type of theatre called Transcendent Theatre. It's purpose is to bring audience members to a greater source of truth or light. Merriam-Webster Dictionary defines transcendent as "being beyond the limits of all possible experience and knowledge." In an LDS world, transcendent theatre's purpose is to bring the Holy Ghost to the audience members, causing a spiritual experience.

The Lord speaks to us in the way that we need to be spoken to - through whatever medium he can reach us. He also prepares us to receive His promptings. For example, I would not receive a prompting today about some doctrine that I'm not prepared for (like eternity or what exactly happens in the three different degrees of the Celestial Kingdom). The Lord doesn't just speak to us through the scriptures or through the prophets. Personal revelation is a fantastic thing! And, it can come to us through many different means, including theatre!

You cannot force someone to feel the Spirit or to have personal revelation. However, it seems that this is the purpose of transcendence theatre. I have a problem with labeling something as "Faith Affirming" because what is faith affirming to one person will likely not be faith affirming to another. And, like I said before, you cannot force someone into have their faith affirmed, especially if he or she is not prepared or if it's not how the Lord needs to speak to that person.

This last set of plays at NPP was a "faith affirming" cycle. I'll be honest - I did not feel the Spirit. (Actually, I felt the Spirit leave me during one of the plays. Does that count?) My faith was not affirmed. However, the plays were all religious in some way. Does religious = faith affirming in this setting? Who decides what's faith affirming? Why them? Why am I supposed to feel the Spirit in the ways that this person/these people are deciding? What if I don't? Why not just do a cycle of religious plays and let them be faith affirming if they need to be for certain individuals?

You can't force someone to feel the Spirit, and yet that's what the purpose of this cycle was, and what most of these plays were trying to do by being "faith affirming." I understand the importance of doing uplifting theatre and I try myself to create uplifting theatre. However, uplifting is different from faith affirming.