Dancing Priest: A Review

Those who know me well know how much I detest exercise. The only way I am able to tolerate the daily climb onto my elliptical machine is if I can crank up some cheesy seventies music and open a good book. I am ever in search of a decent story to keep me distracted long enough to finish my workout.

I’m not interested in stories containing graphic and violent imagery that isn’t part of my everyday experience. Nor am I interested in what is typically offered in the name of Christian fiction; sweet tales of lost pets finding their way home on Christmas Eve after Grandpa finally gets saved. I just want to read a good story.

Dancing Priest by Glynn Young is a good story. And, trust me, in this story no lost pets come home on Christmas Eve.

Michael Kent, the central character in the book, is a university student in England preparing for ordination in the Anglican Church. He is also a bicyclist in training for the summer Olympics. He’s experienced loss in his life. He falls in love and likes Starbucks coffee.  In Michael Kent, Young has created a likeable character; one which seems real, the kind one might actually enjoy meeting in a Starbucks.

One of my favorite lines in the book is the question Michael asks after hearing of his assignment as a newly ordained priest. Michael asks, “By the way, archbishop, would the people at St. Anselm’s mind if I brought my bike?” Glynn Young has told a good story about an interesting, likeable and multi-dimensional man of faith.

Michael Kent’s faith is integral to his story, and I suppose some might decide to pass on a book containing strong Christian themes. I would encourage those readers to give Michael Kent a chance. Michael talks about his faith in a way which is both winsome and authentic. His character embodies what faithful Christian living might look like in the context of a young man navigating the world of career, calling, relationships, and a passion for biking. As a priest, and as a friend, he confronts the ugliness of brokenness and sin. His work dares to ask the question, “Can the gospel actually make a difference in the lives of those who bear deep wounds?”

Young, who among his other titles, serves as a contributing editor for The High Calling, an online network which encourages everyday conversations about life, work, and God. In Dancing Priest, Young offers a story which fleshes out ideas about the sacredness of all work.

I appreciated Young’s suggestion, in the words of one of his characters, that kingdom work doesn’t always take place in expected ways or places. Although Michael Kent’s desire is to serve in the African country of Malawi, it seems he might land a prestigious assignment within the church’s hierarchy. After learning the location of his first assignment, however, Michael’s archbishop offers him these words:

It will be better for you to be on the periphery than at the center because the center is rotting and collapsing. The future of the church is at the edges, and there you’ll find a willingness to abandon what’s dead, to meet the spiritual need . . .

That insight reminded me of the ministry of another, one who many expected to come and establish His kingdom by power and by force. He, instead, showed up and ministered to those in the fringes of society in backwater places like Bethlehem and Samaria.

There is only one thing I didn’t like about Dancing Priest, and it is this: After I finished the book, I realized I would have to wait until this summer to read the next in the series. How am I ever, until then, going to find the motivation to face my elliptical?

Dancing Priest is available in paperback and via download to Kindle.