Why would you want to be in a ritual theater circle?
Let us count the ways. There are many. Here are thirteen.
You will grow as a human being.
Ritual theater asks you to be present in a way that ordinary life rarely demands. You will discover things about yourself — your voice, your story, your capacity for transformation — that you did not know were there.
You will make something real.
These are not exercises. These are plays that will be performed — short runs, real audiences, real talk-backs. Your work will reach people. That matters.
You will be part of something new.
The Hineni Circle is developing a new theory of ritual theater. You will be in at the beginning of something that will outlast all of us.
You will learn to use your voice.
Not just your speaking voice — your full voice. Your presence. Your authority. Ritual theater teaches you to occupy space, to be heard, to matter. These are skills for every part of life.
You will have fun.
We laugh. We argue about plays. We eat. We celebrate. The circle is serious work and it is also a joy. People who do this work together become something to each other.
You will meet people you would never otherwise meet.
A 17-year-old and a 75-year-old reading the same play together, discovering they have the same questions. This is what intergenerational work actually feels like. It is surprising and it is good.
You will help complete the plays.
Every play is workshopped in the circle before it goes to print. When you read a play here, you are not just performing — you are finishing the writing. The published play will carry your work in it.
You will learn a new way to think about theater.
The Hineni Circle theory is genuinely new. You will learn how ritual theater is written, directed, voiced, and designed. Whether you are a theater person or not, this will change how you see performance.
You will be part of a community that takes you seriously.
We take every member of the circle seriously — their age, their experience, their questions, their contributions. There is no hierarchy of who matters here. Everyone is in the circle.
You will do something you have never done before.
Most people have never been in a ritual theater circle. Most people have never experienced a play that is also a prayer. Most people have never stood in a circle with people of every age and said: I am here. This is that.
You will be heard — fully, and without interruption.
In the circle, when you speak, the circle listens. Not politely. Not waiting for their turn. Actually listens. This is rarer than it sounds, and more powerful than you expect.
You will leave each session with something to carry.
A line. An image. A question you did not have before. The work has a way of staying with you — in the car, at dinner, in the middle of the night. That is how you know it is alive.
You will help shape what comes next.
The Hineni Circle is still becoming. The plays being written now, the rituals being developed, the theory being tested — all of it is in motion. When you join now, you are not joining something finished. You are joining something being made. That is a different kind of belonging.
The most important conversations happen across generations.
Ritual has always been intergenerational. It is how communities transmit what matters — from those who have lived it to those who are beginning to. The Hineni Circle is built on this principle.
When a 17-year-old and a 75-year-old read the same play together, they discover things neither of them could find alone. The 17-year-old brings urgency, freshness, the questions that haven't been answered yet. The 75-year-old brings depth, perspective, the knowledge of what endures.
Our productions are built around intergenerational casting — a high school senior and a Green Valley senior sharing the stage, each bringing what the other cannot. The plays are better for it. The performances are better for it. The audiences feel it.
And the circle members learn from each other in ways that no classroom or workshop can replicate. This is what community actually looks like. This is why we do it this way.
It is never too late to learn something that matters.
Your life experience is not a limitation here — it is the material. The plays Dr. Sherman writes draw on the full weight of a life lived. You have things to say that younger people cannot yet say. The circle needs your voice.
You are at the beginning of everything. Ritual theater will teach you things about presence, voice, and story that will serve you for the rest of your life — in theater, in school, in relationships, in whatever comes next.
If you are drawn to the intersection of theater, ritual, and spirit — if you have ever felt that something was missing from the performances you have seen — this is for you. No experience required. Only presence.
These portraits from Dr. Sherman's monologue books are the ancestors of the Hineni Circle — women across 2,000 years who showed up, spoke up, and changed the world.
