WHY WE DO CEREMONIES

Why Ceremonies?

Torches at the four directions glow in the fading light of day.  The scent of incense fills the air.  A drum beats an ancient rhythm as the notes of a flute entwine with the drumbeat. As the celebrant approaches the eastern directional gate, a hush falls over the assembly.  Candles on the altar in the center of the circle are lit one by one.  An invocation accompanies the lighting of each.  With the sacredness of the ceremony set, the story of the event is choreographed to dance and 
music.  This is ceremony!

Humans have celebrated with like rituals and ceremonies for over one hundred thousand years.  Archaeologists found pottery, tools, and cave paintings indicating they were an essential component in the lives of every ancient culture.  Societies recognized the seasons of planting and harvest, the movement of the moon and stars, and honored birth and death.  At some point,  religion crept into the ceremonies complicating or altering many of the ancient practices.  Yet the dates marking the seasons were kept with attributions to the different Gods of each religion.

For the past twelve years ceremonies have been an integral part of the practices in our community. Individuals with similar beliefs mark the dates by participating in or supporting the vision inherent in each gathering.  The past decade offered up a rare occurrence that happens only once each century.  Between 2001 and 2012 the calendar dates 01-01-01 through 12-12-12 were identified as cosmic trigger events and celebrated as such.  On each of the triple numerical dates, a special ceremony, tied to the numerology of the date, was held. It ended with a large gathering on 12.12.12 known as Sounding the Bowls where hundreds of crystal and Tibetan bowls were sounded in concert across the waters of the Gulf of Mexico. 

But what about ceremonies?  What are they and what do they do for the human psyche?  And why should we in the modern world do ceremonies or rituals?  There's an easy answer.  Rituals and ceremonies connect us to an ancestry and history that provide a glimpse into a time and heritage long past.  When performed in the modern era, they remind us to halt the noise of everyday life and to remember the meaning of sacred space and the power of seasonal changes. Even more, they acknowledge the spiritual mystery inherent in celebrating special events, stimulating reverent qualities in all attendees.

It's easy to identify with Equinoxes and Solstices which represent Spring, Summer, Autumn, and Winter.  But if you've been part of these gatherings, you know each season or ceremony carries its own frequency that changes from year to year, though the event is the same.  

Each celebrant brings practices that makes each ceremony unique.  For example, a Celtic Bard might enact a story of the Return of the Light on the Winter Solstice that includes the use of hundreds of candles.  A shamanic practitioner might instead use the power of imagination to journey into the darkness to find the light and return it to earth.

When children participate a benign sweetness descends on the gathering.  There's recognition by all assembled that the next generation is being introduced to sacred patterns of harmony and reverence.  And in their own way, the children respond.  Shy ones find their voices, enter the circle, and speak to their elders with wisdom and clarity.  The more outgoing children take leadership roles in the ceremony, writing prayers, poems, or wishes for peace on earth. 

The size of a gathering can affect the energy either positively or negatively.  But if the gathering is set in a containment field, like a circle, it's much easier to feel sacred rhythms. An altar at the center of the circle makes a statement to all attending that this is a holy gathering. 

The role of officiant is important and carefully orchestrated. With exceptional power, they hold the containment field intact while voicing the intentions and impressions needed to make the ceremony solemn and reverent.  When the intentions are set, the candles lit, incense is burning, drums are sounding, and dancers weaving around the altar in the center, the audience responds with awe for they have become entwined with the ceremony.

From these many gatherings, people connect, a community is built, grace flows, and blessings are bestowed for family, friends, and all beings on the planet.  That is the sacredness of ceremony which really answers the question, Why Ceremonies. 

 

Jo Mooy - December 2015     

All Journals are archived on the website: Starsoundings Journals 

    

THE 13 CLANMOTHERS - THE CLARITY OF GREY

The Clarity of Grey

When 2015 arrived it seemed world events would ease a bit. But the geopolitical  predictions for the year pointed to more turmoil with extremists and terrorists of various persuasions running roughshod over others. How can this be? All over the world there are groups praying for peace, for a change in human hearts, or for a better way of life. Yet, their sparks of light get lost in all the dark and dreary events in the news. What can we do?

Reflecting on it one morning in meditation I heard a voice say, Summon the Clanmothers.  It seemed like the answer! Especially because this month is the Equinox - the seasonal point when the earth is covered with equal hours of sunlight and darkness. It's a cosmic point of balance for the earth, where extremes are harmonized. At the midpoint everything that is black or white becomes a neutral gray. In that moment The Clarity of Gray appears. It simply blends and neutralizes both extremes of black and white.

So, if the ancients considered the Equinoxes holy and sacred why not us? The word went out and the Clanmothers were summoned. One was a peacemaker. Three led  spiritual centers. One worked with the oceans and her inhabitants. A few taught "earth ways" in their practices while others led meditations. All of them responded to the call, knowing that on this day, in this season of balance, the sound of their prayers would fill the ether, and the discerning would hear it. They knew in this brief moment of balance, the extremes of black and white would neutralize for a few days, and they would influence the outcome.

The 13 Clanmothers represent aspects of the Divine Feminine - aspects ignored for 3000 years. The Divine Feminine kept the wisdom ways, told the stories, acted as a healer, counseled the afflicted, weaved and spun, prevented war and honored the visions. Each of the 13 Clanmothers was a matriarchal elder in ancient tribes. Each matriarch held the truths of the aspects. They performed the rituals and ceremonies, presiding over births and funerals. They were keepers of the names, dispensing them at birth and returning the name at death.

The Clanmother was not just the wisdom keeper but also the dispenser of justice. She would remove a Chief who did not follow the guidance of matriarch. She negotiated and harmonized all tribal disputes. Wars could not begin unless the Clanmother approved. She rose above the petty arguments and extreme positions, using her skills as peacemaker and mother to keep everything in balance. She was the epitome of The Clarity of Grey.

Each Clanmother is aligned with one of the 13 moons of the lunar. It's more natural because it acknowledges the feminine and lunar cycles. It logically assigns thirteen months of 28 days to the lunar calendar. This totals 364 days of the solar year. The extra day was one of celebration, honoring the year past and welcoming in a new year.

On the Equinox, the Clanmother acts as harmonizer for the earth and peacemaker for the people of extreme positions. She will take all extremes of black and white and blend them into the clarity of grey. She will insist that weapons of war and the voices of hate be sheathed as she summons peace upon the land. She sees far and weaves a web that raises humankind. For her duty is to hold a vision of hope, ease, and grace. But most of all she sees to the children who will live the vision of the 13th moon.

Jo Mooy - March 2015  

Walnuts And A Piano

Walnuts and a Piano

   

There's a rhythm to life. It's a musical quality that asks us to hear the cords and feel the vibration of sound that carry our emotions from the highs through the lows and back again. The recognition of this rhythm allows us to live in balance and to enjoy the music of life. 

This time of year always pulls at my heart and mind with sweet remembrances of the rhythm of childhood. Perhaps it's the blustery feel to the weather, the knowing that winter is soon to come, or a recognition of the gentle turn of the seasonal cycles. Certainly ancient cultures honored this time of year, the time of the thinning veils. The Celts honored it with ritual and the ceremonies of Samhain. This time of year creates an opening that allows for the fine tuning of my inner nature and with it, the ability to appreciate the song that became who I am.

Autumn is a time of preparation for the mysterious and sacred winter-time ahead. In California, where I grew up there wasn't a winter that was severe or dangerous, yet there was still something otherworldly about it.  It was a season of deeper inner silence.  During this time, as we made ready for the shorter days and longer, mysterious nights, we felt closer to something magical.  Of course, much of that magic revolved around that most sacred of children's holidays, Christmas.  Christmas required great preparation and just as the ancient people we had our own rituals that readied us the special time ahead.

One particular autumn shaped my life forever more. Our mom cooked good food that was as delicious as it was nutritious. In fall she prepared for the holidays by baking cookies - lots of them in a great variety of shapes, flavors and textures. Cookies are a treat that nourish us on so many levels. They bring joy to the taste buds, a lightness to the mind and a healing of the soul.

But the kind of baking our mom did required lots of ingredients and some were expensive and hard to come by in those days. So every October our family was packed into the car for an hour drive south of our home in San Jose to a place where the main north south road, highway 101 narrowed to 2 lanes and where towering black walnut trees lines the road. There we'd park the car as each of us were given burlap bags to fill with the green round pods that had dropped from the trees. These pods held the treasured meat that would in December become Russian tea cakes, one of Mom's specialties made only when the weather was cooler. I could almost taste them as I gathered my walnuts in my sack.

I knew the whole procedure by heart. I knew this movement of our life's musical movement well. When we got home my dad would lay 2x4s on the ground and nail them together to make a pen to hold the walnuts while the outer shells dried out in the sun for weeks. When they were ready to be hulled he took his large carpenter's hammer smashing the thick outer shell tossing them onto tin baking pans. Then each evening we'd all dig out the precious tasting walnut meat for the inevitable holiday baking to come. All of this lay in the depths of my psyche as we hunted for the round treasures hidden under the fallen leaves of the great old trees.

That particular year mom needed to use the restroom on our trek home from the walnuts. In that part of the world, on a blustery fall Sunday, there weren't too many options for her. My father found a seedy looking bathroom on the outside of a dilapidated filling station where the gas attendant barely looked up as he pumped gas into our station wagon.  When mom came back to the car she was carrying a big leather purse which she didn't have when she left. She and my dad held a muted conversation but I caught snippets of it. "Someone left their purse..." "I don't feel right leaving it..." "Would you trust..." 

I think there were more walnuts to be had but something had changed and we headed home. The bags of walnuts were piled in the backyard forgotten now as we gathered round as mom and dad opened the purse tentatively. My parents were honest hard-working folks so we could see they felt like sneaks just opening the bag to see if there was some id in it. Even before they'd opened it there was talk of placing ads in the personals to see if the owner could be found. Each article was removed and placed carefully on the kitchen table, some tissue, a wallet, a comb, a huge diamond ring. Even to a kid's eye, you could tell this was very valuable, And then the one thing they had hoped to find, an address book which identified the owner.

They immediately called the number in southern California. The son answered and as soon as Dad told him what they'd found he was jubilant. His parents had called a few hours before, devastated that his mother had lost her purse. They looked everywhere, drove miles back retracing their stops to no avail so were cutting their trip short and coming home. He had no way to reach them until they arrived home as it was well before the time of cell phones. Instead he told my father that the ring was his mother's wedding ring and very valuable. It seemed she usually took it off when in the car as her fingers got swollen when she sat for long periods of time.

Arrangements were made to return the purse and everything in it was packed with great care. The next day it was mailed, insured and sent to a woman we had never met. When it arrived, the lady called, thanking my parents for their honesty and for their kindness. My parents assured them it was no problem, and not to give it a  second thought. I could tell by the smiles on my parent's faces that their reward was the warmth that comes with bringing great joy to someone and in this case someone they would never meet. Then the incident was forgotten and we went back to our rhythm, the walnuts were laid in the sunshine to dry, children went to school, fathers to work and mom kept the home fires burning.

A few days later, a letter arrived in it was a check for $300, a small fortune in 1961. It was a small token of their gratitude from the lady and her husband. The ring had been in the family for a very long time and was irreplaceable. My parents called them saying they couldn't accept it as they had only done what anyone would have, but the lady insisted. She said that many would not have returned it and that they had the money so it would was a pleasure to thank them. It turned out that was the amount of cash the woman had in her wallet when it was lost but my parents had never even looked in the wallet.

Mom wanted to use the money to pay bills and maybe buy nice Christmas gifts, but dad was adamant. "You are going to get something for yourself; something that will make you happy." A few weeks later, a used upright piano arrived. My mother who had learned to play as a child sat down and was in her element.

That Christmas there was music, real music, not from the radio but from our mother's fingers and from her heart. And much like the home baked cookies the music was sweet and nourished us in unseen ways, body mind and spirit. The piano reset the rhythm in our household and the music in our lives. This fall just like every other fall, I think of walnuts and a piano and how that came to be such an indelible memory in my life.

 

Patricia Cockerill - October 2013