RCG-I Seasonal Salon Spring Equinox 2006
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Spring Equinox 2006 Salon Home Page Beautiful Mother, Immense and Varied Sacred Places, Sacred Journeys |
Beautiful Mother, Immense and VariedDebby ZygielbaumWe have a beautiful mother Let me talk to you from a different perspective. I live on the temperate western edge of the North American continent. Here, it does not rain in the summer. Here, we drowse in the dry summer heat, waiting for the fall rains. Welcome to the Mediterranean climate. It is in the summer that plants are dormant here not the winter. The bright, burgeoning growth happens in spring. At Hallows, the rains begin. If we are lucky, we will get rains into May so we will have enough water to last the summer into fall. My chosen religion glorifies instead the climate of the ancient northern Celts where it is cold and dark in the winter, temperate and rainy in the summer. Where there are distinct seasons bookended by Solstices and Equinoxes and divided by cross quarter days. We are an international group there are many of us scattered over many regions and climes. Yet here I attend a Summer Solstice ritual glorifying bright green growth and wet fecundity while the dusty plants outside wither in the furnace of the sun. I once met a witch in Queensland, Australia who celebrated the Sabbats and cross quarters with the Northern Hemisphere regardless of the opposite reality of the Southern Hemisphere. This paradox, this disconnect is not just limited to our spiritual and religious practices. It is a symptom of a wider problem our society and culture are no longer tied to the land. In the space of sixty years we have gone from an agrarian to an urban society and all that knowledge of the land that agriculture has been lost. How will we ever re-learn, re-connect? The roots of my chosen religion are as ancient as agriculture and agriculture is the very root of our civilization. This is what gives the mystery, the mystique, the draw to Wicca. The old voices calling, the ancient entreaty to the seasons to ensure a bountiful harvest, the deep knowledge of growing things, of place, the joy born from the strong love of the land well stewarded. I am a Wiccan because I love the land, because I am Called back to the land. We as pagans, Wiccans, witches and goddess womyn love the land but, often, we do not live with the land. We imagine a deity outside of ourselves, above the earth, Judeo-Christian in our concept of divine. Whats in a name? God becomes Goddess and we are satisfied. We live our lives in a way that imagines the wild outside of ourselves, out there beyond the pavement, Judeo-Christian in our concept of nature. We work our magick in a way that imagines the mystery outside of ourselves, out there beyond our kenning, Judeo-Christian in our concept of prayer. In the same way, our rituals have become disconnected, not varying from place to place, climate to climate. Regardless of where we are, we celebrate summer as if it were a return to life. We worship winter as a time of quiet and peace and death. We forget that at the same time we worship the return of the sun in the north, others in the south are singing her to sleep for winter. We might as well be the Catholic Church whose rituals are made for the indoor glory of an external God and stored in the sacristy. Magick, deep magick, comes from a sense of place, of rootedness, of belonging, of knowledge and connection. Goddess, the divine, is created in the very movement of the living, the energetic rhythms of life even among the asphalt and concrete, She is there. Our rituals should celebrate this movement, dance to this rhythm, move to this reality. The Goddess and Her worship are found in the dance of life, the dormant seed, the unfurling leaf, the changing seasons. Once, my life was indelibly stamped with the subdued, fragrant hues of the coastal sage scrub and chaparral of the southern California landscape. And now, in northern California, stately sleeping oaks and verdant hillsides haunt my winter days. My summer dreams are full of dry golden grasses hiding Mariposa lilies. The land is more than a concept for me; it is my life, my magick and my religion. To know Goddess, to truly celebrate the land, we must know the climate we live in, the creatures, the plants and animals, that inhabit that space. Our rituals must change from place to place, climate to climate. We must reconnect. And in reconnecting in our spiritual spaces, we will begin to reconnect in our physical lives as well. End Note What can you do (to reconnect in the physical world)? Buy local, buy organic, support local economies. Support your local farmers market, join a CSA. Think about the energy it takes to get a resource to you. Buy fruit and vegetables in season. Grow your own food (even if it is a pot on your windowsill.) Reduce your use of resources, whatever those may be. Get off the grid; install solar, wind, whatever, if you can. Drive less; get rid of your car or buy a hybrid if you can. Recycle what you can. If you are an urbanite, learn about agriculture and farming; you might be surprised. Agriculture is an ancient art that harkened the dawn of civilization. It is our blessing and our curse. Realize that farmland is much more valuable than houses. For example, winegrape farming has saved the Napa Valley from looking like Silicon Valley (if you don't get the analogy, think green, open space with a protected watershed versus miles and miles of urban development.) Realize that the run off from urban development (NOT farmland) is the greatest cause of pollution to our waterways! Learn your geography; know what is really going on in the rest of the world and know your place in it. We, as a nation, have been oblivious too long. Start here: http://www.zmag.org/bios/homepage.cfm?authorID=90 Learn your local environment; know your native plants and animals. Know what are invasive weeds. We protect what we know. And finally, realize that no matter what you do, our earth might still be irrevocably changed. References
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