The days are getting longer. Depending on where you live, the first little green shoots might be poking up. It’s time to celebrate Imbolc! I’m musing about the many Imbolcs our coven has celebrated, in many different conditions. They are priestessed by the out-going Maiden, Mother, and Crone priestesses. (I wrote about the Crows’ priestess …
Now is the time when the darkness is deepest. The nights are long, and the further north you live, the more intense the difference is. Winter Solstice brings us to the peak of the power of darkness. As pagans, we know that this darkness is holy. Singing at Winter Solstice, we embrace the value of …
I have spent the past 20 years of my musical career in awe of the power that song and chant have to transform a singer, a group of singers, or an audience. I began writing, singing, and performing pagan spiritual song and chant in 2001. The act of integrating a love of singing with my …
Gather your tools and symbols of magic, and journey with me into a spell of cleansing, consecrating and charging. As Witches and Pagans, we circle with our covens and with the Goddess, while our Magical Tools focus and strengthen these rituals. What tools do you use? Wand, athame, pentacle, chalice, besom, divination materials, cauldron, crystals, …
I love the lead-up to Samhain. I can dress as witchy as I want and fit right in with the Muggles celebrating Halloween. As Jon mentioned in his astrololgy post last week, even though most people celebrate Samhain and Halloween on October 31, the actual cross-quarter day is November 6, which is this coming weekend. …
I heard recently that we experience not one but many comings of age. I can’t find the author interview where I heard this, but I was inspired to think about my life at this stage as a coming of age. I have just retired from a career that has been so meaningful a part of …
As we turn toward the darkening year, and the long Summer days give way to the generous ripeness of Autumn’s reach, I feel myself begin to focus my gaze inward, like the trees drawing back their chlorophyl, allowing the rich, hidden colours of the Inner Self to emerge. In witnessing and honouring the festival of …
When it’s time to release a loved one to the Summerland, or heaven, or Valhalla, or wherever you believe we go upon death (if anywhere) perhaps you’ll use my song Web of Wonder in the funeral rite. It’s on the Crow Women’s first album: Crow Goddess. In this post, I’ll tell you the story of …
A Gift of Song Safely curled up in my tent after a wet Autumn festival weekend, I contemplated this: my last evening in the woods, the pre-Samhain introspection of the rituals and workshops, and my connection to my community and to our elders and ancestors. A time for thoughts of rites of passage. Anticipating a …
Summer Solstice. Midsummer. Litha. Alban Heflin. Feast of the Sun. Sonnenwende. Thing-Tide. By whatever name you know it, ’tis the season to celebrate the sun! The Summer Solstice has been celebrated for millennia all over the world. So, chances are, you know at least a bit about it. But how much do you really know? …
