Pagan interest thread

[MoonFaceMama]

Hello,

As a pagan who practices alone i sometimes find it difficult to mark the passing of the wheel of the year in a secular society which largely ignores there things (ie, i sometimes forget special days ) I get the feeling there might be others on here who feel the same, or who do remember, and that maybe we could support each other in reminders and suggestions for celebrations...

Personally i tend to mark the seasons in ways that feel appropriate and are informal, i'm not big into ritual (but willing to discuss this with those who are). Now that i have a ds i think i'm more concious of helping him to have structure to his year (when i was little i had this through the church) and am considering joining a local pagan group so that i have a community of support in this, which might, in time, be available to him should he wish to access it.

So...a place to discuss pagan celebrations, ideas etc... Any takers?

I'll do that then happyhome.

That sounds like a lovely equinox. I am very of your apple trees.

MMm am partial to ale myself.

A neighbour has just dropped in a bag of apples from her trees - well, there was a bag of them tied to the door handle when I came home from work.

So I will bring DD out to pick blackberries at the weekend and make a crumble.

Thankful for good neighbours.

How funny, haven't had time to check out this thread yet the dc and I did exactly that this afternoon - pop conkers in pots to see if they grow. Very around here though as all the horse chest nuts hav ethat horrible disease - last year they looked like they were rallying but this year two trees we usually go to have no nuts at all, one has small shrivelled nuts and two have fruited but nothing like they normally do. Usually we fill a whole bag from one tree alone but this year we have a tiny bowlful. So I suggested planting the conkers as a way of trying to offer hope and healing. If they grow we ar ethinking of moving so will take one when we go, and give othe rothers to one of dh's farmer mates to plant on their land.

We also tidied the autumn display in our hall.

I have a bit of a shrine/altar overload and need to get a grip. I have one in the kitchen and one in the hall. Then in our bedroom I have an angel altar where I work for our family, plus a shrine/prayer place. Then I have an altar or something that is connected to our move and one for dh and I. I'm not sure whether to condense this fdown a bit or just work on one thing at a time, or leave everything as it is. It'll work out. Anyway, this is what I will be doing for Mabon: sorting out my sacred space befor elighting a black and whit ecanle to symbolise the balance between light and dark.

I know that dd1 wants to do something as well so will have a think about this, and including dd2 and ds as well.

Ooh, and I've got a new card deck. I already read angel cards and work with angels a lot, and I feel like I want to work more closely with nature spirits, so I have a tree angel deck which is gorgeous.

With regards to Reiki, I'm a Reiki master (allegedly ) and trained with these people.

I love Starhawk and her novel, Fifth Sacred Thing was one of the signposts that led me to the Goddess.

She writes and speaks about mycorhizal fungi as

'Sticky as spiderthread, they snake through the caverns of the soil, holding the archways and boulders in place, wrapping them in a living binding'
and

'the caverns are penetrated by the most delicate, pearly, irridescent tubes of the root hairs of the plants and great trees above. And each gives of its own fragrance, its sweetness, its unique taste.'

I think of the hedgewitch, the Pagan woman, the Priestess, the shaman, the witch, the healer, the Wild Woman, the ordained woman, she who seeks the spiritual, as being part of the Great Web. Each action, each intention, each prayer, each blessing, each healing as the magic snaking through our world, each woman with her own unique signature.

So at equinox I will give thanks, I will ask blessings, I will seek to learn from the past and set out my intentions for the future.

And I will see myself as part of that Great Web, as I am the Goddess and She is Me, and I will think of my sisters on this Earth and here on MN and try to send that connection out to strengthen peace and love, to ask that we are helped to act on our beliefs and stand up for the oppressed and for this planet on which we stand.

Ooh I came over all profound!!

Our celebration will involve food and drink, readings and blessings, candles and incense, creating an altar and a sacred space,giving thanks and looking at how we can improve the harvest, both in the garden and in our lives.

I will dig out the chants, they are mostly from the Reclaiming Tradition, that appeals greatly to me.

Then I'm off to Glastonbury with my beloved neice before she goes back to uni, so much to look forward to this Equinox.

Sleep tight x

Hello fellow pagans or not 'quite sure but by closest approximation pagan interest thread" as we're nearly all a bit unsure'

I consider myself to be a mish mash of Green/Kitchen/Hedge witch, lol, I don't really follow formal rituals, but use everyday things like cooking, gardening, crafts etc for my rituals, and sending my blessings to the Goddess and Gods, and through my weekly meditation.

We're gearing up for the Autumn Equinox in the Moonmother household. After school today we are going to gather fallen leaves, acorns conkers etc to decorate our Equinox display. In my house that equates to a large welsh pottery plate that sits in the middle of my dining room table, and it is decorated for each Equinox or Festival.
On the day after dropping the Dc's off at school I will go for a lovely wander through the local countryside with my dog, giving thanks for the wonderful fruits and berries on the trees, the harvest food that has already been gathered and the wonderful time of year. Back home , I'll probably do some gardening and harvesting of my own.
Dinner will be a special meal, as it always is on these days and I will read the Dc's a story at bedtime that follows the beliefs of the equinox.

Afterwards Dp and I will sit outside for a while , by our fire , surrounded by candles.

Hello Everyone,

Moommother you sound very much like me My path is similar and I try to express and include my beliefs in the way I carry out day to day things. Your Equinox plans sound lovely.

Its interesting to hear about your alters, its not something I have done but feel very inspired, I shall begin to create one in my plans for the Equinox.

Just out of curiosity I was wondering if your families share the same beliefs?

It's nice to meet a like minded soul Happyhome .

My family do not follow my path.

My Dp is a humanist if I had to describe him.

My Dc's will choose which path they wish to follow when old enough to choose. They know of my beliefs, and like all the nature inspired things, but I don't want to force any beliefs of any kind on them.

The rest of my family are Church of England but none apart from my Uncle and Aunt are in any way religious really.

I am open about my beliefs within my close family and friends and none have had a problem with it. Other family and friends don't need to know really, although it's not anything I hide.

Hello,

I'm sticking a twig in here to bookmark my place if i may...
Have to do the tea / bed thing but will be back
Merry Meet!

None of my family or friends have any strong religious beliefs and so its not really a topic that crops up in conversation often - they are vaguely aware of my beliefs and accept them.

I would say that my path is Pantheist with Pagan leanings (or maybe Pagan with Panteist leanings) and that my DH can identify more with Pantheism and is quite open to that side of it however he does class himself as Atheist.
I'm the same with my DS, it will be his choice to follow whatever path he chooses.

hello and welcome moonmother penny

Moonmother your approach sounds very like mine too.

Sadly it upon closer inspection it looks like my conkers are no good. Hollow and shriveled. I suspect they were immature when i collected them.

Earthymama i love the text you quoted. I have a thing for fungi and love that idea of the myc. as "living binding"

Happyhome, my dh does not really share my beliefs. I'd probably call him a humanist too moonmother. But he does love the wheel of the year and happily celebrates with me, and is happy for us to bring ds up with an awareness of my beliefs. I think it's really the energy that i sense in things that he doesn't get.

On that subject we.ve decided to all celebrate together on thurs. I really do have to try and spend am afternoon away from ds to see how he gets on, back to work soon, but i don't want it to be then.

MFM, I'm sure there is a problem with conkers this year, the unseasonal weather has affected their development.conker shortage

Do try to read Earth Path by Starhawk, it's lovely and always has something new to guide, teach and surprise me.

Just a quick post, am supposed to be cooking. I love Starhawk and have her Reclaiming chants CD, and also a really good audio by her that is an introduction to earth-based spirituality. It includes some meditations as well as history and beliefs and is just the thing for when I'm stuck indoors.

Mind you, this afternoon I scared the pants off myself with MR James whilst ironing - can't listen to/read him late at night!

Re conkers, around here it is def. the disease that is the problem - two trees we usually collect from have no fruits at all, it's not that they've fallen early, they just aren't there.

I went to two more conker trees today, neither had any sign of fruit. i'll check out your links when i'm on the computer next earthymama, they look interesting thank you. Phone is a complete pita for things like that!

Well the equinox cake is in the oven. it's a blackberry upside down cake, the recipie was in the paper at the weekend. I couldn't find enough blackberries close to home though so made it up with some apple and pear. And i had to adapt some other things due to a lack of lemons. But i'll make some custard and that will make everything ok! The house is tidy enough to do for tomorrow. So it should be a relaxing, fun day. I hope you all have a lovely day too.

Last night was just lovely here.
The full moon rose as the sun set.

Penny - I love you setting a twig to mark your place :)

Thanks Wukter...yes it is lovely here at the moment too. I love autumn

I've recently bought myself some dowsing rods...any one here dowse? I do have a crystal one on a chain but have never used it. These ones are the copper ones that swing round. Funnily enough the day after i bought them there was a programme on with folks dowsing in a church to find the hidden spring it was built on (hidden meaning of churches series - fascinating stuff even for a pagan )...

Hello,

Funny but my non-believing dh and I have just had abig talk abut clearing things away and making a new start and breaking away...have changed plans to a ritual of releasing the old and welcoming the new tonight. Very emotional and a bit right now.

(Penny, I dowse, but for guidance mostly)

Why so sad spiritmum? Will these be big or small changes? Sorry, i obviously don't know your history.

I think it's about now that we begin to see the dying days of the year (or the build up to Christmas i suppose) - Autumn is a time for reflection.

Hello...can I join in?

I've been Pagan for nearly 20 years and, if I had to categorise myself, it would be as a kitchen witch. We have an altar in the living room, but we don't tend towards ceremony or ritual.

I do try to mark the wheel, but pressures of life have taken over at the moment - I've just 'missed' the equinox....

Anyway, I'll stop rambling on - it's good to 'meet' you!

D.

I too have been clearing and tidying generally around the house for the past week, including today! That wasn't in my festival plans

Sad to hear some of you are having problems with conkers- we have an abundance here this year. Dc's are coming home from school with loads in their bags each day.

I have a big glass bowl that we fill each year and we've already nearly reached the top.

I hope everyone enjoys the Equinox today.

Hello everyone,

No conkers here either

Penny I'm interested to hear about your dowsing as its something I've been thinking about doing for a while. The reason being is that we seem to have an abundance of frogs in our garden!!! There is however no visable source of water, the garden has been neglected for many years (not by us, the previous owner was an elderly gent who couldn't access it). Infact while we were planting our apple tree we were being watched by a little frog!

I hope you are all having a fruitful day!

Welcome ishtar and don't worry, the equinox is today this year! Bit later than often i know. So take yourself for a walk and pour yourself a glass of something to toast a welcome to the coming dark, and a farewell to the fading light.

Are you ok spiritmum?

We've been for a walk this morning to collect greenary which now crowns our green man. Off for another walk shortly to get brambles.

We've already had some cake, oh happy day! There,s more for pud later, have made some custard, yum! And we've prepped a dish of all things delish from the garden, courgettes, toms, chillis and little leeks. We'll stick it in the oven with halloumi when we get back, there,s bread rising to go with it. And the fire is laid for later on...though at the moment the sun is beaming down.

Have to dash, back later.

Penny and MFM, thank you, I will be okay if not at the moment. Too much back history and pain which dh and I usually pretend doesn't exist - however am hopeful that now we're suddenly talking things will move in the right direction. So but also relieved.

I forgot to say, on our Autumn display we have a figure of a sleeping hare, curled round like a full moon. I'd put her in a shallow brass candle dish, and without me noticing the dc have made her a lovely soft bed of leaves and feathers.

Anyway, I thought I'd share this with you if you can get to the last of the blackberries:

Blackberry brandy.

12oz blackberries
1 pint good brandy
6oz caster sugar.

Put the blackberries in a large jar and squash them a bit. Add the brandy. Cover and leave for 48 hrs hen strain through a muslin-lined sieve. Now pour back into the jar and add the sugar and stir until dissolved. Leave for 1 month. Bottle and cork it and leave for 3 months to mature.

Yum! You can also use summer fruits such as raspberries.

This recipe actually won me second prize in our village show. It did, you know!

Oh, and it has rained here all day. No long walk for me sadly.

My thoughts are with you Spiritmum.
Blackberry brandy sounds yummy, I picked the last of our blackberries to make a crumble but have a glut of autumn raspberries so may have to give it a go this weekend!

It was lovely and sunny this morning but put my walk off untill I had caught up on my work - its rain and thunder here now too so no long walk for me either.