Thoughts for the season...

Interfaith generally refers to interaction between faiths, but it is as important or perhaps more so to speak to the mainstream world too. In my expression of druidry in the community I've been asked to write a few short pieces for my local weekly newspaper "The Gazette", in the form of 'thoughts for the week'. These form a part of a larger Interfaith initiative, whereby different faith groups are asked to contribute pieces in turn. As a Pagan Druid, I have so far been offered dates which align with the tradition.

Writing these small articles offers different challenges to writing these pages - people reading these web pages already have some idea of what we're about... readers of a weekly newspaper have little understanding of our spirituality, nor consider any spirituality at all often. And I only have 250 words to get the ideas across. Almost Paganism 101 in brief! Anyway, here they are, uploaded as I write them... I hope you enjoy them, and if you choose and are in Membership, do discuss them in the Interfaith Gathering.

"Thought for the Week" - for Thursday 18th June 2009ce -=- SUMMER SOLSTICE

This weekend is the Summer Solstice; one of the major events in the Druid year, and for all folk who follow a Nature or Earth-based spiritual path. The tabloids will no doubt focus on those partying through the night at Stonehenge before they watch the rising Sun. The circle will be filled with colourful characters, jugglers and drummers, happy painted faces and energetic dancers. Somewhere in the crowds there will be Druids in formal robes holding a ritual to witness the Sunrise.

Many more Druids however will avoid the noise and crowds of Stonehenge and seek out the quiet places; woodland, river, hill and sea. Finding a sacred spiritual connection within the environment we will celebrate in ritual with friends or in solitary meditation. Our ancestors marked the longest day, and whether they viewed the Sun as a god or marked the Solstice in order to more accurately set out the farming year (or both) in marking it they located themselves on the turning wheel of the year.

Our modern life can insulate us from the seasons until we forget our relationship. In calendar terms half the year may be gone but a circle has no end, only the ever changing now. So take a moment; plant your feet, smell the sweet air and feel the land about you, and marvel at our wonderful, wonder filled planet. For a while at least, recall that we are an intrinsic part of the sacred song of life. Blessings of the High Sun.

“Thought for the Week” – for Thursday 29th October -=- SAMHAIN

And so once again the wheel of the year turns and we are at Samhain - or Halloween if you choose, full of ghosts and ghouls running from house to house in search of tooth decay… 

Samhain (the word derives from “summers end”) is the Pagan festival that celebrates death and the transition from life to afterlife. You may feel ‘celebrate’ is the wrong word in such a context; our society holds death far away from itself. A taboo subject for many, death is yet something in which we all have a vested interest; something we cannot avoid. Death truly does bring with it the promise of new life, whether you find in those words a spiritual message or the simplicity and complexity of the garden compost. Fear of dying is understandable, but the journey through death itself should where possible be met in full awareness. 

This time of year is when Pagans mark endings and beginnings; the death of the old year and the rebirth at Winter Solstice being an obvious example. We remember and honour those we love who have gone on ahead, giving thanks for their gift of life and their teaching. In meditation we might seek to penetrate the veil which hangs between the realms of life and unlife. And smiling at the children at the door in their scary costumes, we thank the gods for that gift without which there could be no new life. May we each remember our ancestors fondly, and in peace.