A Pagan Ritual Prayer Book (27 page)

Maple trees:

• The geese are flying
  

  over the maples,
  

   
  

  which I wish to praise.
  

   
  

The God and Goddess:

• The apples which fall like the rain which they drank, like the cider that will pour out when their slurry is pressed,
  

  would not have been possible without the Goddess, Queen of Bees and Flowers.
  

   
  

  And none of this would have been possible without the God, King of Seeds and Trees.
  

   
  

  When I drink the cider that is the blood of life of the apples from which it is pressed out,
  

   
  

  it is the gift of the Goddess and the God that I drink:
  

   
  

  their gift, poured out.
  

   
  

• The doors to winter open, for chill winds to blow through:
  

  they are the doors through which the dead pass, from this world and returning to it this night.
  

   
  

• End over end in the growing darkness it spins,
  

  with no light to flash from its whetted edge.
  

   
  

  With no light to flash from its whetted edge,
  

   
  

  it comes as a surprise,
  

   
  

  out of darkness, it comes unseen;
  

   
  

  it comes in silence, it comes unheard,
  

   
  

  until with a thud,
  

   
  

  until with a thud it hits our breasts,
  

   
  

  and transfixes the summer hearts we had not believed could die.
  

   
  

  With hardly a hiss of resistance, the sickle of harvest cuts away our most beloved moments of past warmth.
  

   
  

  From the harvest of grain, it comes to the harvest of souls.
  

   
  

  Its silent coming pulls from us a sudden cry, and we mourn.
  

   
  

  For the death of the year, we mourn.
  

   
  

  For the death of the grain, we mourn.
  

   
  

  For the death of the light, we mourn.
  

   
  

  And we are shocked to learn that we mourn for ourselves:
  

   
  

  we mourn for all our losses:
  

   
  

  we mourn for every love that has passed away,
  

   
  

  we mourn for every love that never was,
  

   
  

  we mourn for every loss we have ever known,
  

   
  

  we mourn for losses yet to be,
  

   
  

  we mourn for all we have yet to lose,
  

   
  

  we mourn for all dreams we will never realize,
  

   
  

  we mourn for the little deaths we have known,
  

   
  

  we mourn for the little ones to come,
  

   
  

  and we mourn for the great one, which will come at the end.
  

   
  

  If there is no one who will mourn that passing, all will still be well,
  

   
  

  for tonight we will have mourned in anticipation.
  

   
  

  Tonight we will have mourned our own deaths,
  

   
  

  we will have mourned the death of all who mourn here with us,
  

   
  

  we will have mourned the deaths of all who die,
  

   
  

  we will have mourned the deaths even of those who die unmourned.
  

   
  

  We honor these deaths with our mourning,
  

   
  

  which comes in the darkness through which Samhain's sickle flies,
  

   
  

  which sounds through the thud of our shock at its arrival,
  

   
  

  which rings out in the silence of its cutting,
  

   
  

  which is heard after it is silent again,
  

   
  

  which is the eternal mourning of eternal, unavoidable loss.
  

   
  

  We mourn for all deaths.
  

   
  

  We mourn.
  

   
  

• As our beginnings are in the Ancestors,
  

  so the beginning of the year is with this Samhain.
  

   
  

  As we welcome the new year at Samhain,
  

   
  

  we welcome the Ancestors.
  

   
  

  We invite you to us on this Samhain night,
  

   
  

  this year's beginning,
  

   
  

  that year's end,
  

   
  

  to join us at our table, Blessed Dead,
  

   
  

  source of our beginning,
  

   
  

  promise of our end.
  

   
  

• We welcome you, the Honored Dead,
  

  whose lives, now over, led to ours:
  

   
  

  Welcome and greetings for those gathered here.
  

   
  

• Come to us, Spirits of the Dead;
  

  Be honored by our rites,
  

   
  

  Be pleased with our offerings.
  

   
  

  We invite the dead to join with us around the hearth:
  

   
  

  We're one family, so it's their hearth too.
  

   
  

  Honored Dead, welcome.
  

   
  

• Is it cold where you dwell, Honored Dead?
  

  Cold like that I feel when I think of joining you,
  

   
  

  of joining you, of joining you, on this cold night?
  

   
  

  Cold like that I feel when I think of you joining me,
  

   
  

  of joining me, of joining me, on this cold night?
  

   
  

  Or do you feast in the warm well-lit halls of the Lords of the Dead?
  

   
  

  Do you travel through meadowy plains in festival clothes, singing merry songs?
  

   
  

  And does the cold touch you, too, when you think of joining us,
  

   
  

  of joining us, of joining us, on this cold night?
  

   
  

  When we call you to leave that warm and meadowy world do you hesitate,
  

   
  

  as we would hesitate to answer
  your
  call?
  

   
  

  Our hall is well-appointed, our feast well-spread,
  

   
  

  showing shame to neither host nor guest.
  

   
  

  We invite you to it: join us, join us, join us.
  

   
  

  Together we will warm this cold night.
  

   
  

• This cold, dark night is made colder and darker by the dead who gather around us.
  

  May they grow brighter, grow warmer, through this offering,
  

   
  

  may they lap at this milk and be filled with life for the time of this ritual
  

   
  

  so that they will hear the stories of them that we will tell.
  

   
  

• Tonight the world turns topsy-turvy,
  

  and children in costumes,
  

   
  

  hidden behind masks,
  

   
  

  roam through the darkness asking for treats.
  

   
  

  May you, all you Numinous Ones,
  

   
  

  be as open-handed in the coming year as I am tonight
  

   
  

  to these spirits of misrule ringing my doorbell and asking me to give.
  

   
  

• Here we are, gathered on this wonderful holiday, among family and friends,
  

  and all we can think is “thank you.”
  

   
  

  Thank you to all those whose presence made this celebration possible,
  

   
  

  and gratitude most of all to the Shining Ones,
  

   
  

  whom we will continually praise.
  

   
  

• Keep safe in your womb this winter wheat, Mother Earth;
  

  may the cold which kills so much else be a catalyst for its growth.
  

   
  

• Facing the winter
  

  with fear, with trepidation,
  

   
  

  this time of cruel ice,
  

   
  

  we will trust the Gods
  

   
  

  and the mighty Ancestors;
  

   
  

  we will sing in the darkness,
  

   
  

  we will dance in the cold,
  

   
  

  and all will be well.
  

   
  

• As winter closes in,
  

  I will fight the coming cold,
  

   
  

  the coming dark,
  

   
  

  the death around me.
  

   
  

  I will fight for life.
  

   
  

  And when I fail, as I will,
  

   
  

  may it be with grace.
  

   
  

  Summer deities,
  

   
  

  spirits of growth and life,
  

   
  

  stand by me in my struggle.
  

   
  

  Winter deities,
  

   
  

  spirits of the hard and the dead,
  

   
  

  be good winners.
  

   
  

  Teach, don't punish me,
  

   
  

  who has only fought for what I love.
  

   
  

Orion:

• Bold Orion on the rise,
  

  see the summer fall before you:
  

   
  

  guard us in the growing dark.
  

   
  

Sun:

• Though even at noon you are low in the winter sky, your glory is worthy of praise,
  

  and so my prayer.
  

   
  

• The safely contained fire on the hearth is a herald in winter's cold of the power of the summer's sun, which will be the outside hearth of the sky.
  

  The herald has arrived, if not the One who sent it.
  

   
  

  On this midwinter's night, we are here to acknowledge the message of hope,
  

   
  

  but also to praise and offer to the herald itself, whose glorious friendship is itself worth this prayer.
  

   
  

• Each candle we light is a star.
  

  Let us light as many as we can, and spend time among the stars we've created on Earth.
  

   
  

  Let us know that their twinkling is them smiling, because they know a secret:
  

   
  

  the Sun will be coming back, and not only returning, but strengthening,
  

   
  

  from this day through many,
  

   
  

  from this darkest of nights.
  

   
  

  On Yule, let us laugh with the stars at our fear of eternal darkness,
  

   
  

  laugh with these earthly stars we've lit.