Samhain Ritual 1999

@ Lady Therese 1999

Cleanse the circle area with your besom (broom).

Cast the circle.
First with Sword or Staff
Secondly with Salt Water
Thirdly with Incense

Have everyone ground and center themselves (Use a short tree connection)

Bless and welcome all. (have all visiting HP/HPS walk the circle while placing oil on the foreheads of the guest, saying nothing--each HP/HPS has there own oil bottle)

HPS:
I ask the blessings of the Wise-men, wise-women, Holy Ones of all generations and those witches who have gone before us. The Priest and Priestesses who have walked this path before. Send forth the strength and energy as we tread this path between the veils that no soul be harmed, may no one be treated without respect on this night of nights.
Blessings upon those who walk the spirals of the maze.
May your wisdom lead us.
May the great work of this night be guided by the Source of all Mystery.
Blessed Be

HP:
Once again we meet to turn the wheel. It is the festival of Samhain, the eighth and final spoke of the wheel. On this night, we perceive that the boundaries between the worlds are thin, less defined. The souls of either realm might look beyond the veil and glimpse the other side and perhaps pass through. Our Lord Sun has become the Lord of Shadows. The days grow shorter, the nights cooler. The Cosmos tonight provides a mirror of your soul, reflecting the cycles of your life that you create. On this night of darkness, look to the mystery of the season to release that which has been completed. Look at and acknowledge that which has come to an ending within your own life and bid it a final farewell. Even though this may bring you pain, it must be done. This is the Scorpio part of the year. it is the trial of death and rebirth or the dissolution of vain pleasure and revenge. It is at this point in life that the seeker must choose the sting of the scorpion, the mud of the gray lizard or the wide, clean, vision of the eagle.

HPS:
Samhain is a night for divination, the past, present and future merge. For those of you who have not been here to share our holiday before, I will explain something of Samhain. Halloween, called Samhain by the ancient Celts, and Hallowmass by the early Christians, represented the final harvest of the year for the ancient people. A time when all of their food was stored for the coming winter, a time of abundance and plenty, a time to give thanks to their deities.

East (water)
We the Witches of old call the Watchtowers of the East, the powers of water. The tides of the ocean, where all life began, the rivers and streams that feed and nourish the Earth. Thou art the dark sea from which all life comes and unto which all life returns. We call you now to aid us in our rites.
So Mote It Be.

South (air)
We the Witches of old call of the Watchtowers of the South, the powers of air. The gentle breezes that soften winters chill and the cleansing force of the gale winds. Oh, Ye of the Southern wind, place of storms and breath of life. We call you now to aid us in our rites.
So Mote It Be.

West (fire)
We the Witches of old call of the Watchtowers of the West, the powers of fire. Cauldron of burning light, fill the night. The spark of lust which leads to all Creation, Ignite the dark, while amidst the ancient stones we stand. We call you now to aid us in our rites.
So Mote It Be.

North (Earth)
We the Witches of old call of the Watchtowers of the North, the powers of earth. The womb of the Mother, dark protector of the seed. Guard ye well the dormant seed, wrap all that lives in restful sleep. We call you now to aid us in our rites.
So Mote It Be.

(Evoke the God and Goddess)
(Light the God and Goddess candles)

HPS:
Charge of the Crone
Hear the words of the dark Goddess who stands within the crossroads, whose torch illuminates the Unknown:

I am the Queen of Transformation and the Dark of the Moon, hidden in the deepest night. I am the mystery of the Underworld and the wisdom that coils about your heart in the time of your trials.
I am the soul of nature that gives form to the universe; it is I who await you at the end of the Spiral Dance. Most ancient among Goddesses, let my worship be within the heart that has truly tasted life, for behold all acts of craft and art are my pleasure and my greatest ritual is love itself.

Therefore, let there be beauty in your strength, compassion in your wrath, power in your tolerance, and discipline balanced through mirth and reverence.
You who seek to see me and seek to behold my true face shall know that all your searching and efforts will one day come to an end. For the mystery shall be unveiled. Look no further than within yourself in order to look into my eyes.
Behold!
At the end of the Spiral you shall cease to imagine and come to know.
Blessed be.

HP:
Charge of the God
I am the radiant King of the Heavens, flooding the Earth with warmth and encouraging the hidden seed of creation to burst forth into manifestation. I light my shining spear to light the lives of all beings and daily pour forth my gold upon the Earth, putting to flight the powers of darkness.
I am the master of the beasts wild and free. I run with the swift stag and soar as a sacred falcon against the shimmering sky. The ancient woods and wild places emanate my powers, and the birds of the air sing my sanctity.
I am also the last harvest, offering up grain and fruits beneath the sickle of time so all may be nourished. For without planting there can be no harvest; without winter, no spring. Worship me as the thousand-named Sun of creation, the spirit of the horned stag in the wild, the running wolf, the endless harvest. See in the yearly cycle of festivals my birth, death, and rebirth --- and know that such is the destiny of all creation.
I am the spark of life, the radiant Sun, the giver of peace and rest, and I send my rays of blessings to warm the hearts and strengthen the minds of all.
Blessed Be

Dark Lord: (older man steps forward to speak)

And as does the cycle of the Moon ever begin to wax and wane and to grow forth again, as do the seasons from one to the next flow in smooth rhythm...so will my children know their own pattern in both worlds.
On this eve of Samhain we have come to honor those that have passed beyond the veil. The Moon must decline, darken, and die. Beyond life are the realms of shadow; the journeys unknown and the visions undreamed. For the soul seeks its own level, rests, and gains a time and a place to be reborn. Now here the story of birth and death.

I remember those days when our people first heard of the strange invaders who had come to the Lion Island so long protected by its distance, it's cliffs and it's sea. Invaders had come before. In time they went away again and we continued our lives as they had been in the times of our long fathers.

Ours lives flowed on within the spiral of the year. Spring we brought to the fields with dance, song and the love of lad for lass. And winter brought we to the land that seeds might sleep and stags might raise their mighty antlers over the high lonely hills. Upon the night between the moons long, did we lead our people to the hollow hills.

I remember how the flames of the tiny lamps we carry would flicker although within the hill there was no wind. I remember how I thought I saw the flames reflected in the empty eye holes of the skulls set in hollows in the walls. We bow our respect to them when we enter. We summon the winds of the world to honor them, we call our Gods and Goddesses and we cut the veil which from year-birth to year-end has sundered us from them. We sit and close our eyes and listen, listen, listen. And in soft whispers they would tell us of what might bode and who may live...and not. Names they give us for those to enter life and praise for those whose day will come. Then we thank them and seal the door and leave them till the wheel comes round once more.

I remember though those years have passed far beyond the memories of nations -- and nations strong and mighty in that time have also faded and grown into stories fit only to frighten children.

But there came a year when those who dreamed strange dreams and saw strange signs above them in the skies came to Albion and brought their news of a new God and a new order to the high rules of the land. They said that their way was now the only way. They said that kings must bow to their dead God or they would fall before his march to own the Earth. They taught the kings to murder and to kill for differences of thought or word. And we, we took our sheep and looms and walked into our further hills. A foot, a mile, a stead we moved. For we were not aminded to be one with them nor to follow their strange God they carried nailed upon a tree.

And when the year rolled round and the dark began to fall, the Dree declared year-end was nigh. Where were our barrows and the heads of those long fathers of our clan who came to us upon the night which stands between the years? And I, I was the last of the old women of the path. Dead my sister, lost in the long miles wed run from the swords and horses of the new god's priest.

I looked back to where the warm lands steamed and boiled with the tall and strange followers of new beliefs. Long miles and long weeks of walking lay between me and the hollow hills of my clan. Never again might I seek the dark eye holes of my grandmothers, never more would I look upon their dry bones. We had left them there in the low lands to barrows sealed and dark. What would we do without their words and thoughts and wisdom?

My people cried and tore their cloaks. "We could have brought them with us," they said. "Why did you let us leave them? They wouldn't have slowed us much." How could I tell my children that the old ones couldn't leave their dark and holy caves. Had we tried to lift their skulls the sun and air would crumble them.

There's one more night before the year-turn I shall wrap me in my cows skin and I will dream for us. I shall dream the hollow hills and the long mothers heads upon their shelves. And I shall ask them to tell me what our people should do. In my dreams I left the high lands and fast my mind flew across the land and to the door within the hollow hill.

There I sat up wrapped tightly within my cow skin and made my bow to the ancients sitting there upon the shelves. "What shall we do?" I cried to them, "We have lost this land and ne'er may we return to visit you here on Samhain's eve."

Soft they spoke to me and soft their words followed me far across the hills and high into the North land we flew. Back into my cold stiff flesh I came back and round me sat the clan awaiting for what word I might bring. And I sat up and cackled and I smiled and I told them to untie the skin and to help me up. And from a child I took a round smooth turnip. Grown in the soft lands, it was, so large the center had hollowed of its self. And I took my knife from my belt and carved into it eye holes, a nose; a wide and smiling mouth. And I set within it the last of the tiny lamps we once had carried into the hollow hills.

The sun set upon the day without a date and all around the poor cold camp of the clan shown the eyes and smiles of the long fathers and long mothers. Through the years out of reckoning still I see my children on that night lighting up the skulls of the old ones. See, there beside that house; there's my skull with candle set within. Watch I'll keep this night for you and, if you bow in honor of the old ones, I'll tell you of the year to come. Of the birth of Arthur and of Nimue. Of who must die that life may always change, yet be always of the same sort and kind.

HPS:
Now we will enjoy the Myth of the descent of Persephone.